Dear MoveOn member,
I believe that reaching every possible voter before the polls close on November 5 is necessary to win this election and that the consequences if we lose are unthinkable.
We must have the guts to take on and defeat a powerful and greedy ruling class and create a government that works for all, not just the few.
I will say more about that below, but first, I have an important request: MoveOn has identified 1.5 million voters in battleground states who are in danger of not showing up to vote in 2024 and need to be contacted over the next 34 days. MoveOn members and volunteers have been working tirelessly to reach them. However, MoveOn's fundraising has fallen short of what's needed to complete this essential get-out-the-vote work. Which is why I am writing you today to ask you to support their work:
I know that you are receiving many requests for support. But I'm asking you to donate to MoveOn because they have the expertise to identify key voters and mobilize the precise voters needed to win. In 2022, their get-out-the-vote program resulted in 50,000 unlikely voters casting a ballot in battleground districts, many of which were decided by a margin of just a few thousand votes.1
The reality is that the voters who will decide this election are not those who remain undecided about Trump and Vice President Harris but those who have not yet decided if they will vote at all. That is why MoveOn's work is so important.
Improving voter turnout is absolutely essential to win elections and make passing a progressive agenda possible. MoveOn has been a key part of improving voter turnout over time—in particular, by contacting people in battleground states and districts who have progressive values but vote inconsistently, reminding them of the critical issues that are at stake, and helping them make a plan to vote.
In 2020, nearly two-thirds of all eligible voters turned out—the highest rate since 1900—and Joe Biden won. We must build on that success and push turnout even higher in 2024. But Republicans are doing everything they possibly can to suppress and steal the election—purging the voter rolls, passing racist voter ID laws, and more. If voting rates this year fall back to where they were in 2016, Trump will likely win the Electoral College and the presidency, which would be a catastrophe for this country.
MoveOn is in the final sprint of the most sophisticated election program in its 26-year history. It is a program designed specifically to increase voter turnout by inspiring voters to show up in the key swing states that will decide this election. And it is critically needed.
Already, MoveOn members have made more than 557,000 phone calls to "surge voters"—young and infrequent voters with progressive values in battleground states and districts—and sent them 73,000 postcards, while hosting 550 election events to help elect Vice President Harris. But over the coming weeks, MoveOn needs to make millions of phone calls, send hundreds of thousands of texts, and flood the streets with thousands of canvassers.
Donald Trump is a hateful and vindictive man, a pathological liar, someone who thrives on divisiveness and xenophobia. And let's be clear: He has absolutely no vision for the future of this country except enriching himself and his billionaire friends.
If Trump is elected this November, the fight against climate change is over. He has already promised to sell this country's energy policy to the highest bidder, saying he would "drill, baby, drill" in exchange for $1 billion from oil industry executives.
If Trump is elected this November, the billionaire class, which already exerts enormous power over our economic and policy systems, will only strengthen its stranglehold on our political system.
If Trump is elected this November, the fight to protect a person's right to control their own body will be under even greater threat. Project 2025, the blueprint for his presidency, contains multiple ways to accomplish a national abortion ban—without Congress.
On the other hand, if Vice President Harris and Governor Walz win, we can build on the progress we have already made, while we continue to organize and make progress on the issues that you and I know the American people care about. I have been working with MoveOn members to organize on those issues for years. And on those issues, thanks in no small part to MoveOn and its millions of members, we have made enormous progress.
As one example, take the issue of Social Security. Back in 2012, Democrats offered Republicans a budget deal that would have slashed Social Security benefits by $112 billion. Thankfully, MoveOn members joined with me, and together, we killed that deal in the Senate.
Today, such a deal would be unthinkable. Instead, Vice President Harris supports expanding Social Security. That's because together, we built a political movement that has changed the center of gravity in the Democratic Party.
Back in 2011, MoveOn was also one of the first groups to call for student debt cancellation, delivering more than 1.2 million petition signatures to Congress. At that time, I supported canceling student loan debt, while many Democrats in Congress did not. But because we spent time building a movement for change, under the Biden administration, we canceled student debt for nearly 5 million financially strapped Americans.
Or take the issue of prescription drugs. I have been saying for years that, at a bare minimum, we must negotiate prescription drug prices as every other developed country does. We recently cut the price of asthma inhalers under the Biden administration, capped out-of-pocket costs for prescription drugs, and got free vaccines to the American people, which made life measurably better for many Americans.
Now, we must continue building on that work. We must finally take bold action to address climate change, the existential threat of our lifetimes. We must finally fix our broken health care system and organize to make health care a right, not a privilege, for everyone in this country. We must push to raise the minimum wage, ensure pay equity for women, make public colleges and universities tuition-free, transform our energy system, pass immigration reform and criminal justice reform, and do much, much more.
On these issues, poll after poll shows the American people are not with the Republicans. But to make those polls translate into actual policies, we must do two things. First, the American people must show up and vote in great numbers to elect leaders who will listen to their concerns, and that means electing Vice President Kamala Harris and Governor Tim Walz. And then, we must continue building our political movement and pushing for progressive change.
Day after day, year after year, MoveOn and its members have stood with me, pushing the Democratic Party—and this country—toward a more progressive, just future. Over time, on issue after issue, the progressive agenda—our agenda—is winning. And within the Democratic Party, our efforts are having an impact.
It is not going to be easy, but we must have the guts to continue to take on and defeat a powerful and greedy ruling class and create a government that works for all, not just the few.
Because the alternative is unthinkable. If Trump returns to the White House, then let's be clear: Everything we've achieved could be undone. Our hard-fought victories on health care, climate action, workers' rights, and economic justice will be reversed by an administration that has no interest in serving the people—only the billionaire class and corporate elites. We will be lucky if our nation's democracy survives. And we can absolutely forget about making any progress on the issues that matter to working people in this country.
The choice is ours. In my view, we cannot afford to risk losing, because if we do, we'll be set back for a generation. Which is why I'm once again asking:
Thank you.
In solidarity,
–Senator Bernie Sanders
Source:
1. "Did Biden win by a little or a lot? The answer is ... yes." NBC News, December 20, 2020
https://act.moveon.org/go/186364?t=6&akid=408912%2E40999114%2Ea7IGn9
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