Dear John,
I arrived at the University of Houston Downtown campus just before 11am to join our volunteers for a full day of registration and action.
UHD is a really special place. It is the often-overlooked sister institution to the University of Houston main campus. But it is its own place. Separate mascot (Gator, not Cougar), different student body (more Houston-based, fewer students from other parts of the state) and a real drive to prove itself on its own terms.
For the next four hours, we met, registered and—importantly!—committed to staying in touch with every student we met. As you know, our organizing model is different from any other out there. Our volunteers maintain personal contact with the voters they meet for the duration of the election year, ready to answer questions on voter ID, election dates, candidates and also there to prompt, nudge and push these voters to cast those ballots. In 2024, the young voters in our network turned out at a rate of 79.5%!
And this isn't a transaction. It's personal for us. We take the time to introduce ourselves, ask the students their names, understand their concerns, answer their questions and listen to their stories. I learned a lot yesterday by doing just that. These young Texans told me about their lives, how in many cases they are the first in their family to go to college, how they live in mixed immigration status families that are afraid to go out in public, and concerned about what it will mean for them to be registered and to vote.
I met a young man who was picking up his diploma and was there with his mom. He's a U.S. citizen and she's a legal permanent resident. But not only has she produced this recent graduate, one of her daughters was her high school's valedictorian and is now at Duke and the other finished top three in her class and is attending Vanderbilt. She, and so many others that I met at UHD, underscore the fact that immigrants make this country great.
At 3pm we started a town hall program, open to all students, faculty and staff, organized by the UHD Democrats. In front of a full house I had the opportunity to make my case for doing more than just voting to overcome the challenges we face. It's going to take the kind of organizing work that we're doing at UHD and all across the state. I asked these students to join us as volunteers, and many answered the call. I also had the chance to hear their questions and share my perspective on a range of issues—gerrymandering, immigration, ICE, and how we can persuade people who voted for Trump, and now might be feeling some remorse, to join the effort to save our country.
After grabbing a quick bite (Nua Thai—really good!), I met our volunteers for a happy hour at Axlerad's. After a big, long day of meeting, registering, and talking with students it was fun to share stories, get to know each other a little better and meet some of our newer volunteers.
Our tally at the end of the day was 251 conversations with students, each of those students agreeing to let our volunteers stay in touch with them to help them vote. We verified registrations for 185 and registered or updated registration for 66. And remember, that's just one day, on one campus. Our volunteers and organizers are in every part of the state doing this work every day. I could tell that everyone felt exhausted, but the good kind of exhaustion, where you know that what you did has made a difference. In the face of so much that is so wrong in the country right now, knowing that we are helping change things for the better—one voter at a time—feels pretty good.
As I write this, we are about to leave for another full day of voter registration work on the Prairie View A&M campus in Waller County, about an hour from Houston. I'm looking forward to it and grateful that we get to do this work.
Thank you for supporting us and keeping us going.
Beto
Powered by People volunteers reach, register and turn out voters by meeting them where they are and building personal relationships to significantly improve the likelihood that they vote.
