North Carolina here. DON'T GIVE UP ON US, FOLKS! Here in Durham we are working to GOTV nonstop, registering voters, canvassing, early voting, poll greeting. Anyone who wants info for Durham and surrounding areas, to donate, canvass, phonebank, look up your voting info, can find it HERE: https://linktr.ee/Durhamgotv
Twenty-five of NC's 100 counties plus the Eastern Band of Cherokee tribal lands (3 more counties) are subject to the disaster orders but it looks like only 5 county Boards of Election offices are currently closed.
Avery: Closed (Elections staff are working.)
Buncombe: Closed (Elections staff are working.)
Mitchell: Closed
Watauga: Closed (Elections staff are taking calls)
Yancey: Closed
Cynically, just 2 of those 28 counties with an emergency designation is majority Democratic based on 2020 election results:
Buncombe County - Biden won 59.7% <-- This is Asheville and the most populous county in WNC
Wautauga County - Biden won 53.1%
Trump won the rest of the western counties - in some cases with as much as 75% of the vote.
In terms of numbers, most of the population of NC (and most of the Democrats) live in the central "Piedmont" region which includes Charlotte, Raleigh, Durham. Greensboro, etc. The biggest impact here was with temporary power outages, which (unless repeated) will not effect residents' ability to vote.
This is super helpful and matches what Drew Kromer of the Meck Dems told me and Robert Hubbell (we're posting the video of our conversation tomorrow. It's GREAT!)
Thank you so much for the shout out for Donuts+Democracy, Jess! We are so excited by the amazing response from college student organizers - we now have 32 (and counting) schools and colleges in battleground states hosting Donuts+Democracy tables! We just had our first two events at Montana State University and GA tech. Check out these results!!
🍩At MSU, they talked to 300 students in a few hours and registered 50 new voters. (The event had the Democratic candidate for governor Ryan Busse and Lt. Gov. candidate Raph Graybill both showed up and handed out donuts!)
🗳️At Georgia Tech, they spoke to 140+ students, verifying registration and registering voters.
🩵Here's our update from last night with photos from MSU!
🙏🏼 Grateful to anyone who can donate and spread the word!
You've probably seen it by now-but the Longshoremen's strike is on hold until January 15. So much for the MAGA memes that were starting to circulate, about "It's October-SURPRISE!"
Thank you for the IRS Resistbot, Jess. I am reading "Poverty, by America" by Prof. Matthew Desmond at Princeton and he highlights that as one of the things that prevents us from eliminating poverty period. There are about $1.3 billion uncollected yearly.that could easily make sure that no child is on the street or hungry or wants for clothes.
I hope your dentist trip went okay. I realize asking people to get involved in campaigns is 'like pulling teeth"--just making the ask can be difficult. And then for people who consider volunteering, working on campaigns is like going to the dentist--one procrastinates, who fears the unknown, one thinks of worse case scenarios.
For those reasons, I am not surprised at the success at postcard and letter writing campaigns-which are good social events, fun, make people feel involved and gives people something to say when asked to talk about campaigns. We are having great success in Iowa, both on Iowa and national races.
Regarding messaging, my head spins with all the different messaging coming from so many sources. We need a mega analysis on what messaging is working, if necessary broken down by certain demographics. I look fondly at MAGA or supporters of Project 2025--their message has been and continues to be relatively unchanged (of course, their candidates flip-flop).
Regarding messaging, my head spins with all the different messaging coming from so many sources. We need a mega analysis on what messaging is working, if necessary broken down by certain demographics.
⬆️
The effectiveness of the messages for postcards and letters has ALREADY been tested on the target audiences. It also works that way with the designs of digital ads.
As data analytics has gotten more sophicsticated, the audience can be split into more defined groups with messages targeted specificially for them. "One size fits all" may make more sense to you, but it really isn't all that effective across the board.
Check out Galvanize Action (https://www.galvanizeaction.org/) for an interesting discussion of targetting digital ads. (Their focus area is Moderate White Women).
For the effectiveness of postcards and letters, here are some resources:
Most people are pleasantly surprised by how easy and simple it is to get started with campaigns, not at all like going to the dentist (which these days isn't like it was in the 60s and 70s). Choices run the gamut from phone banking and texting (in which your own phone number is "masked") to knocking on doors to writing postcards or letters. I myself as an introvert am happy to write, switching from postcards to letters because I have a huge amount of first class FOREVER stamps and they were wasted on postcards until I learned about votefwd.org. As Cheryl has already cited some sources of proven success with postcards and letters I won't add to that, but know that these have been in motion since 2017 and there is quite a lot of data supporting the effectiveness of targeted hand-written communication.
North Carolina here. DON'T GIVE UP ON US, FOLKS! Here in Durham we are working to GOTV nonstop, registering voters, canvassing, early voting, poll greeting. Anyone who wants info for Durham and surrounding areas, to donate, canvass, phonebank, look up your voting info, can find it HERE: https://linktr.ee/Durhamgotv
Thank you!!!
Anna, my daughter who drew the photo of you, made that linkt.ree! I think it's fabulous.
North Carolinian here, although not from the western part of the state.
Here's a link from the NC State Board of Elections about voting in the wake of Helene:
https://www.ncsbe.gov/voting/upcoming-election/helene-recovery-and-voting.
Twenty-five of NC's 100 counties plus the Eastern Band of Cherokee tribal lands (3 more counties) are subject to the disaster orders but it looks like only 5 county Boards of Election offices are currently closed.
Avery: Closed (Elections staff are working.)
Buncombe: Closed (Elections staff are working.)
Mitchell: Closed
Watauga: Closed (Elections staff are taking calls)
Yancey: Closed
Cynically, just 2 of those 28 counties with an emergency designation is majority Democratic based on 2020 election results:
Buncombe County - Biden won 59.7% <-- This is Asheville and the most populous county in WNC
Wautauga County - Biden won 53.1%
Trump won the rest of the western counties - in some cases with as much as 75% of the vote.
In terms of numbers, most of the population of NC (and most of the Democrats) live in the central "Piedmont" region which includes Charlotte, Raleigh, Durham. Greensboro, etc. The biggest impact here was with temporary power outages, which (unless repeated) will not effect residents' ability to vote.
This is super helpful and matches what Drew Kromer of the Meck Dems told me and Robert Hubbell (we're posting the video of our conversation tomorrow. It's GREAT!)
Thank you so much for the shout out for Donuts+Democracy, Jess! We are so excited by the amazing response from college student organizers - we now have 32 (and counting) schools and colleges in battleground states hosting Donuts+Democracy tables! We just had our first two events at Montana State University and GA tech. Check out these results!!
🍩At MSU, they talked to 300 students in a few hours and registered 50 new voters. (The event had the Democratic candidate for governor Ryan Busse and Lt. Gov. candidate Raph Graybill both showed up and handed out donuts!)
🗳️At Georgia Tech, they spoke to 140+ students, verifying registration and registering voters.
🩵Here's our update from last night with photos from MSU!
🙏🏼 Grateful to anyone who can donate and spread the word!
https://democratsdeliver.substack.com/p/looking-for-the-helpers-updated?r=51f18
WOW! Amazing! Keep up the great work!
You've probably seen it by now-but the Longshoremen's strike is on hold until January 15. So much for the MAGA memes that were starting to circulate, about "It's October-SURPRISE!"
Yep. Most horrible things that are "sure to happen" don't. Rule of life.
I was so relieved t her that this afternoon. Whew!
The J6 transcript is a really lovely Oct. surprise, except for the Dems for a change.
We can hope we'll see another one near the end of Oct. that can keep the news cycle focused on his horribleness.
Even the excerpts I've read are really devastating. I want to read the whole thing this weekend.
Thank you for the IRS Resistbot, Jess. I am reading "Poverty, by America" by Prof. Matthew Desmond at Princeton and he highlights that as one of the things that prevents us from eliminating poverty period. There are about $1.3 billion uncollected yearly.that could easily make sure that no child is on the street or hungry or wants for clothes.
Oh yeah, that book is incredible and yes. Yet the GOP is currently trying once again to defund the IRS. Sigh.
The Working America letter-writing link seems to be broken.....
Oh crap really? https://volunteer.workingamerica.org/user/login/?return=%2Fportal%2Fsummary%2F
Working now! Thanks!!
Their home page has a direct link to sign up for writing letters... https://volunteer.workingamerica.org/
I hope your dentist trip went okay. I realize asking people to get involved in campaigns is 'like pulling teeth"--just making the ask can be difficult. And then for people who consider volunteering, working on campaigns is like going to the dentist--one procrastinates, who fears the unknown, one thinks of worse case scenarios.
For those reasons, I am not surprised at the success at postcard and letter writing campaigns-which are good social events, fun, make people feel involved and gives people something to say when asked to talk about campaigns. We are having great success in Iowa, both on Iowa and national races.
Regarding messaging, my head spins with all the different messaging coming from so many sources. We need a mega analysis on what messaging is working, if necessary broken down by certain demographics. I look fondly at MAGA or supporters of Project 2025--their message has been and continues to be relatively unchanged (of course, their candidates flip-flop).
Regarding messaging, my head spins with all the different messaging coming from so many sources. We need a mega analysis on what messaging is working, if necessary broken down by certain demographics.
⬆️
The effectiveness of the messages for postcards and letters has ALREADY been tested on the target audiences. It also works that way with the designs of digital ads.
As data analytics has gotten more sophicsticated, the audience can be split into more defined groups with messages targeted specificially for them. "One size fits all" may make more sense to you, but it really isn't all that effective across the board.
Check out Galvanize Action (https://www.galvanizeaction.org/) for an interesting discussion of targetting digital ads. (Their focus area is Moderate White Women).
For the effectiveness of postcards and letters, here are some resources:
* https://shop.bluewavepostcards.org/pages/why-postcards
* https://votefwd.org/impact
* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K9YZuETZ3l4&t=1175s (PTP postcard update)
Most people are pleasantly surprised by how easy and simple it is to get started with campaigns, not at all like going to the dentist (which these days isn't like it was in the 60s and 70s). Choices run the gamut from phone banking and texting (in which your own phone number is "masked") to knocking on doors to writing postcards or letters. I myself as an introvert am happy to write, switching from postcards to letters because I have a huge amount of first class FOREVER stamps and they were wasted on postcards until I learned about votefwd.org. As Cheryl has already cited some sources of proven success with postcards and letters I won't add to that, but know that these have been in motion since 2017 and there is quite a lot of data supporting the effectiveness of targeted hand-written communication.