 We fund voter protection John, You might have seen it. Last week Democratic super-lawyer Marc Elias went on MSNBC to say: “We are not going to out-organize voter suppression.” Marc and his team are fighting tooth and nail for voters in courtrooms all over the country. We’re grateful for his important work. So we say this with our deepest respect: we have to disagree with Marc on this one. Out-organizing voter suppression is the whole reason we founded Power the Vote, and that’s because we’ve seen first-hand that it works! We’re not just blowing smoke here. Last year, the AZ voter protection team helped 3,400 Arizona voters get their rejected ballots counted. Those votes put Democratic Attorney General Kris Mayes over the top – she won by just 280 votes. And those 3,400 votes bumped Governor Katie Hobbs past the margin for a recount – providing a buffer against Kari Lake's attempts to overturn the election results. But it’s not just AZ: voter protection organizing made the margin of victory for President Biden in Georgia (15,870 votes cured!) and Wisconsin (36,000 ballots cured!). In Texas, voter protection organizing brought down the absentee ballot rejection rates from 40% statewide to just 2.7% statewide. In Pennsylvania, voter protection organizing helped flip the Pennsylvania House – securing Rep. Cerrato’s win by just 58 votes. All this to say… voter protection organizing wins elections.
Back to Arizona again – on Election Day, in Maricopa County, problems with ballot printers and scanners impacted voting in 70 polling locations across the county. But the voter protection team was prepared: they had stationed poll watching volunteers in a whopping 89% of polling places in Maricopa County, including 69 out of the 70 locations impacted by the equipment problems. Those volunteers were there to witness everything that went down – and those first-hand accounts became a critical tool to fight back against misinformation spread by Kari Lake and election deniers. So yeah, voter protection organizing works. Our quibble with Marc to one side – we agree with him that we need to treat this threat to democracy like the five-alarm fire that it is. We need touse every tool we have to strike back against Republican efforts to suppress the vote. One of those tools is litigation – and Marc’s got that covered. But I don’t want you to think that there’s nothing you can do but sit and watch litigation unfold. You can help protect voters. Right now. Our voter protection programs – besides being super effective – are 24/7/365. We’re already on the ground in Arizona, and North Carolina, and Texas … because we never left. You know – Marc’s right that tackling voter suppression is really hard. But that’s exactly what we do! It’s our sole mission. And it’s why I hope you’ll join our team, and support our democracy-saving work. Best, P.S. If you’re as fired up as I am about voter protection, and you want to help us out-organize voter suppression, please consider making a monthly donation of $20 or $10 or whatever amount makes sense for you. Having sustaining donors makes this work so much easier to plan. We’ve got on-the-ground teams in Arizona, North Carolina and Texas (and soon will have Georgia and Florida) – each of which need year-round support. We’ve got a goal to get 24 new monthly donors today, in honor of the ‘24 election. Is that cheesy? Yes. It totally is. It’s so cheesy it needs a side of crackers. But you know what? We think it’s a do-able goal – and we hope you’ll help us get there. Click here to make a monthly investment and help out-organize voter suppression. Thanks, Kim Allen, Co-Founder, Power the Vote
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