📝 To the Editor: Putting Pen to Paper and Shaping Our Future through Focused Grassroots Activism
Dear reader:
Welcome, and thank you for being here!
At the risk of dating myself…do you remember, before digital media was king, paging through the newspaper, hands covered in greasy splotches of black ink, perusing the letters to the editor of your family’s favorite publication? The concept of a letter to the editor is both time-tested and as salient as ever as we navigate these turbulent times in our national (and international) politics. When we write to the editor, we have something important to say, an idea to amplify, an impetus to galvanize others around shared outrage or accord.
In a sense, grassroots activism and voting, in service of a principle, value, or shared belief, are letters to the editor writ large — or, put differently, love letters to democracy and our republic.
Like many of you, I’ve had a wellspring of things to say over the last ~10 years. Starting in 2020, I put pen to paper to amplify the idea that voting is power. Since then, I have (hand)written over 7,000 postcards and letters (and counting!) to prospective voters around the country, encouraging my fellow citizens to make their voices heard in races up and down the ballot. All elections matter, every vote matters, and every act of outreach to a potential voter matters as we chart our shared future.
Gripped with anxiety, fear, and a healthy dose of cynicism beginning in 2016, I consciously decided to channel all of the time and mental energy that I had previously spent complaining, raging, and catastrophizing into grassroots activism and voter outreach. The only way out was through, and the only way through was by mobilizing Democrats, Independents, and disillusioned Republicans around a shared responsibility to uphold justice, equality, democracy, and sanity.
In the lead-up to the 2020 presidential election, I sent tens of thousands of text messages to voters around the country to get out the vote for progressive candidates and causes. I connected with some lovely voters via text and was buoyed by their gratitude and camaraderie; I encountered resistance and hateful vitriol from others.
Along the way, as I explored different pathways for engaging my fellow citizens, I discovered that personal outreach in the form of postcarding / letter-writing is a highly effective way to mobilize voters. Research from Progressive Turnout Project / Postcards to Swing States over the course of several years (and across a diverse sample of campaigns) shows that handwritten postcards increase Democratic voter turnout by 1.3%, which really does matter with razor-thin margins deciding the outcome in the races that matter (in 2020, Biden won Arizona by just over 10,000 votes, and there are many similar examples down the ballot).
The quantitative data itself is compelling; more on this in a future post or two. On a personal level, the act and experience of reaching out to voters is both cathartic (a potent antidote to the negativity and polarization that have stained our politics) and a powerful (re)affirmation that we really do have the power to effect change. Indeed, that power is right at your fingertips — the simple act of contacting a few voters could be the force multiplier that makes all the difference in an upcoming election.
To the Editor is a platform for sharing my grassroots volunteer work (as well as opportunities for you to get involved! 🙌🏼), a reflection on why grassroots activism is more crucial than ever, and, where relevant, observations (and critiques) of the news / news media. The critiques are meant not for the sake of criticism, but as a reminder of the critically high stakes in our local, state, and national politics — and our collective power to change the narrative about democracy, justice, and equality through focused activism.
All of my content is free, and I hope that you will share liberally with friends and family, especially as the November 2024 election draws closer.
I pay for all of my volunteer voter outreach work out of my own pocket as a love letter to democracy, so I am extra grateful for your support via a paid subscription. 100% of revenue from paid subscriptions supports my volunteer postcarding / letter-writing efforts; by paying monthly, you are directly funding outreach to prospective voters who will have the opportunity to vote in critical elections up and down the ballot in 2024 and beyond.
Thank you for following along, and for your activism! 🗳️💪🏼💙
Annie
