Since March 5, Hope Springs from Field PAC has been knocking on doors (as weather and primaries permitted) in Arizona, Nevada, Florida, Georgia, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Wisconsin — all critical states that will determine the Senate majority for the next two years. Having said that, we didn’t knock on doors in Arizona last weekend; the NWS had declared a Heat Warning and temperatures in Arizona and Las Vegas were expected to be above 100 degrees. But nothing is more important this election than maintaining a Democratic Senate and even expanding upon it.
1,392 volunteers came out to knock on doors last Saturday on the Holiday Weekend. We hadn’t scheduled this canvass but volunteers insisted. There were myriad reasons — and I do mean insisted here (we didn’t send out an email blast, this was all word of mouth). Some of our more eager (the Obama campaign called them “Super”) volunteers made it a mission to surpass the 3 Million Doors knocked goal (that they had set themselves — our original goal was 2M, which we surpassed in August). But at the end of the summer, volunteers who were knocking on doors with Hope Springs from Field PAC begin to see the effects of the Constituent Service Request forms, either because they knew, or would hear about, official government responses to them, or voters actually asked if they were walking with the forms. The latter could “upset” walking through the Issues Questionnaire but what can you do?
You can see from the graphic that there is a standard dropoff in participation during holiday weekends. Which is exactly why we didn’t originally schedule one last weekend. Regardless, our volunteers knocked on 103,328 doors, and had conversations with 7,819 voters. When organizers told volunteers that we always had significant drops in turnout, they were pretty chagrin. “Does it affect the open rate?” These volunteers have gotten pretty savvy about what works in direct voter contact, and what the benefits are.
I know that i have said that my number one piece of advise (something all our organizers are supposed to start with) when training people how to canvass is, Smile! When i lead trainings, I tell them to “Smile, because no one you talk to today will remember a single thing you say. But they will always remember the impression you left.” But we also tell people that they should expect to talk to no more than 8 voters that afternoon (more than that is exceptional) which has gotten our volunteers in the mindset that it really is all about the numbers. Which, i will repeat, is why we train our door knockers to predict whether there is anyone home before they even knock (iow, as they approach the door). And our more observant volunteers will share with others things they see that are indicators in their minds whether there is anyone home. One of our organizers calls it, “Knock, Drop and Move On” if you don’t see any indicator that anyone is going to answer the door. I will say that i can be quick to decide (or predict) and will move on as someone actually opens to door. But no one has ever acted offended (and voters will act offended if they feel slighted); this happens to me 2 or 3 times a year. But i have been doing this a very long time (i started in 7th grade), in many states, and i am all about hitting as many doors as possible. “That’s why I am here,” volunteers will say. No one wants to waste their time.
We walk with an Issues Canvass, where we ask voters what they think and whether they had a message for their elected officials. 4,840 voters answered questions from the survey, in whole or in part.
By far, the highest response numbers always are in the second question, about what issue voters think “is most urgent” at this time. The “send a message to your Member” is very popular, as well. But we are getting a lot of responses to the “Is there a single issue that will determine how you vote” question, too — far higher than I expected.
The ‘what is their opinion of the job Biden is doing’ question also receives a lot of responses. 2,936 voters (60.6%) told us that they have a favorable opinion of the job Biden was doing as president. 1,574 voters (32.5%) didn’t express an opinion of the president at this time. 330 voters (6.8%) said they had a negative impression of the job the president was doing last Saturday. Remember that we are knocking on doors of Democrats and Independent or Unaffiliated households. While it is not impossible to reach a Republican through our targeting of these households, we exclude GOP households by and large.
While we are not tracking the “what single issue will you vote on” responses, these are entered into VAN (the Democratic database — which happens to be our biggest expense every month), just like all this data. But it is (probably) the most important piece of information for Democratic candidates who access VAN in the Fall. In more than one Senate Swing State, though, the top response to the single issue driving voting decisions question have been Reproductive Freedom.
The Economy was the Top Issue this week, according to the voters we talked to last Saturday. Concerns over Schools was the top response in Georgia, and Jobs was Number 1 in Nevada this week.
Schools was the clear Number 2 Issue this week. Health Care Costs was Second in Florida and Ohio; The Economy was Number 2 in Georgia. The Number Three Issue was all over the place this week; seems like one of everything. That’s weird.
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 ask voters who talk to us whether they approve or disapprove of the job the president, their incumbent Senator (up for election this year), and how their governor (if they are up for election this year) is doing. After the primaries, we also ask about the Democratic Senate and nominees.
In Florida, 58% of the voters we talked to who responded had a favorable impression of President Biden. 76% of voters approved of the job Val Demings was doing while only 11% approved of Senator Rubio. 2% had a favorable impression of Governor DeSantis last week, tying his low. Remember that we are only knocking on doors of households with Democratic and Independent voters in Central Florida; we don’t include households that only have Republicans in them.
We didn’t canvass in Arizona because of heat.
In Georgia, 66% of the voters we talked to approved of the job President Biden was doing. 82% approved of the job Senator Warnock was doing. Both have consistently polled high because we are canvassing in largely rural (southern) Georgia, targeting African-American (mostly) Democrats with predominately young Black educated volunteers. While Georgia doesn’t have partisan registration it does identify voters by ethnicity (and I believe it is unique in doing so). 13% approved of the job Governor Kemp was doing. 65% of the voters we talked to last week had a favorable impression of Stacey Abrams.
In North Carolina, 60% of the voters we talked to approved of the job President Biden was doing. 55% of the voters we talked to approved of the job Governor Cooper was doing. Since the Democratic nominee for Senate is now official, we also asked about Cheri Beasley, the former Chief Justice of the NC Supreme Court. 78% of the people we talked to had a favorable impression of Justice Beasley.
In Nevada, 58% of the voters we talked to approved of the job President Biden was doing. 53% had a favorable impression of the job Senator Cortez Masto was doing. 55% of voters approved of the job Governor Sisolak was doing. 7% of the Nevada voters we talked to had a negative impression of President Biden (the week’s high), 7% had a negative view of the senator and 7% had a negative view of the governor. There is definitely something happening in Nevada, independent of the Democratic candidates to a large extent.
In Pennsylvania, 61% of the voters we talked to approved of the job President Biden was doing. 73% had a favorable opinion of John Fetterman, the Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate. People are eager to see him back on the campaign trail. 76% had a favorable view of Josh Shapiro, the Democratic nominee for Pennsylvania governor.
In Wisconsin, 59% of the voters we talked to approved of the job President Biden was doing, 6% disapproved. 3% approved of the job Senator Johnson this week while 59% of the voters we talked to disapproved of their senator. As you can see, the “approval” numbers for Johnson have been remarkably consistent. In fact, his numbers have been the most consistent of any candidate we have asked about. 71% of voters we talked to approved of the job Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes was doing. 56% approved of the job that Governor Evers was doing; 7% disapproved.
In Ohio, 58% of the voters we talked to approved of the job President Biden was doing. 9% disapproved. 80% approved of the job Tim Ryan was doing. 22% approved of the job that Governor DeWine was doing. 28% of the Democratic and Independent voters we talked to last Saturday disapproved of the job DeWine was doing. I find it interested that the approval numbers for Ryan and DeWine appear (reversely) synced. I would feel better (more secure) about the Ryan numbers if we had been able to canvass in the Columbus area.
The trend lines are clearly starting to converge again for President Biden’s approval ratings in the 8 different states. 8 percentage points now separate Biden’s approval ratings in Georgia, 66% (week’s high), and several states at 58% (week’s low). Remember that we don’t knock on doors of Republican households even though there are definitely doors of mixed party households we canvass. But we are getting interesting feedback from voters who seem inclined to support the president. “He’s got to deliver,” said one voter in Wisconsin recently — a sentiment shared by others in not so different language.
We can also compare the Senate Job Approval ratings from Democratic and Independent or Unaffiliated Voters over time. There is less data here since we only added non-incumbent Senate candidates after their primary victories. Here again we will note that Nevada is particularly disconcerting, primarily because Senator Cortez Masto seems to have lower name recognition than the other senate incumbents. But among the Democratic incumbents, it seems that Nevada will be the closest race. Georgia, because we are talking about more Republicans (who are not part of this data), is notable because Rev. Warnock has very strong support among the voters we have talked to this year in southern and Southeast Georgia.
37 people filled out new voter registration forms for their states during last weekend’s canvassing. Another 286 voters updated their address, as required by HAVA. We differentiate between the two because brand new voters are often ignored by campaigns and we hope to compensate for that somewhat by having volunteers send them post cards before the election and they are also getting robocalls thanking them for registering. You might notice the significant top out at the end of June; this was the result of over-excited organizers and volunteers in Phoenix who encouraged re-registration because voters wanted to get on the Active Early Voting List. You can see that the number of voters registered is not a function of the number of volunteers present or doors knocked. Clearly, they help, but there’s no guarantee that more doors equals more voters registered. Even though registering voters is a primary rationale behind early canvassing, it is not the only one. Just wanted to point that out.
We collected 400 Constituent Service Request Forms last week. 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 CSR and let them know they are working on the issue. This credit-taking is enormously valuable to the Democratic office-holder.
We continue to walk with Incident Reports, and we ask people who say they are concerned about the upcoming general election if they want to fill one out. Last Saturday, 14 voters filled them out.
We pass along Incident Reports to the Lawyer’s Committee for Civil Rights and NALEO (those that correspond to Hispanic precincts), and send copies to state Democratic Party committees. But our purpose is to combine this information with the two independent databases of voting incidents to look for patterns before the election and use that information for warning district, state and U.S. attorneys’ offices that we could see those patterns resurface on election day. We will also use it to target Election Day Protection activity.
By starting early, and aiming towards super-compliance with these really, really onerous provisions in some states, Hope Springs from Field PAC seeks to undermine that strategy, while informing voters about the new laws and regulations aimed at them. There’s a lot of work to be done, but fortunately, the three states that are making it most difficult are also states in which you can knock on doors at least 10 months out of the year. And, with your help, we will be there, getting our people to super-comply with these restrictive provisions.
I am aware of the volume of data presented in this post. But it is the result of the data we collect at the door, to be entered in VAN and accessible by all Democratic candidates who utilize VAN this Fall. The focus on the “horse-race” aspect of this data is unintentional, because the data is what the it is. It is useful for Democratic candidates and provides paths to victory for data-driven candidates (which most campaigns are these days).
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 help:
https://secure.actblue.com/donate/2022senateswing
Thank you for your support. This work depends on you!