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Taking Stock of Joe Biden: What Hope Springs Volunteers are Finding at the Doors (an update) [1]

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Date: 2024-06-04  

[This is a companion diary to A Flight, A Voter and a Verdict]

I started writing this diary a week ago. Periodically, i try to write about the trends that Hope Springs from Field PAC [website] volunteers find at the doors, bring everything together. But i couldn’t finish it (last week).

graphic to be included in (last week’s) draft

Last week i would have written this: So last weekend was a holiday weekend. And the participation by our volunteers reflected that. But a lot of the volunteers who did come out felt like they just got a rude awakening. Seems like volunteers talked to fewer people and the ones who were home weren’t so gung-ho on the president. “I came out for this?” i suspect a few people asked themselves.

But that was last week. So last week.

Something happened. Ok, maybe a few things happened last week. But, i am told, that, for our Hope Springs volunteers, two significant things happened. The first was obvious: Donald Trump was convicted of 34 felonies. When i showed up in Mesa AZ last Saturday, quite a few volunteers were there with ‘34’ jerseys or t-shirts. (I didn’t know, the Dolphins had a famous 34; in fact, my wife has a ‘34’ Bears’ jersey, as well.) And while i don’t remember what i was told about that, my memory was something like, ‘oh, it’s all the rage right now.’

Here’s the funny thing: voters asked about them. “Why 34?” It gave those who showed up in the 34 jerseys a chance to remind voters about that unanimous verdict. Without having to bring it up.

But there was something else. Hope Springs volunteers got a stiff reminder that they had been a bit too ambitious. Over the winter, our volunteers decided they wanted to set a goal of 10 Million doors knocked before Labor Day. That would have tripled the number we knocked in 2023, all the way through to the election. And i reminded them of that, but, no, they liked that number. 10 Million doors knocked. That was the goal.

Hope Springs from Field is a grassroots political committee. At this point, we don’t have staff, we don’t have employees; we have volunteers. Not just volunteer canvassers, but volunteer organizers, as well. Organizers are the people who cut the turf and lead the trainings. They decide if the weather forecasts will interfere in our Saturday efforts. They are the people who have to talk to the cops, if someone gets too protective of their neighborhood. They are the ones who would have to cut turf for 10 Million doors. But no one said a word. (They left me out to hang, as it were.)

But we didn’t kept pace with our goal last month. We were more than 500,000 doors shorts. But did our volunteers back down? Hell, no; they doubled down. Last Saturday, it appears that we had 4,793 volunteers come out (3,809 was our prior high for 2024). And that was without Wisconsin (one of our more consistent states). I take that as a big FU from our peeps who don’t take well to my (incessant?) warnings that we’re not going to make it. They won’t back down.

trend lines after last Saturday’s canvasses

All that’s a very long way to get to the lead: Biden got a bump this week. A big bump. You might even call it a BFD bump.

Hope Springs volunteers normally talk to anywhere between 10,000 and 15,000 voters each Saturday. But here’s the thing, we don’t talk to Republicans (intentionally, sometimes we do); we focus on Democrats and unaffiliated voters — the people who are going to decide this election. The typical media poll you see talk to 400-1,200 people each poll.

Hope Springs from Field PAC began knocking on doors again on March 2nd. We target Democrats and unaffiliated voters with a systematic approach that reminds them not only that Democrats care, but Democrats are determined to deliver the best government possible to all Americans. Obviously, we rely on grassroots support, so if you support field/grassroots organizing, voter registration (and follow-up) and our efforts to protect our voters, we would certainly appreciate your support:

https://secure.actblue.com/donate/hopemobilization2024 Hope Springs from Field understands that volunteer to voter personal interactions are critical. Knocking on doors has repeatedly been found to be the most successful tactic to get voters to cast a ballot and that is the goal of what we do. We can tell by comparing responses to the voter file (VAN) that this bump did not come from independents or Republicans. This bump is almost exclusively from Democrats, as identified within VAN. Outside of Arizona, there was no discernible increase in approval from unaffiliated voters. The Trump verdict seems to be reminding voters why they liked Joe Biden in the first place.

Here’s why what we do at Hope Springs from Field PAC matters so much. We aren’t trying to prop up Biden and Democrats. We are reminding voters that Democrats Deliver! When we talk to a voter at their doorstep, we remind them that the law requires they be registered at their current address (and we’ve had lots of voters ask why!), we ask for their opinion about the issues of the day, and we ask about other concerns they have. If voters have a complaint that government can address, we ask if they want to fill out a Constituent Service Request. If they have witnessed voter intimidation, had their polling place open late or seen people harassing election (polling) workers, we ask if they want to write up an Incident Report. We remind voters that there are things they can do to make their neighborhood better. We suspect that we raise voter expectations about government in general.

But we have found that voters like to have someone who listens to their insights, complaints, frustrations and other observations. And that seems to be the biggest outcome of this kind of Early Organizing. There are states where this is our fourth year of knocking on doors in the same neighborhoods and we are finding more people opening their doors, more people expressing their opinions, more people wanting a say in their government. And this can only benefit Democrats.

We have to remember that:

There are a lot of unique and untested variables in this upcoming presidential election. It is the first race in more than 100 years between an incumbent and former incumbent president (both of whom would be the oldest ever to be inaugurated). It is the first to feature a major party nominee under multiple indictments. And it's the first presidential contest since the Supreme Court decision that overturned Roe v. Wade. At this point, however, the defining issue for this contest is a more traditional one: the economy.

Add to that this is the first presidential election since Roe v Wade was overturned. Republicans want us to forget, and some of us never will, but — as well found in the Ohio and NY-03 Special Election, abortion is an issue that lies beneath the surface but isn’t going away. “We have a group of voters who are not enthusiastic about either candidate, and many may well end up deciding not to decide.”

And that’s why this verdict, and voter reaction to it, is so important. It got Democrats “off the pot,” so to speak. It is getting Democrats back into the fight. “Voters’ perceptions of Trump remain negative overall (52% unfavorable to 46% favorable) and pretty well-baked in, which creates something of a ceiling for his electoral support.” We live with this reality, that:

True independents, on the other hand, are a fickle lot, prone to turn against the party they supported four years earlier. Their behavior recalls one of the great lines from the early 20th-century starlet Mae West, who once said, “Between two evils, I always pick the one I never tried before.”

Right now, independents are trending towards Biden, and this verdict helps that, but finding that Democrats are coming home is encouraging. Four years ago, Democrats choose Biden in the believe that he could beat Trump. And Biden did. Last Saturday, we got a reminder that beating Trump remains a top priority for the Democrats we talked to.

Hope Springs has targeted states that have competitive Senate races and/or the Electoral College in 2024, as well as Congressional Districts that are remapped in ways that offer opportunities or vulnerabilities for Democrats next year (specifically those where a Republican won a Congressional District that voted for Biden in 2022). There is a lot of work to be done! Especially since we have had to expand the map this year.

By starting early, and aiming towards super-compliance with some really, really onerous new voter regulations, Hope Springs from Field seeks to undermine that strategy, while informing voters about the new laws and regulations aimed at them. We are also — this being an election year — adding the Post Cards to New Voters component back into our Voter Outreach (you can sign up at the link), both New Voters we find at their doors as well as New Voters we target in the Voter File. Several of our Arizona organizers are also talking to Native American groups about replicating our Voter Matching service that Hope Springs provides for Black Churches. It’s a big year. There’s lots to be done, and, hopefully, we won’t have to suspend in-person voter contact because of a heatwave this year. Our biggest expense is the Voter File. But it is also a fixed cost. That won’t change as we raise and spend more money. Printing literature is our second largest cost. Printing and mailing our our Post Cards to New Voters is our third cost and paying the fees for ActBlue is the smallest of our monthly costs. 2023 Hope Springs expenses Hope Springs is a seat-of-the-pants grassroots-driven operation. We don’t have employees but we realize that to formalize and professionalize this effort that will have to change.

[END]
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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/6/4/2242886/-Taking-Stock-of-Biden?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=trending&pm_medium=web

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