Fighting Trump, Dems launch plan to elect thousands of local election supervisors

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Source: Politico

ELECTIONS

Fighting Trump, Dems launch plan to elect thousands of local election supervisors

The $80 million effort comes as Trump-friendly conspiracy theorists threaten to take over election offices in battleground states.

By ELENA SCHNEIDER

04/18/2022 04:30 AM EDT

A Democratic candidate recruiting group is pitching donors on an ambitious three-year program to find, train and support 5,000 candidates for local offices in charge of election administration, a sprawling national effort intended to fight subversion of future election results.

The program would recruit candidates in 35 states for everything from county probate judges in Alabama to county clerks in Kansas and county election board members in Pennsylvania -- all offices that handle elections and will be on voters' ballots between now and 2024. Spearheading the effort is Run for Something, a Democratic group that launched soon after Donald Trump's 2016 presidential victory to recruit candidates for local elections. Now, the group plans to raise $80 million over the next three years for this push, which would include at least a hundred staffers to support those candidates in-state, according to details and donor memos first shared with POLITICO.

Amanda Litman and Ross Morales Rocketto, Run for Something's co-founders, call the project "Clerk Work" -- a way-down-the-ballot effort of the type that Democratic donors and national groups have traditionally struggled to focus on. But as Trump continues to promulgate election conspiracy theories, the role of little-known election administrators -- charged with planning, implementing and certifying election results in a hyper-localized system -- has suddenly emerged as a key part of safeguarding American democracy. The move is part of a broader Democratic Party shift toward increasingly prioritizing state-based races, a shift from the massive attention and financing that go toward federal campaigns.

"Election subversion in 2024 is not going to be a mob storming the Capitol, it's going to be a county clerk in Michigan or a supervisor of elections in Florida who decides to fuck the whole thing up," Litman said. "The only way to make long-term democracy protection is by electing people who will defend democracy."

{snip}

Read more: https://www.politico.com/news/2022/04/18/democrats-recruiting-push-local-election-officers-00025733

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Hat tip, Joe.My.God.

Dems Launch Push To Elect 5000 Elections Supervisors
April 18, 2022

https://www.joemygod.com/2022/04/dems-launch-push-to-elect-5000-elections-supervisors/

{snip}

Fighting Trump, Democrats launch $80M plan to elect thousands of local election supervisors https://politico.com/news/2022/04/18/democrats-recruiting-push-local-election-officers-00025733 via
@ec_schneider

Link to tweet

politico.com
‘Defend democracy’: Dems launch massive recruiting push for local election officers
The $80 million effort comes as Trump-friendly conspiracy theorists threaten to take over election offices in battleground states.

[gab13by13]

1. Fantastic idea,

We need to fight against the rigged elections that the Putin party is planning.

[Chango10]

3. Brilliant ‼️

I will get involved which I’ve never done before …
San Diego, California

[Achilleaze]

2. Onward

[Cheezoholic]

4. About time! n/t

[Delmette2.0]

5. Absolutely! nt

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

6. Combating fraud is an extremely urgent.

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/stalin-vote-count-quote/
In 2006, Wikiquote dug up such a source: The Memoirs of Stalin’s Former Secretary by Boris Bazhanov, published in 2002. Translated from the Russian, the version which, according to Bazhanov, was uttered in 1923 by Stalin in reference to a vote in the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, was this:
"I consider it completely unimportant who in the party will vote, or how; but what is extraordinarily important is this — who will count the votes, and how."

[BumRushDaShow]

7. Excellent!!!! This is the type of thing that the group "Indivisible" did before the 2018 election

https://indivisible.org/

Recruit and train interested citizens on what types of local elective offices are available (where many are unfilled and/or lack Democrats as opponents), show how to run for office including what is needed for filing, and guiding through through the primary/general election process.

Stacy Abrams has done similar to get people "engaged".

This is true "grassroots" that the GOP has been doing for some time now - including way back when the Koch's "Americans for Prosperity" were funding candidates to run for positions on local elected school boards. And here we are today.

The embryonic stages of the Koch's efforts started over a decade ago -

Politics
August 15, 2011
How the Koch Brothers Backed Public-School Segregation

Andy Kroll


[UDPATE: In an August 16 letter to Brave New Foundation Robert Greenwald, Dallas Woodhouse, Americans for Prosperity’s North Carolina state director, attacked the premise of Greenwald’s film, saying it “falsely claims” AFP was involved in the 2009 Wake County school board elections. Woodhouse asserts that AFP “did not spend a single dime on those elections” nor did it engage in any get-out-the-vote or voter education efforts. “AFP played no role in the 2009 WCPSS election,” Woodhouse asserts. Read his full response.

In its response to AFP, Brave New Foundation stood by its story. BNF pointed to several statements of AFP-NC’s in support of its claims, including a 2008 blog post of Woodhouse’s saying AFP-NC “is on record as supporting the parents of WakeCARES, through significant financial contributions as well as other support.” In the fall of 2009, WakeCARES endorsed the four school board candidates who opposed Wake County’s busing policy, and a former AFP-NC director later credited WakeCARES with paving the way for the four candidates’ victories. BNF alleged AFP “funneled” financial support to the candidates through Art Pope, a wealthy Raleigh businessman and an AFP national director, who gave more than $15,000 to the Wake GOP which in turn spent nearly all of its political donations in 2009 on backing the four conservative school board candidates. AFP-NC’s Woodhouse also told Newsweek in January that his group did voter education and mobilized volunteers for the school board election.]

At first glance, the billionaire libertarian Koch brothers and the Wake County, North Carolina, school board couldn’t be more disparate. Charles and David Koch, the brains behind the massive Koch Industries conglomerate and the funders of so many right-wing political causes, are national figures, credited with (or accused of, depending on your political persuasion) launching the tea party movement and waging war on the Obama administration and its agenda. The Wake County public school board is, well, just that.

In reality, there are deep connections between the Kochs and Wake County, and it’s all about the money. The latest installment in the left-leaning Brave New Foundation’s “Koch Brothers Exposed” video series claims that a Koch-founded and funded outfit, Americans for Prosperity, fueled a campaign to “resegregate” the schools of Wake County, a prosperous area in central North Carolina that’s home to the cities of Raleigh and Cary, among others.

(snip)

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2011/08/koch-brothers-school-segregation-americans-prosperity/

[flying_wahini]

8. Hell we can't even find enough reg. poll workers- couldn't open up all areas in the regular primary.

A poll supervisor has to do so many jobs and commit to a 15 hour work day.

As a (Texas)regular poll worker I think it’s a great idea but most of these jobs are done by people who do it once and they are gone. Because we don’t have enough people we start work at 5:30-6 am to put together the poll and assembly of the computers, cords, tables, …..
Work all day and deconstruct it. Exhausting work.

If you REALLY want to help, Volunteer at the polls. We need help!

[usonian]

9. Great Stuff. I am copying info to my GOTV thread.

Stand Up and Fight!
https://democraticunderground.com/100216380145

[oldsoftie]

10. YES. And vote in GOP primaries, if possible, to BEAT the trump virus.

I want to see ALL of trumps hand picked fools be big LOSERS on primary day.
If the Democrats party doesnt have a primary race in your state, vote in the GOP primary. Here in GA, no one is running agains Stacy Abrams; I'll be voting AGAINST David Perdue.
Do the same in Liz Cheney's district. Which will BE a red seat regardless. BEAT the trumper.

[Hekate]

11. KnR

[DinahMoeHum]

12. This is why I started being a poll worker several years back.

Yep, we're the ones behind that desk you lean over to sign your name and get your ballot.

We're the ones who are up around 4-4:30 am to get to the polling place by 5 am to set up shop.

Polls in New York are open from 6 am - 9 pm.

And after we close up shop, phone in results, and one of us (usually me) delivers the big blue suitcase to a Board of Elections drop-off point (usually a city hall), we don't get home until after 10-10:30 pm.

But we do it. Primary and/or special elections and general elections. Year in and year out.

[Novara]

13. They have to do this

...to counter the Rs stealing elections.

Finally, one case of fighting back and playing their game.

[DonCoquixote]

14. YES

let's actually play some f*** hardball! I am nto sayign out sleaze the gop, but can we act like we are out to WIN?