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Can we change voter perceptions of the Democratic Party at their doors? [1]
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Date: 2025-09-14
For years (decades), i’ve been leading canvasses of all sorts in all kinds of states and districts. I’ve been part of academic or scientific experiments on their effectiveness. For the last four years, i’ve lead Hope Springs from Field PAC [dated website], a grassroots group whose primary purpose is knocking on doors before Labor Day, when most campaigns really kick in their field efforts. Early organizing, but organizing with a real purpose.
Part of my practise as a field organizer has been the extensive use of Issue Surveys and what i call 10/10/10 calls. Issues Surveys are great for Early Organizing because they give volunteers a reason to knock on doors. They are also great for training purposes. They help volunteers get over the jitters of talking to their neighbors about a once-taboo subject (politics) because most voters like being asked about their opinions about the state of the country. Volunteers have even been thanked as they have concluded their visit!
One of the questions that get included in these Issues Questionnaires that Hope Springs volunteers ask voters (in 18 states, this year) is about their opinion of the Democratic Party. Now we are knocking on doors in Swing States, in the most contested areas of those swing states, suburban areas, so they’re not exactly hardcore blue. But even in the most Democratic area we’ve been canvassing, voter positive views of the party has never gotten out of the 20s. In areas in Ohio and Texas, they were 15% and 14%. It’s not exactly a beloved brand.
But here’s the thing: Issue Surveys are not the only kind of voter contact i am relying on here. As part of my practice, i make 10/10/10 calls every Thursday, 10 calls to voters a volunteer talked to that Saturday, calls to 10 of our volunteers and another 10 calls to our organizers. These are completed calls, so i probably dail up 50 or more to make these 30 “calls” (most of our organizers and even some of our volunteers receive texts as their preferred method of communication). But it’s the 10 calls to voters i am relying on here.
Why do we do this? You don’t have to be a field organizer for very long to find a volunteer or two who fudge their data. So it initially began as a check on errant data, but i found that i collected some really valuable information in these Thursday discussions. And i must think it’s really valuable, because i am not a fan of phone calls or meetings (i love our organizers and volunteers who tell me to text them!). But i continue to do it anyway.
When i am talking to voters on Thursdays, i have either viewed their responses in VAN or have it right in front of me. And i noticed that their stated opinions of the Democratic Party on the phone didn’t always match their response when a volunteer was at their door. I started asking voters why, when i perceived a change. And i got an interesting answer — at least to me — which made me start including a question about it when i talked to voters we had just canvassed.
And that was, ‘my opinion of Democrats improved when a volunteer knocked on my door and started listening to me.’ This has been more true of the unaffiliated or independent voters i’ve talked to than those who actually considered themselves Democrats.
I doubt anyone is surprised by this — and certainly no one who has canvassed before. Yet the biggest part of our training before each canvass is to remind voluteers that their purpose in Hope Springs from Field canvasses is to listen not opine. We’ve had volunteers walk away because they were so intent on persuasion — in convincing voters on why they were right instead of listening.
Persuasion has it’s place — after Labor Day, before an election. But, let’s face it, by then, voter’s impressions of our party aren’t going to be changed anyway. But i’ve now heard a variation of ‘my opinion of Democrats improved when a volunteer knocked on my door and started listening to me’ 94 times since Memorial Day (when i started to track this response). So voters might be on to something.
The question is, are we listening? Our model isn’t going to change, Hope Springs volunteers are going to continue to listen to what voters have to say and record their responses. In a sense, we are like those books and articles that get used to train AI (Large Language Models). Our volunteers are doing the grunt work. In 2025, we have knocked on doors in 18 states: Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Kentucky, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia, Wisconsin and, now, California. 138,891 volunteers have knocked on 10,201,911 doors this year with the express purpose of listening to (and recording) what voters have to say.
We knock on doors of Democratic and Independent voters and use a voter-driven approach to guide them through the Issues Survey, the CSR and Incident Reports. We record questions voters raise with a Q(uestion)-slip and record other relevant observations on an Observations form. Q-slips are sent to the relevant Democrat to respond to and Observations are entered into VAN. 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.
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[1] Url:
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