I know you’ve been getting a lot of emails from Public Citizen over the past few days.

Give me just a minute to explain what’s going on.

If — after reading through this note — you still think it’s too much, at least we’ll both know where things stand.

This is a “peek behind the curtain” that many of the organizations and political candidates who are filling up your inbox won’t show you.

Three major developments have formed a “perfect storm” that is making for rather choppy waters of late.

FIRST

Public Citizen was a pioneer in harnessing email as a key tool our supporters could use to learn about, and participate in, our work — by signing petitions, communicating with elected officials and government agencies, and, yes, funding our modest operating expenses.

We never shied away from including donation requests in our email outreach. But we didn’t ask constantly. And when we did ask, we avoided gimmicks like ALL-CAPS subject lines, garish formatting, gratuitous graphics, misleading “membership status” alerts, and more.

Even now, when we do need to push out a series of fundraising emails, we try to keep them simple and include something interesting.

But over the years — unfortunately for the utility of email itself — more and more organizations have taken to emailing every day, multiple times a day, and abusing cheap techniques that used to be confined to spammers.

What this all means is that email doesn’t work quite as well as it once did. It’s still one of the best ways for a budget-conscious nonprofit like Public Citizen to connect with our hundreds of thousands of activists and supporters all across America.

We just have to email a little more often than we used to.

SECOND

A LOT of people have been running to be the next president of the United States, with highly aggressive email tactics making up a major prong of their campaigns.

As long as Public Citizen has been doing email, we haven’t been forced to compete for inbox space with SO many politicians SO willing to exploit email to its breaking point.

Until now.

THIRD

We all woke up sickened on November 9, 2016, hardly able to believe that Donald Trump had been elected president.

We could have wallowed in despair, but we did not.

Millions of Americans took to the streets, again and again, to protest Trump and his policies.

It made a difference. It stiffened Democrats’ spines. It stopped the repeal of the Affordable Care Act. It prevented all kinds of atrocities the Trump cabal had planned.

Public Citizen and other organizations’ lawsuits blocked countless dangerous policies. Our and others’ ethics challenges forced out numerous Cabinet officials (Tom Price, Scott Pruitt, and Ryan Zinke, to name three).

Yet despite all we have done, Trump has done immeasurable harm. He lies relentlessly. And he has been further emboldened by Mitch McConnell’s absurd simulation of an impeachment trial.

As a result, many of us are feeling burnout, fatigue and — worst of all — that fighting doesn’t make a difference.

These feelings are understandable.

Understandable. But feelings we must resist with every ounce of determination and hope we can muster. Because the sentiment that fighting doesn’t make a difference is totally wrong. It’s the ONLY thing that makes a difference.

If we stop fighting, there is, literally, no telling what Trump will do. On the other hand, if we stay in this together, we will defeat Trumpism along with the bigotry, fear, and greed that gave it rise.

That means, among many things, keeping in touch. Even if you wish I wouldn’t send as many emails.

STILL WITH ME?

With everything on the line — ending the Trump regime, winning Medicare for All, overturning Citizens United, confronting climate disaster, and so much more — your support is more crucial than ever.

And our critical February fundraising deadline is at MIDNIGHT TONIGHT.

So, if you can, please donate right now.

Or maybe even join our popular Monthly Giving program to help make sure we have the baseline level of resources we need.

Thank you for reading this.

Thank you for anything you can chip in.

And thank you for everything you do as part of this shared project called Public Citizen.

Onward,

- Robert Weissman, President of Public Citizen
 
 
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