John, this is a horrifying fact we all must reckon with.
The extremists behind January 6th and Trump’s Big Lie are already laying out their plans to sabotage our elections in 2022, 2024, and beyond.
And even worse? They’re doing it in broad daylight.
As I write to you, shadowy online disinformation networks – left unchecked by social media sites like Facebook and Twitter – are ginning up new lies about the 2020 elections, nearly a year and a half after the fact.
Now, state lawmakers have used those lies as justification for sweeping, tyrannical anti-voter legislation – even asserting the right to overturn elections if they decide that “fraud” occurred.
John, they have millions of dollars, a far-right media echo chamber, and an entire political party backing them up. The only way you and I can fight back is organized people power – armed with the truth.
That’s precisely why we’re going bigger than ever for this year’s Protect the Vote 2022 effort – our response to the all-out assault our democracy has come under.
And today, I’m writing because I want to let you know about our plan to stop this poison at the source – and how thousands of Common Cause members like you have already stepped up to help make our plan a reality.
You see John, we’ve spent decades defending our democracy against any threat it faces. But online disinformation has popped up in recent years as a new, high-tech, and ultra-vicious way to undermine the public’s trust in the values we all share.
We started this work in 2018, and frankly, we were shocked by how widely – and how quickly – anti-voting disinfo was spreading in public online channels. And, we knew it’d only get worse for 2020 – which is why we built up a community of volunteers who infiltrate and monitor private Facebook groups – where the lion’s share of disinformation campaigns get started.
This operation gets results – we’ve flagged thousands of pieces of disinfo, countered them with facts from trustworthy sources, and gotten the most egregious ones removed entirely.
But John, everything I’ve seen so far this year is telling me we need to go even bigger.
After all, former President Trump has made willingness to repeat his Big Lie a pre-condition for his coveted endorsement. That means we must prepare for even more disinformation attacks than we faced in 2020.
So, with your help, we’re ramping up our volunteer effort early – training even more Common Cause members to fight lies with the truth – without amplifying or allowing them to spread.
And, we’ll do it all alongside our traditional, in-person Protect The Vote 2022 effort, placing thousands of trained volunteers at polling places to help make sure no voter is left behind.
You’ve seen firsthand how far these extremists will go to disrupt our democracy. Can I count on you to step up and fight? Please rush your contribution of $3 or more to help us STOP disinformation about our elections for good >>
John, I get worried when I read the latest reports on extremist social media lies from our volunteer team.
But at the same time, I’m encouraged: every data point marks another piece of disinformation that we’ve been able to track, push back on, and stop in its tracks – before it spreads any further.
I hope you will join me so we can turn the tide against this menace, before it’s too late.
Thank you,
Emma Steiner, Disinformation Analyst
and the rest of the team at Common Cause
