One Republican poll watcher said the quiet part out loud:
"If We Can Disqualify Enough Blacks and Enough Mexican Americans..."
We need to be better prepared in 2022 (and 2024). We can’t wait until the last minute this time.
This Sunday, in 863 Black Churches in Georgia, 324 Black Churches in North Carolina and 166 Black Churches in the panhandle of Florida, Hope Springs from Field PAC kicks off its 2022 Election Protection Project. We had originally planned to kick everything off in March, but the churches did not want it to interfere with their Lenten Calendar.
From their pulpits, they will introduce their Elections Committees (if applicable) and ask parishioners who are registered to vote to hold up their voter registration cards. No expects many (or any) of them to have their voter registration cards with them, but their speakers and Elections Committee members will hold their’s up. This is the starting point: congregations will be told to expect frequent presentations by their Elections Committees and ask that members bring their voter registration cards. Then they will be reminded that they need to be registered at their current address. Congregants will also be asked if there are people who need Voter ID cards (where applicable) and reminded that the Elections Committees will man tables outside the door for those who need to register, or re-register, sign up to get their Voter ID card or want to fill out an Incident Report. And they will be asked if there are any volunteers to serve as Mentors to newly registered voters.
So it begins.
2022 can be different, 2022 will be different. We just spent a year where Republicans laid out and wrote into law their plans for voter suppression. This year, we counter with a massive response that begins on Sunday (although, actually, it began with the Michelle Obama alliance that pledged to register 1 million new voters).
Hope Springs from Field PAC is knocking on doors and partnering with local civics and civil rights groups awareness of the fact that Democrats care about our voters and are working to protect their rights. We are thinking about how to mitigate Voter Suppression efforts, get around them and make sure we have "super compliance," both informing and helping our voters meet the requirements and get out and vote. We are taking those efforts to the doors and gathering locations of the communities most effected (the intended targets or victims) of these new voter suppression laws.
Obviously, we rely on grassroots support, so if you support field/grassroots organizing and our efforts to protect our voters, we would certainly appreciate your support:
https://secure.actblue.com/donate/2022electionprotection
Hope Springs from Field PAC was started by former Obama Field Organizers because field was the cornerstone of our success. Election Protection was central to the Obama primary effort in 2008 because we were running against a party favorite with strong roots in state and local party organizations and we needed to appeal to voters outside that framework. 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 cured.
Just as important, while Democrats went over to Zoom to organize, Republicans continue to build out their central organizing framework that relies on reducing the numbers of voters who don’t look or think like they do.
Republicans are well-organized and more motivated now. Covid-19 stopped their plans to funnel Democrats and minority voters into precincts in 2020 so they could challenged voters and, if not intimidate them from voting, at least force them to cast provisional ballots and make them take extra steps in order for their votes to be counted.
Republicans have been unleashed. Again.
In the early ’80s, Democrats accused the Republican National Committee and local Republicans of using off-duty police to patrol minority neighborhoods and precincts and other tactics to intimidate primarily minority voters in New Jersey. The lawsuit resulted in a consent decree that restricted the Republican National Committee from continuing these practices.
A federal judge ended those limitations in 2018, and ever since, Republicans have aspired to shape the electorate on election day in order to win elections.
The Trump campaign jumped at the opportunity, as soon as it opened its campaign headquarters in Arlington, VA. Intimidating voters is illegal under federal law, but Republican aspirations went well beyond the thought of voter intimidation. They tried to recruit 50,000 poll watchers, place them in heavily (primarily minority) Democratic precincts and challenge every single voter they could with a variety of rationales. True the Vote as well as Stop the Steal groups are trying to double that number with the same goal — intimidating voters and elongating the process in Democratic areas.
We are ready. Up until Labor Day, Hope Springs from Field PAC will continue to build out both the organizational capacity and the underlying database for cutting this GOP effort off at their knees. All our canvassers ask not only is the person they are talking to registered to vote, but registered to vote at their current address. We have started to curate training videos for poll watchers because some of these states require that poll watchers sit through trainings before they can obtain the needed credentials.
But because we continue to build a database of historical acts of voter suppression and intimidation, we have something that MAGA and True the Vote reactionaries don’t: prior communication with the courts, the Justice Department and local prosecutors. Prior election incident reports will be used to point out concerns to local District and US Attorneys offices before election day. It makes law enforcement aware of past practices, and reminds them of their duties to protect all voters in all precincts. It marries local, state and national efforts to protect the vote.
We are establishing Election Protection Teams who will know that we will call in local law enforcement, the feds or take incidents and disruptions to court, if necessary. Election Protection Teams will recruit, train and staff polling locations with Poll Watchers (inside), Poll Monitors (outside) and Ballot Curing Teams to help voters fix ballot issues before time runs out.
We start now, organizing among our most vulnerable voters, because it gives us the ability to correct issues (like voter registrations at old addresses), keeps voters engaged in the upcoming elections and build a trust network that will allow friends and fellow congregants to make sure that people vote and that their votes count. This is critical for many reasons, but the fact that this is a midterm election *and* the first election after electoral districts have been re-mapped makes it doubly so. Changes in polling locations may double the importance again. Voters want to feel comfortable about casting their votes.
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 developing Election Protection strategies now, and not wait until a couple of weeks or so before the general election. We have a lot of work to do. Can you help?
If you are able to support our efforts to protect Democratic voters, especially in minority communities, expand the electorate, and believe in grassroots efforts to increase voter participation and election protection, please donate:
secure.actblue.com/donate/2022electionprotection
Thank you for your support. This work depends on you!