In an excellent new in-depth look at the upcoming special election in Georgia’s 6th Congressional District, CNN’s Eric Bradner credits Daily Kos with launching Democrat Jon Ossoff’s campaign:
But it was the involvement of the liberal blog Daily Kos that really catapulted Ossoff onto the national map. The blog has been the largest driver of Ossoff's eye-popping $4 million fundraising effort to date. It bested its previous fundraising record for a single candidate—$412,000 for Elizabeth Warren in 2012—in a single week. Daily Kos's pro-Ossoff fundraising efforts crossed the $1 million mark on February 28.
Hats off you, Daily Kos readers! That initial blast of donations—which astounded us—led to a big round of media coverage for Ossoff, which in turn led to even more donations, which in turn led to more exposure … you get it. It’s been a very positive feedback loop, and this community was crucial in igniting it.
But Bradner also goes deeper and extensively quotes Daily Kos political director David Nir to explain how exactly we’ve helped tap into the intense outpouring of anti-Trump energy to channel it on behalf of Ossoff:
"One thing I've experimented with is putting up blog posts asking people to contribute to Ossoff at times when people (myself included!) are really feeling angry and upset at Trump in order to give them something affirmative to do," Nir emailed.
"For instance, I published this post the weekend Trump issued his travel ban. It raised almost $34,000. We then sent out an email based on that post and it raised another $118,000. We've seen similar responses in other similar situations as well."
Please give $3 today to Jon Ossoff today and help him shake the GOP to its core!
And our impact could go well beyond this one election:
[Nir] argued that Georgia's 6th district "very well could be a test case for the future of Democratic targeting."
"It would generate even more excitement for future races. And I think it would terrify Republicans, because there are a lot of other districts like this one: traditionally GOP, but highly educated and very Trump-wary," Nir wrote.
Regardless of the outcome, this race could hold real import for the 2018 midterms, when Democrats will be trying like hell to win back the House from Paul Ryan and the Republicans:
Nir said progressives are hoping for a win. But he also compared this race to one Democrats lost in 2005. In 2005, a hard-fought campaign by progressives brought Paul Hackett just three points away from victory in an Ohio congressional district that George W. Bush had just won by 28 points.
"That very tight margin in a race that should never have been competitive in the first place was a harbinger of 2006, when Democrats got extremely fired up and won a whole lot of previously red seats," he said.
But once again, Georgia’s 6th is still a very Republican district, and it’ll take a lot more incredibly hard work to pull off an upset here. With Republicans ramping up their attacks on Ossoff to absurd proportions, we need to leave our old fundraising records in the dust so that he can fight back.