The Five Most Badass ‘I Voted’ Sticker Winners
Kids draw the darndest things
You know those little stickers they hand out at polling locations after you drop your ballot? They kick ass, right? Like, to the point that it’s kind of disappointing when it falls out of the mail-in ballot envelope because you know you can’t wear it for three more weeks without looking like an asshole.
It turns out they’re actually serious incentives for rocking the vote, because people are more likely to vote when they know others have (and also, how often do adults get free stickers?), so several states have decided to have fun with it by commissioning unhinged designs from the most unhinged population: children. The results are nothing short of face-melting.
Michigan’s Rage Wolf
In 2024, Michigan’s sticker contest went viral after the state’s residents chose an image of a wolf ripping off his muscle tank and howling skyward in front of an American flag, because obviously. The image was doodled by a 12-year-old girl from the small town of Grosse Pointe Farms while she watched National Treasure in social studies class, so it was clearly Nicholas Cage-inspired.
New York’s Deranged Spider Head
Remember in Toy Story, when Sid makes a baby-doll-head-spider that would be sweet as hell if we didn’t know toys have feelings? Also, remember Barrel, the skull-faced member of Boogie’s Boys in The Nightmare Before Christmas? Smush ‘em together and add a touch of madness, and you get the 2022 winner of New York’s contest, designed by a 14-year-old boy in Ulster County. “It makes people on both sides of the aisle feel like, yep, this is what voting is like,” said the commissioner of the county board of elections, who seems like she could do something about that.
Kentucky’s Lizard Man
Not to pit children against each other, even though we’re technically doing exactly that, but the runner-up of Kentucky’s 2024 contest, a jacked lizard man with far too many teeth and an expression that suggests what we’re voting on is who he gets to eat designed by a boy named Cash, was robbed. One former candidate for the Kentucky House of Representatives even suggested “giv(ing) the lizard man stickers to members of the legislature every time they vote.” But sure, the horsey is nice, too.
South Dakota’s Spaghetti Western Eagle
Most of the designs by children are silly, but South Dakota’s grade 9-12 winner is just heavy. It depicts, in starkly shaded black and white, an eagle flying over a craggy desert landscape (presumably South Dakota), a mountainous stump rising in the background. It looks like something a hobbit would have to traverse and also like it should be the cover of a metal album. Obviously, it was designed by a teenage boy.
Indiana’s Buff Bird
It’s time to get weird, because the depiction of Indiana’s state bird in its third-place winner isn’t just goofy or awesome, it’s sexy. Emerging from the sleeve of a T-shirt two sizes too tight is a rippling, bushy arm suggesting the kind of bod that will build you a bookcase and then carry you off to bed, while the neck hole surrounds… a bird head. It’s deeply uncomfortable, but it’s nevertheless very proud of you for voting, giving a fawning thumbs up in a field of corn. How it only came in third is a mystery. Obviously, it was designed by a teenage girl.
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