It’s hard to remember that all the issues we now have about Voter Suppression and Restrictions all seem to have their origins in Wisconsin. You may be familiar with the playbook: harsh voter ID laws, restricting early voting hours, changing the laws regarding absentee ballots, changes to polling place regulations that inject partisanship into the polling place, and unprecedented partisan redistricting. And we can’t treat Wisconsin the same as these other states seeking to emulate the Walker playbook because it isn’t guided by the same laws. Wisconsin is exempt from the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 because it allows same day voter registration at polling places with respect to elections for federal office. But Republicans everywhere seem to be eager to follow in Wisconsin’s footsteps to dissuade Democratic-leaning voters that it isn’t worth their time to vote.
Hope Springs from Field has been working in Wisconsin for the last 15 months to show that Democrats Deliver! We do this by putting voter interests and concerns at the forefront of our canvassing efforts. Even voters that wanted nothing to do with our Issues Survey have turned back to respond to our Constituent Services Request forms. And, in fact, we’ve had a higher percentage of responses in the latter in Waukesha county than any of the other 3 where we’ve been knocking on doors. So while we’ve had more responses to the Issues Questionnaire query about a single issue determining how (and, quite frankly, whether) voters would vote, our responses to the CSRs has been very consistent. Volunteers like doing them, too — it makes them feel empowered (their term).
On Saturday, we got the die-hard volunteers to come out for the last canvass in summer. Because we only had 5 organizers available last week, communications about this canvass was more low-key. We only blasted those who had previously come out to knock on doors this summer. And, yet, 89% of those who told us they’d come out did so. We even had a couple of volunteers email after we had started to explain that something came up. That is not normal, at least not this summer.
188 volunteers canvassed with Hope Springs from Field PAC on Saturday. We continue to canvass in Milwaukee (where we are canvassing in African-American wards), as well as Kenosha, Waukesha and Dane counties. The key Democratic and swing areas of this Senate Swing State.
We knock on doors with an Issues Questionnaire, which we use as a conversational device to make it easier for both volunteers and voters. But one thing that our Wisconsin volunteers have been more adept at that any other state (according to our organizers) is the demonstration part of voter contact. Not only have they been adept at showing voters the survey right off the bat (doing so allows voters to see that this won’t take long and there are no surprises in participation), but many of these volunteers have jerry-rigged or made modifications to clipboards that allow them to easily go back and forth between the (paper) survey and input into their phones with miniVAN.
But we find that, by sharing or showing the survey with voters, many of them pick out the questions they want to answer — sometimes even moving directly to those questions. And the survey also sparks conversation and because we train our volunteers to absorb information, not challenge voter comments, we can learn an awful lot about individual voters and their views of the political and cultural trends of the area. This tactic means that we tend to get about 65% of those who answer their doors to provide at least 2 answers to the survey, and generally answer at least 6 questions.
This week, per usual, The Economy was the most popular response to “What Issue is most Urgent?” Schools was the second most frequent response and we did hear about concerns about School Safety for the upcoming school year. And it isn’t just about fear over school shootings but also the potential for violence at school event (not from students), PTAs and school board meetings. That’s new (to me, anyway). Health Care or Insurance Premium Costs was third. We do still hear a lot additional comments about Reproductive Rights and Gun Violence in the “Anything to add” or message to Congress query. And even though most volunteers only get to talk to 8-10 voters (maybe double that, if you include other voters in the same household) a weekend, you get the sense that what we learn over time is what voters in those areas are talking about, thinking about, making their voting decisions on.
59% of the voters we talked to expressed approval of President Biden last Saturday, a slight uptick. 6% expressed disapproval in the job the president was doing.
3% of the voters we talked to expressed approval of Ron Johnson this Saturday. 59% of voters told us they had an unfavorable opinion.
56% of the Democratic and Independent voters we talked to approved of the job Gov. Evers is doing. 7% said they had an unfavorable impression. And, since the other major candidates dropped out of the Democratic primary for Senate, we started asking the voters we talked to how they felt about Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes. 71% had a favorable view of Barnes this week.
Hope Springs from Field PAC has been knocking on doors in a grassroots-led effort to prepare the Electoral Battleground in what has been called the First Round of a traditional Five Round Canvass. We are taking those efforts to the doors 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, voter registration (and follow-up) and our efforts to protect our voters, we would certainly appreciate your support:
https://secure.actblue.com/donate/2022senateswing
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 cured.
We registered 6 New Voters last Saturday and updated (or corrected) the addresses of another 41 voters. Most of these were in Milwaukee.
As you can see from the very first question in the Issues Questionnaire, making sure that voters are registered from their current address is a major function of early canvassing. But we are also asking people who open their doors about whether they need services delivered to their neighborhood. 62 voters we talked to filled out Constituent Service Request forms last Saturday. In general, we send these to Democratic elected officials responsible for the requested functions, but if the appropriate office is held by a Republican, we still send it along. For Democrats, though, we encourage them to reach out immediately to the voter who filled out the Constituent Service Request forms and let them know they are working on the issue. This credit-taking is enormously valuable to the Democratic office-holder.
We specifically ask voters in the Issues Survey if they have any concerns about the upcoming elections. Voters who tell us they have experience voter intimidation or other problems with voting are asked to fill out Incident Reports. We found 1 voter in Milwaukee who wanted to fill out an Incident Report in Milwaukee on Saturday. We collate these Incident Reports, to be shared with local, state and federal officials in charge of voting, as well as use them to plan out our Election Protection strategy in the fall. They could also be used in court cases.
But asking — and collecting — Incident Reports has a second purpose at this time. We are reminding voters that we care about Election Protection, that if they witness something, they can say something and it will matter. It also assures them that we are ready to do something if they see something.
Interest in Fair Elections, as they say in Georgia, is a particular interest in the African-American wards in Milwaukee and especially an interest of those volunteers who are canvassing there. Voters are keenly aware of the complete waste of the (now fired) Gableman investigation and we hear resentment about chasing down mythical election fraud when voters in Milwaukee can experience real voter suppression “that they don’t care about” [they being the GOP legislature in Madison].
By starting early, and aiming towards super-compliance with Wisconsin’s voting laws, Hope Springs from Field PAC seeks to undermine the Republican strategy of shaping the electorate.
If you are able to support our efforts to protect Democratic voters, expand the electorate, and believe in grassroots efforts to increase voter participation and election protection, please help:
https://secure.actblue.com/donate/2022senateswing
Thank you for your support. This work depends on you!