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Returning to the Field. We start knocking in Arizona and DeSantistan (aka Florida) on Saturday! [1]
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Date: 2023-03-02
Volunteers working with Hope Springs from Field PAC have spent the winter helping with GOTV in the Georgia Senate Runoff, the Virginia Senate vacancy (7th District), the 3 special elections in Pennsylvania (PA House District 32; PA House District 34; and PA House District 35) and the primary for the Wisconsin Supreme Court race (which isn't technically a special election but essentially is (plus the stakes are so high). But Saturday inaugurates our primary function for this presidential election cycle: knocking on doors in Senate and Electoral College Swing States with our unique, systemic approach to identifying, motivating and mobilizing Democratic and unaffiliated voters in Arizona and DeSantistan (aka Florida).
And we are excited!
Arizona is obviously a swing state by any consensus but DeSantistan? Can we really consider Florida a Senate or Electoral College Swing State?
I think we can all agree that Florida is leaning Red in both cases, but there are strong reasons for continuing our grassroots work there. First of all, DeSantistan remains a highly transitory state and one that aggressively removes voters from their rolls. Even before Covid-19, red states (measured by counties) like Florida had higher mortality rates than blue states. But the pandemic made things worse in this regard.
While Covid originally effected bluer areas worse than the more isolated, red areas of the country, the mortality rates reversed as time went on. “Counties that went heavily for Donald Trump in the last presidential election are more than twice as likely to die from COVID-19 than those that live in areas that went for President Biden.” It is a terrible reality but one that we should remember when we think about the long-term consequences, especially with regards to organizing for the future. NPR noted that “Political affiliation continues to be the largest predictor of vaccination status” and vaccination status is increasingly a predictor of lifespans. So Florida is not only a state that sees a lot of movement by voters, but is one that is highly affected by these attitudes.
Registering (and re-registering) voters in Senate and Electoral College Swing States is a key mission for Hope Springs from Field.
But, wait, there’s more! DeSantistan has legislated Voting Laws that are intended to hurt Democrats — but only if Democrats don’t do the kind of long-term (Deep Organizing) for which Hope Springs from Field has been mobilizing volunteers since the pandemic started curbing Democratic efforts in field organizing.
Florida is very aggressive about pruning its voter rolls, but since control of voter rolls is through the elected Supervisor of Elections, most red counties have been much more aggressive about it than bluer counties. Republicans actually think this is a “feature.” Now the Obama campaign in 2012 faced these kinds of tactics in Wisconsin during the Gov. Walker reign of terror. And we started including recently purged voters in our walk lists, attempting to confirm the accuracy of the Walker purge lists. Hope Springs from Field has been doing the same, most aggressively in Georgia which not had only the Kemp-Raffensperger voter purges but also a history of voter participation suppression as identified by LSU professor Jhacova Williams. Florida has these counties, as well, where a higher rate of lynchings predicted lower voter registration rates among African-Americans.
But our continued involvement in DeSantistan also stems from a commitment to protect minority communities in Florida from Trumpian efforts in voter suppression and intimidation.
There are two additional factors for our continued organizing in Florida: first of all, Florida is one of more than a dozen states where the 2020 census remap is still being litigated. Two different lawsuits are winding their way through the courts. Alterations in Congressional District lines may present opportunities for Democrats and Hope Springs from Field has been attempting to leverage those opportunities wherever possible.
The other factor is DeSantis himself. The voters that we talked to last year in Central Florida had some interesting feedback that might be useful should the wanna-be-president advance in the Republican primary. In fact, the term “DeSantistan” to describe Florida comes from a voter in Seminole county. Knocking on doors can actually contribute leads to Opposition Research.
Door to Door canvassing is the most effective way to reach voters but it is doubly important now since Democrats didn’t really do in-person canvassing in 2020 — and we seem to have lost a cycle of field organizers who could pass on their knowledge to those who followed. Our own experience knocking on doors in the 2021 Georgia Senate Runoffs and the Senate Swing States last cycle was that many Democrats and Independents felt more confident supporting candidates who sent people out into their neighborhoods asking for their support.
Hope Springs from Field PAC begins knocking on doors again Saturday in a grassroots-led effort to prepare the Electoral Battleground in what has been called the First and Second Rounds of a traditional Five Round Canvass. We are taking those efforts to the doors of Democrats and unaffiliated voters with a systematic approach that reminds them not only that Democrats care, but Democrats are determined to deliver the best government possible to all Americans.
Obviously, we rely on grassroots support, so if you support field/grassroots organizing, voter registration (and follow-up) and our efforts to protect our voters, we would certainly appreciate your support:
https://secure.actblue.com/donate/fistfulofsteel
Hope Springs from Field PAC understands that repeated face to face interactions are critical. And we are among those who believe that Democrats didn’t do as well in the 2020 Congressional races as expected because we didn’t knock on doors — and we didn’t register new voters (while Republicans dud). We are returning to the old school basics: repeated contacts, repeated efforts to remind them of protocols, meeting them were they are. Mentoring those who need it (like first time and newly registered voters). Reminding, reminding, reminding, and then chasing down those voters whose ballots need to be (and can be) cured.
Like our canvasses in the last cycle, we walk with an Issues Questionnaire. Especially early in the cycle, where volunteers aren’t as comfortable with their campaign pitch, the Issues Survey allows for the voter to lead the conversation. Volunteers, then, are more focused on prompts, things that spur more thought and conversation so that we have a fuller picture of what motivates the voter.
We knock on the doors of Democratic and Independent voters. At every door, we leave a piece of “show the flag” lit, something that tells them we were there and hopefully reinforces the Democratic brand. The lit focuses on the things voters told us were important to them last fall, aiming to appeal to every voter. Far and away the number one issue that the voters we talked to in the Senate Swing States was inflation or price increases, and I imagine that concern has only increased since November.
But the main focus of our canvassing right now is the Issues Survey, asking voters for their input and concerns. We find that most voters who aren’t in a hurry or in the middle of something are willing to answer at least a couple of these questions, especially their top issue or concern and their views of President Biden. Voter responses to the questionnaire are entered into VAN and made available to all Democratic candidates who use VAN in the state after the primary. Creating this kind of data isn’t done with a specific goal in mind but has the purpose of engaging voters and creating a dataset that any Democratic candidate can use in opposition to a Republican.
In this way Hope Springs from Field PAC has a hybrid approach. We aren’t interested in competing with regular campaign field organizing. We are in the field before they get there and then move on when the Democratic campaigns start their intensive field work. Indeed, when we wind up the typical field work by Labor Day of 2024, we will encourage all the volunteers working with us to move over to the Senate or presidential campaigns in their states (and hope that our field organizers will be hired on by those campaigns). After Labor Day 2024, we will begin organizing our Election Protection Project like this past cycle.
Of course, voter registration and the Issues Survey is not the only purpose of this Early Organizing. Volunteers also carry Constituent Service Request forms and Incident Reports, if those opportunities are presented at the door. As i’ve mentioned before, this is a very systematic, data-intensive approach that worked well for us in 2022.
By starting early and expanding into more states and Congressional Districts, Hope Springs from Field hopes to talk to even more voters in 2023 than we did in 2022. Last year, volunteers from Hope Springs knocked on 2,984,214 doors of Democrats, Independents and NPAs in Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Nevada, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. We targeted the swing Congressional Districts that grew out of re-districting in the Senate Swing States. And Democrats won 16 out of 18 of those swing congressional districts. We talked to 230,305 voters and 144,029 of them answered questions on the Issues Survey with which we walk every weekend. The valuable data we obtain by asking voters what issues are important to them and how they feel about their elected officials will all be entered into VAN (the Democratic database/voter file) available to all Democrats who use VAN in those states. Hope Springs from Field PAC was involved in the registration of 113,558 voters, and, with our ongoing efforts to ensure voters have the necessary photo identification, we helped 18,478 Georgians get their free Georgia Voter ID cards!
We are eager to do even better this year.
Please join us in this effort to organize early and extend voter contact to an almost year-round degree. Our biggest expenses before getting started at paying for access to VAN and literature.
We can’t do this without help. Hope Springs from Field PAC is trying to reinstitute best field practices, such as canvassing with people who look like the voters we are talking to and targeting former voters thrown off the rolls. A lot of these got forgotten because of the Covid restrictions in the last cycle, and we have an entire cycle of campaign staffers who were trained without the benefit of actually getting to do field. That’s why it is so important to start knocking on doors now, and not wait until a month or so before the primaries. We have a lot of make-up work to do. Can you help?
If you are able to support our efforts to mobilize Democratic voters, especially in minority communities and swing districts, expand the electorate, and believe in grassroots efforts to increase voter participation and election protection, please help:
https://secure.actblue.com/donate/fistfulofsteel
Thank you for your support. This work depends on you!
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