Many hands make light work.
August 14, 2024 8:07 PM Subscribe
Harris campaign reports record-breaking volunteer surge in key swing states. Harris' campaign is transforming big crowds into volunteers on the ground in key swing states. Surge of volunteers makes Harris team bullish on Florida, where GOP still has tight grip. There's a lot of work to do. It can feel good to join in, even if you only have a little bit of time or energy or money to bring to the party.
Postcards make a difference (2018). Postcards make a difference (2021). Handwritten letters make a difference. (Vote Forward)
There are so many ways to join in. Help voters with Voter ID laws (Vote Riders). Turn inactive environmentalists and transform them into consistent voters (Environmental Voter Project). Register Democratic voters (Field Team 6).
Mobilize.us lets you find all kinds of ways to participate: Get Out the Vote. Canvass. Knock doors. Text bank. Phone bank. Play bingo!
Short on time, but found a $20 on the sidewalk? New MeFite A Most Curious Rabbit has you covered:
Want to make a big difference in the smaller races? Outstanding MeFite migurski can help:
Got questions? The magnificent MeFi hive mind has answers!
Some recent AskMes:
How to help get out the vote for Harris?
I am neurodivergent and want to get out the vote, but...
Helping with GOTV
orgs working both to register dem-leaning voters AND to find/inform/re-enfranchise dem-leaning voters who may have been scrubbed from the rolls
If you had two months to help, how, where, and when would you spend it?
Best Biden/Harris org to throw last money at?
Help me donate money
And a few from 2020:
Texting to GOTV - how does it work? How best to do it?
living in a blue state, helping GOTV in swing states
Many of us are new to all this. Whether you're just thinking about testing the waters or a long-time activist, please share your experiences, your enthusiasms, your favorite organizations, your favorite activities. Fill in all the stuff I missed!
Gratitude and encouragement to everyone who's helped foster a healthy political community - in the USA or anywhere. Mutual appreciation and encouragement begins ... NOW!
Postcards make a difference (2018). Postcards make a difference (2021). Handwritten letters make a difference. (Vote Forward)
There are so many ways to join in. Help voters with Voter ID laws (Vote Riders). Turn inactive environmentalists and transform them into consistent voters (Environmental Voter Project). Register Democratic voters (Field Team 6).
Mobilize.us lets you find all kinds of ways to participate: Get Out the Vote. Canvass. Knock doors. Text bank. Phone bank. Play bingo!
Short on time, but found a $20 on the sidewalk? New MeFite A Most Curious Rabbit has you covered:
I sometimes work with political campaigns ... I guarantee your $10 or whatever you donate totally matters and will get put to good use, and may even help make some small but useful measure possible when it wasn't before.Need help voting, or want good resources to help others vote? Awesome MeFite ALeaflikeStructure put together a fantastic MetaFilter Wiki page on voting (announced at New Wiki Post for USA Voting Support ), tips on how to register and vote, plus LOTS of awesome links to great organizations working to GOTV (Get Out The Vote)!
Want to make a big difference in the smaller races? Outstanding MeFite migurski can help:
I’ve started running a Downticket Dems bot on Bluesky (link) and Fedi (link) focused exclusively on D candidates in and near districts that Cook Political Report defines as competitive. Follow and donate!
Got questions? The magnificent MeFi hive mind has answers!
Some recent AskMes:
How to help get out the vote for Harris?
I am neurodivergent and want to get out the vote, but...
Helping with GOTV
orgs working both to register dem-leaning voters AND to find/inform/re-enfranchise dem-leaning voters who may have been scrubbed from the rolls
If you had two months to help, how, where, and when would you spend it?
Best Biden/Harris org to throw last money at?
Help me donate money
And a few from 2020:
Texting to GOTV - how does it work? How best to do it?
living in a blue state, helping GOTV in swing states
Many of us are new to all this. Whether you're just thinking about testing the waters or a long-time activist, please share your experiences, your enthusiasms, your favorite organizations, your favorite activities. Fill in all the stuff I missed!
Gratitude and encouragement to everyone who's helped foster a healthy political community - in the USA or anywhere. Mutual appreciation and encouragement begins ... NOW!
Our local Indivisible organizes postcarding. They work with Sister District and so on to identify campaigns. They out out a call for volunteers, and I fill out a Google form with how many cards I want, and they deliver a package to my house: the right number of blank cards, a printout with the names and addresses, and an instruction sheet with exactly what to write. We sit down and write 'em out, pay for the stamps and mail them out ourselves. The organizers do a tremendous job and I don't have to figure stuff out, I can write GOTV reminders or support for key candidates in important races all over the US.
There are options that are more self-starting but having a local group lead it is really nice. This part of their work isn't particularly local (that's the point of Sister District) but it feels connected to me.
posted by stevil at 8:37 PM on August 14 [3 favorites]
There are options that are more self-starting but having a local group lead it is really nice. This part of their work isn't particularly local (that's the point of Sister District) but it feels connected to me.
posted by stevil at 8:37 PM on August 14 [3 favorites]
(first link is broken by the way - should be this I think - https://www.axios.com/2024/07/26/harris-campaign-volunteers-swing-states
posted by stevil at 8:39 PM on August 14
posted by stevil at 8:39 PM on August 14
HELL YEAH
Thanks for this front-and-center banger of a post, kristi (and all whose info it compiles)! I’m going to do postcards plus this year, and am excited to figure out what the plus will be.
posted by rrrrrrrrrt at 8:48 PM on August 14 [4 favorites]
Thanks for this front-and-center banger of a post, kristi (and all whose info it compiles)! I’m going to do postcards plus this year, and am excited to figure out what the plus will be.
posted by rrrrrrrrrt at 8:48 PM on August 14 [4 favorites]
(stevil, you are right about that link - I've asked the mods if they can fix it. Thank you! and sorry.)
posted by kristi at 8:59 PM on August 14 [1 favorite]
posted by kristi at 8:59 PM on August 14 [1 favorite]
Thanks for this Kristi. I did Vote Forward in 2020 and wrote 100 letters. I even got a note from VF saying one of the people I had written to had written in to let them know she had gone out and voted because of the letter I had written. Just that one response was enough to make the other 99 worth it regardless if the recipients acted on it or not.
posted by grumblemf at 10:41 PM on August 14 [11 favorites]
posted by grumblemf at 10:41 PM on August 14 [11 favorites]
The best volunteers are; Our Youth. May not be able to vote, but will swing the votes with their enthusiasm for a better future. Wish, I was enrolled in a Political Science Class this semester...all the extra credit between now and November by volunteering & attending the rallies. Ps, do not forget volunteering to get thevote<> out by registering folks to be able to vote in November.
posted by thomcatspike at 11:28 PM on August 14 [1 favorite]
posted by thomcatspike at 11:28 PM on August 14 [1 favorite]
TIME to phone bank...the hardest work as a volunteer. In 1984, One had the yellow pages & the white pages for phone records. My Congressman in his campaign used the voting registrations. As one called by their addresses, door to door.. If a home was skipped in calling. Then sent a representative in person to register them to vote, which was of their choice as party, being in California.
posted by thomcatspike at 11:52 PM on August 14
posted by thomcatspike at 11:52 PM on August 14
You know, I’m really trying to fight the optimism but you people are not making it easy.
posted by Phanx at 3:32 AM on August 15 [11 favorites]
posted by Phanx at 3:32 AM on August 15 [11 favorites]
What have you all been up to, friends?
A couple weeks before Biden dropped out, my BFF lamented to me about how she really wanted to Do Something. She still lives near where we grew up, within the same congressional district. I'd just seen someone suggest doing postcard-writing here on the Blue and told her about it, and we made a pact that we would both sign up together.
We didn't actually sign up until Biden DID drop out, but I discovered that "our" congressional district (CT-2) is one being targeted with a specific campaign and so we both signed on to that. (I was briefly concerned that one of the names on my list would be our 7th grade bully, but fortunately no.)
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 4:37 AM on August 15 [3 favorites]
A couple weeks before Biden dropped out, my BFF lamented to me about how she really wanted to Do Something. She still lives near where we grew up, within the same congressional district. I'd just seen someone suggest doing postcard-writing here on the Blue and told her about it, and we made a pact that we would both sign up together.
We didn't actually sign up until Biden DID drop out, but I discovered that "our" congressional district (CT-2) is one being targeted with a specific campaign and so we both signed on to that. (I was briefly concerned that one of the names on my list would be our 7th grade bully, but fortunately no.)
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 4:37 AM on August 15 [3 favorites]
The great candidate switch happened on my vacation, and on the way home I finally developed my first case of Covid. So I had to wait longer than I planned to start volunteering. Last week I wrote 47 postcards and then on Saturday knocked 39 doors. They had me working the bottom of the ticket, this Saturday I'm signed up to knock doors for the top of the ticket. It's all really important. We have a governor candidate who is more unhinged than Trump and a GOP that cheats hard and gets away with it.
My hope is that a big enough blue wave actually swamps their gerrymandered districts, designed to be safe but close wins while as many democratic voters are packed into as few districts as possible. But so far I have seen some activated people, some people who are mad as hell at Trump, some who think Dems have "gone too far," some who just want to opt out of politics, some gay folks who want to protect their families, some racist folks who are angry about a Black woman on the ticket, the whole range.
So I'm skeptical that a big enough wave will push North Carolina closer to fixing our broken system. I feel like if we win, it will be incredibly tight and we'll never break their veto-proof majority in the state house. But I'm game to try.
We asked our 22-year-old son to come into the shop and work on Saturdays so I can go knock doors (we're a family of introverts and I'm the only one willing to go out and volunteer, but they are super supportive). We cancelled all our Saturday morning classes up till the election, it's just too important not to get out there.
posted by rikschell at 4:42 AM on August 15 [12 favorites]
My hope is that a big enough blue wave actually swamps their gerrymandered districts, designed to be safe but close wins while as many democratic voters are packed into as few districts as possible. But so far I have seen some activated people, some people who are mad as hell at Trump, some who think Dems have "gone too far," some who just want to opt out of politics, some gay folks who want to protect their families, some racist folks who are angry about a Black woman on the ticket, the whole range.
So I'm skeptical that a big enough wave will push North Carolina closer to fixing our broken system. I feel like if we win, it will be incredibly tight and we'll never break their veto-proof majority in the state house. But I'm game to try.
We asked our 22-year-old son to come into the shop and work on Saturdays so I can go knock doors (we're a family of introverts and I'm the only one willing to go out and volunteer, but they are super supportive). We cancelled all our Saturday morning classes up till the election, it's just too important not to get out there.
posted by rikschell at 4:42 AM on August 15 [12 favorites]
We’ve got our Harris sign up in the yard (first in our very blue neighborhood thanks to an eagle eye MeFite in a previous thread). My stack of Vote Forward letters is complete (20 to Colorado’s CD3) and I just got done with my first page (25/200) of postcards targeting Dem-leaning infrequent voters in Colorado CD 8, which despite encompassing a good portion of the suburbs from Denver and Boulder is expected to be a near tossup and one of the most competitive House districts nationwide. In 2020 pediatrician Yadira Caraveo won it 48.4%–47.7% and is now defending her seat against an R opponent running soft on crime hits with a ton of outside money behind him.
Given the location of the district and our mail ballots for all approach here in Colorado, I’m hopeful my postcards show up at the right moment to remind people to pull their ballot out of the stack of unopened mail, fill it out and send it in.
posted by deludingmyself at 4:55 AM on August 15 [3 favorites]
Given the location of the district and our mail ballots for all approach here in Colorado, I’m hopeful my postcards show up at the right moment to remind people to pull their ballot out of the stack of unopened mail, fill it out and send it in.
posted by deludingmyself at 4:55 AM on August 15 [3 favorites]
Oh, and if you’re in a swing state and need the cash (or know someone who does; I texted a grad student I know in Wisconsin about this one): PAC sponsored voter outreach paying $125 per completed door knocking list in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina or Wisconsin here.
posted by deludingmyself at 5:01 AM on August 15 [5 favorites]
posted by deludingmyself at 5:01 AM on August 15 [5 favorites]
Also, I am living for the optimism and shared sense of hope, but if you need a healthy dose of anxiety to motivate you, the Economist this morning has the great and terrible update that Kamala has narrowed the race to a 52% chance of winning. Up more than double from a 25% chance in just a few weeks? Yes. Still essentially a coin flip where we need all hands on deck? Also yes.
posted by deludingmyself at 5:25 AM on August 15
posted by deludingmyself at 5:25 AM on August 15
I'm in blue NJ, next to battleground PA. Someone there has donated a rental house for October, and people are signing up for shifts to canvass during the day and crash there at night so we don't have to drive an hour there and back every day. I'm signed up for a week so far.
posted by Brachinus at 5:44 AM on August 15 [7 favorites]
posted by Brachinus at 5:44 AM on August 15 [7 favorites]
Wonderful post, kristi! I live in Ohio, and I've already requested my absentee ballot. Can't wait to help turn this state blue!
posted by hydra77 at 5:55 AM on August 15 [2 favorites]
posted by hydra77 at 5:55 AM on August 15 [2 favorites]
I'm in Florida in what they consider a bellweather county, and I also happen to have been the office manager of the county Democratic Party office (volunteer, I'm otherwise retired) for about the last 4 or 5 years unofficially and officially. The last three weeks have been wild with people calling, emailing and knocking on the door wanting to volunteer and wanting Harris yard signs. We had about 10 additional VOIP phones installed and people are on them constantly calling to get out the vote, right now for the primary next week, but then shifting to the general election. We have one person (not me, thank whomever) pretty much doing nothing else but talking to new volunteers and placing them in whatever volunteer position they can do.
It's incredible how the mood has changed since last month.
posted by lordrunningclam at 6:08 AM on August 15 [12 favorites]
It's incredible how the mood has changed since last month.
posted by lordrunningclam at 6:08 AM on August 15 [12 favorites]
Great post, kristi!
I am organizing Democrats in my area to canvass for local candidates once a week. I also plan to start phone banking twice a week -- one for Harris, and one for our U.S. rep, which is in a swing district.
If you're new to political volunteering, know that there is something for everyone! It doesn't matter whether you are extroverted or introverted, or where you live, or what your schedule is, etc.
Some other ways to help are driving canvassers, doing tech or analytics work, or at the polls.
Many places have shortages of election workers. Those shifts can often make for a long day, but they are often paid. And campaigns and parties also often have poll watchers, or some such.
And phone banking isn't just to persuade or get out the vote. Sometimes calls help people "cure" ballots, I think if there is a problem with absentee ballots.
If you have any questions, I bet somebody here can help answer them!
posted by NotLost at 6:12 AM on August 15 [1 favorite]
I am organizing Democrats in my area to canvass for local candidates once a week. I also plan to start phone banking twice a week -- one for Harris, and one for our U.S. rep, which is in a swing district.
If you're new to political volunteering, know that there is something for everyone! It doesn't matter whether you are extroverted or introverted, or where you live, or what your schedule is, etc.
Some other ways to help are driving canvassers, doing tech or analytics work, or at the polls.
Many places have shortages of election workers. Those shifts can often make for a long day, but they are often paid. And campaigns and parties also often have poll watchers, or some such.
And phone banking isn't just to persuade or get out the vote. Sometimes calls help people "cure" ballots, I think if there is a problem with absentee ballots.
If you have any questions, I bet somebody here can help answer them!
posted by NotLost at 6:12 AM on August 15 [1 favorite]
Very specific ask I just saw on BlueSky: “if you can write in Korean or Vietnamese, Field Team Six is looking for volunteers to write postcards asking folks to register to vote. Get more info by emailing postcards@fieldteam6.org”
posted by deludingmyself at 6:17 AM on August 15 [4 favorites]
posted by deludingmyself at 6:17 AM on August 15 [4 favorites]
This is a terrific post, Kristi; thank you! I'm going to put a link to it on the wiki page, with a note that it has helpful information about what different activities involve, effectiveness data, a list of related threads, and a strong let's-get-going vibe.
posted by ALeaflikeStructure at 6:52 AM on August 15 [4 favorites]
posted by ALeaflikeStructure at 6:52 AM on August 15 [4 favorites]
I wish I could be that gleeful about Harris. I’ll be spending my time writing and calling reps about how she won’t be getting my vote until she demonstrates a stand against funding an ongoing genocide.
posted by iamck at 10:29 AM on August 15 [1 favorite]
posted by iamck at 10:29 AM on August 15 [1 favorite]
i am writing postcards to voters in swing states to remind them to vote. they'll be mailed at the end of october. but i'm wondering, how influential is that messaging really. like, how can anyone be unaware there is an election this year?
posted by misanthropicsarah at 12:54 PM on August 15 [3 favorites]
posted by misanthropicsarah at 12:54 PM on August 15 [3 favorites]
I think the postcards also serve as a kind of reminder? "Please vote" postcards can spur thoughts like: Is my voter registration current?; since I moved, maybe I'm not getting the usual mail-in ballot? I'll check on that; where is the polling place now, given the redistricting?; right, I'll have to arrange for a sitter; how am I going to get to and from the polling place on that day ...
Dates can get the drop on anyone, and a late October mailing allows about a week to sort out a plan for November 5th if needed.
Thank you for writing postcards — it does make a difference.
posted by Iris Gambol at 2:00 PM on August 15 [3 favorites]
Dates can get the drop on anyone, and a late October mailing allows about a week to sort out a plan for November 5th if needed.
Thank you for writing postcards — it does make a difference.
posted by Iris Gambol at 2:00 PM on August 15 [3 favorites]
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I DO NOT HAVE TIME to phone bank this year, but apparently I can't help myself, so I signed up to call voters in Ohio to remind them to request their absentee/vote by mail ballots.
It went great - I got 4 live people and left 35 messages, and I feel good that I helped remind a few folks that now's a good time to go get that ballot.
And for those who haven't seen it, I'm linking once again to my comment from 2021 about how amazing it was to be on a phone banking call with a bunch of teenagers who couldn't wait to change the world.
What have you all been up to, friends? I've seen you mentioning things here and there in some of the politics threads. I want to hear it all!
posted by kristi at 8:11 PM on August 14 [17 favorites]