Dear MoveOn member,
There is no way to sugarcoat this. Fundraising has been at an all-time low this month, just five months out from Election Day, and I'm getting worried.
Our country cannot withstand another four years of Donald Trump, which is why MoveOn launched one of our most strategic, innovative, and robust election programs in our 25-year history—and committed to investing $32 million to make it a success. Unfortunately, members are just not giving at the rates we expect to see during a presidential election cycle, and time is running out before it will directly impact our ability to continue this work.
When donations were down in January, we could shrug it off as simply being too early in the election cycle for our members to pay attention. We convinced ourselves of the same in February and March.
But then April rolled around. Donald Trump's first criminal trial got underway, highlighting his unmatched corruption and criminality.1 He did an interview with Time magazine in which he refused to condemn political violence, said that people want him to be a dictator, indicated he would let states monitor menstrual cycles and "punish" people who have abortions, and expressed enthusiastic support for the deadly, draconian abortion bans already in place in states across the country.2
And now, polls now show him leading in five out of six battleground states, but MoveOn members are still holding back.3
We've fallen far short of our budget goals to fund our election program, and I am asking for your help right now to make sure we have the resources to do everything we can to defeat Trump and his MAGA movement. MoveOn is funded by its members, and if things do not turn around soon, I will have to make hard choices about what cuts to make to our election work.
Please chip in $5 a month, or the most generous amount you can, to power our program all the way through Election Day.
No, I'm sorry, I can't make a monthly donation.
Recent polls have indicated that voters have simply forgotten how bad things were when Trump was in office.4 In fact, many of those polled actually said they felt that the economy was better when Trump was in office.5
Have they forgotten how Trump egregiously mishandled the pandemic response, which led to more than 1 million Americans dying, hundreds of thousands of people losing their jobs, and the economy falling into disarray?6
We cannot allow people to forget the constant chaos, fear, and cruelty that defined Trump's presidency—because his second term would be far, far worse.
If MoveOn cannot turn our fundraising around soon, we simply will not have the funds we need to reach swing-state voters and remind them just how bad the Trump presidency was. Please chip in $5 a month, or whatever you can, starting today.
No, I'm sorry, I can't make a monthly donation.
Trump has fully embraced a terrifying, fascistic agenda known as "Project 2025" that was put together by white Christian nationalists. It would strip away even more rights from women, the LGBTQ+ community, people of color, and poor and marginalized communities, while completely remaking our country into a Christian theocracy.7
And if that weren't enough, conservative Republican Liz Cheney has said she is certain that if Trump is elected, he will refuse to leave office at the end of his term, ending our democracy.8
Our election program is laser-focused on breaking through the noise and connecting directly with the cohort of voters that pollsters have identified as key to President Biden's victory. We tested these programs in 2020 and 2022 and now have data showing that they helped to turn out hundreds of thousands of voters who might otherwise have stayed home.
In an election that will likely be decided by a few thousand voters spread across just a handful of states, that's the difference between protecting our democracy and falling into fascism.
But if energy does not turn around soon, it will be too late.
Please, John, don't wake up the day after Election Day wishing you had done more.
Help us break out of this slump by chipping in $5 a month to power our work from now through Election Day.
No, I'm sorry, I can't make a monthly donation.
Thanks for all you do.
–Cheryl Zando, COO
Sources:
1. "A recap of Trump's trial in NYC, and why a delay in the Jan. 6 case is likely," NPR, April 27, 2024
https://act.moveon.org/go/193434?t=8&akid=390135%2E40999114%2ELsLdXT
2. "Trump may get another chance to be president. He's planning an aggressive second term," NPR, April 30, 2024
https://act.moveon.org/go/193435?t=10&akid=390135%2E40999114%2ELsLdXT
3. "Trump Leads in 5 Key States, as Young and Nonwhite Voters Express Discontent With Biden," The New York Times, May 13, 2024
https://act.moveon.org/go/193177?t=12&akid=390135%2E40999114%2ELsLdXT
4. "Rosy memories: Voters' views of Trump's presidency improve," Axios, April 15, 2024
https://act.moveon.org/go/193436?t=14&akid=390135%2E40999114%2ELsLdXT
5. Ibid.
6. "Do Americans Remember the Actual Trump Presidency?" New York Magazine, May 13, 2024
https://act.moveon.org/go/193437?t=16&akid=390135%2E40999114%2ELsLdXT
7. "GOP's 'Project 2025' Plan May See the Rise of Dictator Trump," Daily Beast, May 19, 2024
https://act.moveon.org/go/193438?t=18&akid=390135%2E40999114%2ELsLdXT
8. "Liz Cheney warns Trump will never leave office if he's elected president again," MSNBC, December 4, 2023
https://act.moveon.org/go/185414?t=20&akid=390135%2E40999114%2ELsLdXT
Want to support MoveOn's work? The MAGA movement's book bans have forced teachers and librarians across the country to remove books from their shelves and censor what young people can learn. MoveOn is fighting back, including by filling a "Banned Bookmobile" with books that the far right has banned and driving it to key cities and towns to raise the visibility of book bans, hand out banned books for free, and bring people together to stop censorship. To keep up the fight against book bans and the MAGA politicians who support them, we need your help.
Will you start a monthly gift to power and sustain MoveOn's critical work?
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