RESOURCES for ELECTIONS TEAM LEADERS
This page is specifically designed to provide Elections Team Leaders with talking points, motivational language and resource links. Send your suggestions for content to leanleftvt@gmail.com and we’ll be happy to expand this Resource page!
Talking Points
States are restricting voter access, gerrymandering, and interfering with certification of elections through their state legislatures, county boards, state executives, and state judiciaries.
What happens in other states affects the balance of power in Congress, the outcome in the electoral college, and, ultimately, how we live in Vermont.
State-level rules and decision-makers impact voting and elections in so many ways:
State legislatures control the rules for voting, who has access, when and how votes are counted.
State legislatures control the drawing of Congressional districts, which determines the make-up of Congress and decisions that affect every U.S. citizen.
State judiciaries rule on cases challenging gerrymandering, voter ID laws, and other voting issues; disputed laws can reach the Supreme Court and have consequences for the whole country.
Election deniers in positions of power can disrupt the counting or certification of state election results for Congress and for President.
An important way to change what happens in Washington is to change who gets sent to Washington.
Why States Matter
About Lean Left Vermont
Talking Points
Lean Left mobilizes Vermonters to protect voting rights in states where voter suppression threatens to deprive voters of their rights.
Lean Left’s priority states are NH, NC, PA and VA.
We provide ongoing education, support and leadership development for volunteers, including effective ways they can take action to inform and help voters overcome voter access hurdles.
We help people make the connection between the role state entities play in making voting laws and the intentional strategies to disenfranchise blocks of voters and restrict voter access. We then make it easy for them to plug into electoral work.
We have longstanding relationships with organizations in our states, and we partner with them to identify effective ways for Vermonters to contribute. We know that these groups know what is best for their communities, and they understand the issues that will energize voters, so we take our lead from them. The phone banks we run during PowerHour and the ones we list on our Take Action page are phone banks we’ve vetted for effectiveness.
Talking Points
A series of studies about the effectiveness of voter contact methods on voter mobilization were conducted starting in 1998 and continuing through 2016. This is what they found when it came to Get Out the Vote (GOTV) efforts:
Canvassing was the most effective action, increasing voter turnout by 7%.
Phone calls increased voter turnout by 3.6-4%.
Texting increased voter turnout by 3% (in follow-up studies).
Postcards and other written materials like signs, flyers, etc. increased voter turnout by 1%.
All our actions make a difference, but we’re especially effective when we scale up by adding additional ways to take action. Postcards are good; combining postcards with other actions is even better. Make sure you Scale Up by including one more action in your Saving Democracy Tool Box.