Democracy Comes to Michigan

David Byrne

March 21, 2022 |

Reasons to be Cheerful |

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Response Location: United States, Michigan

A grassroots campaign ended gerrymandering in Michigan by passing an initiative requiring districts be drawn by citizen-commissions rather than politicians. The all-volunteer campaign went door-to-door collecting enough signatures to get the initiative on the ballot and used creative voter-engagement techniques to sustain the support. Once the ballot initiative passed, 9,300 people applied for the first commission. A third-party firm ultimately selected four Democrats, four Republicans, and five non-partisan people as commissioners, who worked together very well to redraw districts.

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The Town That QAnon Nearly Swallowed

Sasha Abramsky

February 07, 2022 |

The Nation (New York) |

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Over 3000 Words

Response Location: United States, Sequim, Washington

The Sequim Good Governance League (SGGL) formed in response to right-wing agitators taking over positions of power and spreading misinformation. SGGL recruited progressive and moderately conservative candidates who successfully defeated incumbents with the help of dozens of volunteers they trained. Volunteers worked around the clock, sent out emails, put up signs around the town, and used their most effective tool: having one-on-one conversations with other residents. SGGL-backed candidates now hold the majority of government offices.

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Climate change activists look to increase voter turnout in 2022 and beyond

Ben Adler

January 28, 2022 |

Yahoo! News |

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1500-3000 Words

Response Location: United States

The Environmental Voter Project (EVP) is a nonpartisan nonprofit working to increase voter turnout among irregular voters who care about the environment. The EVP has 6,000 volunteers who contact infrequent voters in 17 states via text, phone, postcards, and door-knocking. Volunteers identify would-be voters who care about the environment but don’t actually talk about the environment. Instead, their goal is to engage voters and get them to vote regardless of whether anything related to environmental regulation is on the ballot. EVP uses peer-pressure and sends many reminders to get people to the polls.

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How Outreach and Deep Canvassing Can Change Rural Politics

Amanda Abrams

November 22, 2021 |

Yes! Magazine |

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1500-3000 Words

Response Location: United States, North Carolina

Down Home North Carolina is a nonpartisan get-out-the-vote group that practices “deep canvassing” in rural areas to increase voter participation and elect progressive candidates. The technique involves one-on-one conversations that aim to connect on an emotional level, as a way to find common ground, and involves active listening to people and their concerns. Canvassers go door-to-door, and conduct outreach in public areas like Walmart and food banks, (though COVID-19 moved conversations to the phone) and particularly aim to connect with people who haven’t been engaged in the political process before.

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Why bother? Greater Cleveland's youth rise to the task of local civic engagement

Michael Indriolo

October 05, 2021 |

The Land |

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1500-3000 Words

Response Location: United States, Cleveland, Ohio

Cleveland high school students created votecle.com, a website that centralizes information about local elections. A political alignment survey on the site assesses users’ opinions on important political issues to match them with local candidates. The group focuses outreach on drop-off voters, people who reliably vote in national elections but not local ones. These voters tend to be younger, on average, and cite a lack of information about local candidates and issues as the main reason for not voting. After creating the website, the group got a grant from Cleveland Votes to continue engaging young voters.

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‘Blind date' for political rivals? TV show is breaking down barriers.

Sara Miller Llana

May 05, 2021 |

The Christian Science Monitor |

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800-1500 Words

Response Location: Canada

The Canadian reality show, “Political Blind Date,” pairs two politicians from opposing sides to spend two days together visiting each other’s constituents and wrestling with difficult issues. Fifty politicians have participated over five seasons, averaging about 195,000 viewers per episode. The aim is not to get them to change their minds, but to humanize people with opposing political beliefs and break down the increasingly common ‘us versus them’ mindset in politics. Advocates say that this has a “trickle down” effect on viewers forging greater understanding and more respectful debate.

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Can “democracy dollars” keep real dollars out of politics?

Julia Hotz

April 28, 2021 |

MIT Technology Review |

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800-1500 Words

Response Location: United States, Seattle, Washington

Democracy Vouchers, a tax-payer-funded program that sends four $25 certificates to residents to donate to local candidates, made Seattle the national leader by increasing the percent of the electorate donating to local campaigns to nearly 8%. They also allow more non-establishment candidates, who lack connections to wealthy donors, to run for office. Four of the nine 2019 city council candidates used vouchers to help fund their campaigns and the vouchers are being expanded to the city’s mayoral races. A national pilot program was also approved to try vouchers for congressional candidates in three states.

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What Other States Can Learn from Georgia's Historic Elections

Fiza Pirani

April 08, 2021 |

Yes! Magazine |

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1500-3000 Words

Response Location: United States, Georgia

A complex combination of successful fundraising campaigns, engaging with and energizing Black voters, and mobilizing the state’s other ethnic and racial groups helped Democrats flip Georgia blue in 2020. Large financial investments allowed organizers to implement effective voter education and registration campaigns and distribute the resources to areas where the need to mobilize voters was greatest. Organizers tapped into Black culture through food, music, and the Black church to energize voters. They also conducted multiracial, multi-ethnic, and multilingual outreach to engage other marginalized groups.

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Georgia College Political Society Sparks Conversations as Solution to Political Polarization

Shania Shelton

March 25, 2021 |

Grady Newsource |

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800-1500 Words

Response Location: United States, Milledgeville, Georgia

Georgia College Political Society, a non-partisan debate and discussion organization, hosts events where students from across the political spectrum discuss political issues. Discussion topics have included criminal justice, foreign policy, and the 2020 election. The group currently meets on Zoom and posts livestreams of their debates on Facebook. The environment has been friendly, with some agreement on the structural problems, but different ideas about how to solve them. So far, there have been 10 panels and the College’s political science faculty have provided crash courses on the topics being discussed.

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The 'Army Of Environmental Super Voters' Is Growing, And Marching On City Hall

Alexander Kaufman

March 18, 2021 |

The Huffington Post |

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800-1500 Words

Response Location: United States

The Environmental Voter Project has contacted nearly 6.2 million non-voters that care about the environment in 17 states since 2015, estimating that over 733,000 of them now vote regularly. They identify voters using demographic and behavioral data, verify the data using surveys, and apply algorithms to predict “super environmentalists,” focusing on people who don’t vote. They concentrate on local elections, such as mayoral races, and call, text, and knock-on voters’ doors. They also fundraise, increasing donations from about $475,000 in 2017 to nearly $2.7 million in 2020, mostly from small donors.

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