Here at Contest Every Race, we have a lot to celebrate! Movement Labs, the incubator and consulting firm we are housed under, has committed to expanding our grants program to unprecedented numbers during this critically important election year.
Let’s take a minute to look back on how far we’ve come. In 2021, the first year of the grants program, 40 counties took part in the program across just four states. Today, we are thrilled to be partnering with a staggering 350 counties spanning 29 states! In a critical election year such as 2024, there is no doubt that the power of local political organizing will make a difference in defeating Trump and building progressive political power.
Participating grantees receive $500 per quarter, training, free texting, and support from a designated Contest Every Race Organizer. Grantees commit to creating strategic plans and completing monthly actions based on increasing community engagement, recruiting volunteers, and supporting those who express interest in running for office. Now, let’s look at what teams in our grants program were up to in the month of April- which was focused around voter registration.
Let’s look at what some of our teams were up to in April.
Great things happen when community leaders sit down to brainstorm. In the month of April, grantees were tasked with organizing a voter registration drive. This proved to be a bit of a challenge for the Juneau County democrats of Wisconsin. A location that normally would serve as the perfect spot- a local trade school- didn’t have a large space where students typically gathered, making it difficult to reach out to potential new voters. After some thought, Brenda, a member of the Juneau County Dems, suggested reaching out to her friend, who is a social studies teacher at a local high school. After receiving the administration's approval, they implemented a voter registration curriculum, largely based on information available on myvotewi.gov. They even partnered with a volunteer from League of Women Voters to present to the social studies class. The result- ten new registered voters!
Juneau Dems are excited to build on this effort- after all, several members are retired school teachers themselves. Now, they’re reaching out to the other four high schools in the county to ask if they are interested in implementing their voter registration curriculum. They’ve also created informative posters that they will offer to place in all five area high schools, as well as public libraries. Initial conversations with school officials have been positive surrounding this nonpartisan effort, and we are excited to see this outreach grow throughout the rest of the school year and into fall of 2024. In the words of chair Leon Radant, reaching out to high schoolers was simply “the right thing to do”- we couldn’t agree more!
In Warren County, Tennessee, local dem chapter member Jennifer Kirby took it upon herself to bring along her personal tablet to public events to help with voter registration. Using tablets as a tool turned out to be a hit- people preferred using them to pen and paper. Plus, a huge added bonus is passersby are more likely to start and finish registration if given a tablet compared to taking a paper application home to fill out and return later. It proved to be a fast and more convenient way to get people registered. Realizing this, Jennifer thought to reach out to a former colleague at the local Verizon store to see if they had any extra tablets lying around they’d be willing to part with. In a short time, the Warren County Dems were donated three tablets from customers donating their previous devices! They have been put to use at any event where Warren County Dems have a booth- for example, next month’s events commemorating Juneteenth will definitely have “registration tablets” on hand!
Creative problem solving is critically important in overcoming the challenges non-urban Democrats face- and the Juneau County and Warren County Dems are testaments to that! Our county partners continue to utilize their network, relationships, and resources to the utmost in order to organize and build political power, and that’s something worth celebrating!
