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WHERE ARE THE CHILDREN?
It’s one of the great ironies of our society that one of the groups with the most at stake in our elections has the lowest voter turnout. Only 48% of American 18-24 year-olds voted in 2020 as compared to the national average of 61%. Americans 25-44 years of age turned out at the somewhat higher rate of 55%, but still underperformed the national average as well as 44-65 year-olds (66%). The top performers were our oldest citizens, 65+ year-olds, 72% of whom voted.
Especially at a time when one of the major messages of the Democratic presidential campaign is “passing the torch to a new generation,” it is frustrating that so many young voters simply don’t care enough to show up. We should all work to boost the participation of younger voters. If you are a younger voter, talk to your peers about the importance of voting. If you have children or grandchildren or contact with younger voters, tell them voting matters because when one doesn’t vote, they...
- give their vote to someone else
- allow bad actors to assume positions of power
- give up their voice in influencing public policy priorities, such as taxes, education, access to healthcare, and reproductive rights
- allow other people to make decisions for them on bread-and-butter issues like local tax rates, tuition at public colleges, local budgets affecting city and town services.
Let's face it: If voting doesn't matter, why do Republicans work so hard to take away other people's right to vote?
As always,
Your faithful editor
In This Issue
- Make A Plan to Vote (Very) Early
- Meet & Greet -- Best Ever
- Upcoming Events
- More Things You Can Do
- Vote "Yes" Yard Signs Are Available
- Get a Kamala "Forward" T- Shirt -- Act Now
- Honey For Money - Deadline Extended
- In Case You Missed It
- Extra Credit Quiz
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MAKE A PLAN TO VOTE (VERY) EARLY
There are many good reasons to take advantage of early voting, which starts in Connecticut on Monday, October 21. Voting early means that you won't need to worry about something going wrong on Election Day, such as your car breaking down, a sick child needing to be taken to the doctor, or being called in to work or being called away unexpectedly. And of course, avoiding the possibility of long lines on Election Day is another great reason. But there is another reason that really matters: When you vote early, the political campaigns will be notified from the publicly-available data that they get from the state elections records. That knowledge saves campaigns the effort and cost of calling to remind you to vote. Instead, campaigns can focus on calling others who have yet to vote -- and your own phone will ring less (and you will get fewer texts). Bottom line: If you want to help, vote on the first day of early voting or as soon as possible thereafter.
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MEET & GREET -- BEST EVER
Thank you, everyone, who came to our candidate Meet & Greet on Sunday at the Town Grove. We had a standing-room-only crowd and our biggest turnout ever! Along with delicious food – much of it provided by our amazing corps of volunteer cooks, bakers, and chocolatiers – we had a great opportunity to hear from State Rep. Maria Horn and State Senate candidate Justin Potter about the stakes in November. Many attendees also had the chance to learn, for the first time, about the importance of the ballot question to allow no-excuse absentee ballots in Connecticut (Please vote “Yes”).
There are too many people to thank by name for their work in making this our best event ever. However, one person does deserve a shout-out: Joanne Hayhurst raised her hand and took charge from the outset, organizing the platoon of volunteers and vendors with outstanding attention to detail and calmness. Joanne shows that Democrats get stuff done!
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October 6 from 12-3pm: Doorknock for State Rep. Maria Horn and other CT Dems in Washington. Never knocked before? No problem! You will be trained and paired with a pro. It's a great way to meet neighbors and have meaningful conversations about the importance of voting. Click here to sign up. Or contact Cindy Barrett at 860-781-5066 or cbingoshen57@gmail.com.
October 7 from 1-3pm: “Messaging Mondays” with the Sharon Democratic Town Committee (DTC) at The Edward, 19 West Main Street in Sharon. The Sharon DTC hosts twice-a-month gatherings to write postcards to voters. Click here to sign up - or just show up and bring a friend! For more info call 860-364-0362.
October 7 at 5:30pm: The Sharon Democratic Town Committee - Regular monthly meeting. Everyone is welcome to attend in person on the second floor of Sharon Town Hall, 63 Main Street, in Sharon, or remotely on Zoom. Please email sharontowndemocrats@gmail.com for a link.
October 10 from 2-5pm: Doorknock for State Rep. Maria Horn and other CT Dems in Kent. Meet at the Northwest CT Democratic Headquarters at 27 North Main Street, 2nd floor, in Kent. Click here to sign up. Or contact Cindy Barrett at 860-781-5066 or cbingoshen57@gmail.com.
October 15 at 7pm: Salisbury Democratic Town Committee. This regular monthly SDTC meeting will be held at Town Hall and via Zoom. The SDTC is committed to promoting good government and democratic principles at every level of our civic life. The SDTC recruits candidates for local elective and appointed offices and supports the most qualified Democrats to run in municipal, state, and national elections. Meetings are usually on the third Tuesday of every month. Contact Al Ginouves to receive a copy of the agenda and the link to the meeting. All are welcome.
October 17 from 2-5pm: Doorknock for State Rep. Maria Horn and other CT Dems in Kent, Washington, and Cornwall. Meet at the Northwest CT Democratic Headquarters at 27 North Main Street, 2nd floor, in Kent and then knock doors in Kent, Washington, and Cornwall. Click here to sign up. Or contact Cindy Barrett at 860-781-5066 or cbingoshen57@gmail.com.
October 19 from 1-4pm: Doorknock for State Rep. Maria Horn and other CT Dems in North Canaan. Never knocked before? No problem! You will be trained and paired with a pro. It's a great way to meet neighbors and have meaningful conversations about the importance of voting. Click here to sign up. Or contact Cindy Barrett at 860-781-5066 or cbingoshen57@gmail.com.
October 20 from 5-7pm: Vote on Day 1 Phone Bank. Join State Rep. Maria Horn and others at the Northwest CT Democratic Headquarters at 27 North Main Street, 2nd floor, in Kent to call voters urging them to VOTE on October 21, the first day of in-person early voting in CT. There will be special activities to make it fun and celebrate this milestone in ballot access. There's no need to wait until November 5 to vote!
October 24 from 2-5pm: Doorknock for State Rep. Maria Horn and other CT Dems in Kent, Washington, and Cornwall. Meet at the Northwest CT Democratic Headquarters at 27 North Main Street, 2nd floor, in Kent and then knock doors in Kent, Washington, and Cornwall. Click here to sign up. Or contact Cindy Barrett at 860-781-5066 or cbingoshen57@gmail.com.
November 14 from 7-9: Book talk with Jonathan Alter at the White Hart Inn. New York Times bestselling author and presidential historian Jonathan Alter will discuss his latest book, American Reckoning: Inside Trump's Trial - And My Own. The book is an eviscerating account of the ups and downs and colorful characters in the first-ever criminal trial of a president as well as a personal reflection on our democracy drawn from his four decades in journalism. During that time, Alter has written about other American politicians and presidents, including Jimmy Carter, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Joe Biden, Franklin Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln. Alter will be interviewed by John Hendrickson, a senior editor at The Atlantic, where he reports on politics and culture. His book Life on Delay, a reported memoir about his lifelong struggle to speak, was named one of the best books of 2023 by The New Yorker, one of the best audiobooks of the year by Audible. To reserve a seat at this free event, please RSVP.
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Now more than ever, what you do matters. Voting has already started in many places with the mailing of absentee ballots. Many voters are still undecided or not sufficiently motivated to vote. Those votes are up for grabs and could be decisive in many races. Seize the moment and join one of the many efforts to move those voters into our column. Regardless of where you live, you can do something. | |
Saving Democracy – Our local advocacy group, Saving Democracy, enters the final leg of its nearly year-long postcarding project with its sessions on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons from 2 to 4pm at the White Hart Inn. The crowd each week often fills the Inn's entire dining room. During the final push of this electoral season the group will also meet on Friday evenings for "Postcarding Pub." All are welcome to join on October 4,11, and 18 from 5:30-7pm in the White Hart ballroom. Snacks are provided during the evening sessions and drinks are available to purchase. Currently the group is sending cards to Democrats in swing states reminding them to vote. It is easy – cards, address labels, and the scripts are provided. Voter turnout will have a big impact on the outcome of the elections in November and these postcards – and your hard work – have a positive impact on turnout.
The last day of writing cards together will be Thursday, October 24. The final batch is expected to push the total output for this year to 100,000 cards! All postcarders are welcome and encouraged to join on that day for a special celebration. For more information, contact savingdemocracyct@gmail.com.
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All in for North Carolina (AINC) – The Harris campaign recently designated North Carolina as the most likely state to flip blue this year. They’ve already opened 14 offices in NC. Biden lost the state by only 75,000 votes, the smallest margin of any state. More than 235,000 new voters have been registered in NC, the largest number of any swing state. Join AINC on Sunday and Wednesday nights for phonebanks from 6-8pm to recruit volunteers and engage voters in all-important Mecklenburg County (home of Charlotte). For more information and to sign up click here.
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Make Calls to Register Voters in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. These states are must-wins for Kamala Harris, but the latest polls show them as toss-ups, and they are likely to be decided by just a handful of votes. That's why registering voters is so important.
Join Rust Belt Rising's virtual voter registration program to make sure that every likely Democrat is registered to vote. In 2020, this program produced over 26,000 Wisconsin voter registrations and Joe Biden won Wisconsin by just 20,682 votes! Here's why this program is so effective: Rust Belt Rising targets people who would likely vote Democratic but are unregistered at their current address. It then mails these targets a pre-filled voter registration form with a motivational flyer and postage for returning the form to their elections clerk. Volunteers like us then make follow-up calls to encourage these people to complete the easy process of registering. This project uses a simple autodialer that makes the work easy and fast.
Click here to sign up for Wisconsin:
Saturdays -11am-1pm (EDT)
Mondays – 6pm to 8pm (EDT)
Click here to sign up for Pennsylvania:
Wednesdays – 6pm to 8pm (EDT)
Thursdays – 4pm to 6pm (EDT)
For details or questions, please contact Lee Greenhouse at (917) 701-5739 or Lrgreenhouse@gmail.com.
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VOTE "YES" LAWN SIGNS ARE AVAILABLE
Connecticut voters have an important question on the November ballot that would allow all voters to request an absentee ballot without having to provide an excuse. Thirty-five states and the District of Columbia already allow this commonsense access to mail-in ballots. Approving this change to the CT state constitution would be a big step forward for our state's voters. Data from other states shows that no-excuse absentee ballots boost voter participation across the board, and importantly among younger voters and other groups with lower rates of voting. But we need to get the word out so that a majority of voters will vote YES on this question. If you live anywhere in NW CT and would like a yard sign, please contact Lee Greenhouse at Lrgreenhouse@gmail.com.
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GET A KAMALA "FORWARD" T-SHIRT -- ACT NOW
If you have been coveting the Kamala T-shirts you’ve been seeing around town, you’re in luck. Local artists Victoria and Mike Selbach, who created the iconic T-shirts, have offered to make more available. But this is a very limited time offer. You can order one or more shirts by emailing mike.selbach@gmail.com. Please provide your name, email address, phone number, and the number of T-shirts you want and in what sizes (Small, Medium, Large, X-Large).
The cost is $30 per t-shirt. Proceeds will be donated to The States Project, which supports candidates in winnable state races across the country. Payment can be made at the time of pick up.
Orders must be received by Mike Selbach by 6pm this Wednesday, October 2.
Shirts will be available in about a week and will be available for pick up at the White Hart.
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HONEY FOR MONEY - DEADLINE EXTENDED | |
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Thank you, everyone who has participated in our "Honey for Money" fundraiser. The Salisbury Democratic Town Committee (DTC) is spending heavily in this election cycle educating voters about our great candidates. We appreciate every dollar donated and work hard to put it to good use. The good news is that Justin Potter (yes, the same Justin who is our candidate for State Senate) has generously donated a case of his delicious honey to the DTC, so we are extending our fundraiser for a few more weeks. You can still get an 8 oz. jar of this extraordinary honey by making a $100 donation to the DTC from now until October 15. To get in on the action, just click here to donate online.
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IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Trump Says Jewish Voters Would Be To Blame If He Loses. Donald Trump said recently in back-to-back speeches that he would hold Jewish voters responsible if he loses the election, suggesting that they owe him their support because of his position on Israel and questioning the sanity of Jewish Democrats. Trump also repeatedly insisted that Kamala Harris’s election would directly result in the elimination of Israel, and he accused her, without evidence, of hating Israel and Jews. (Her husband is Jewish, as are Trump’s grandchildren by his daughter Ivanka, who converted to Judaism.) At one point in a speech, Trump appeared to use Israel and American Jews interchangeably, stating, “Israel, I believe, has to defeat her.... More than any people on earth, Israel has to defeat her.” For more read this article in The Washington Post.
Republicans’ Electoral College Edge, Once Seen as Ironclad, Looks to Be Fading. Ever since Donald Trump’s stunning victory in 2016 — when he lost the popular vote by almost three million votes but still triumphed with over 300 electoral votes — many who follow politics have believed Republicans hold an intractable advantage in the Electoral College. But there’s growing evidence to support a surprising possibility: His once formidable advantage in the Electoral College is not as ironclad as many presumed and might be shrinking. If polling trends hold, the Republican advantage in the Electoral College will be at its lowest level in a decade. Read this analysis in The New York Times.
Debunking the Myth of the ‘Migrant Crime Wave.’ In the past few months, politicians and certain media outlets have latched on to a narrative that recent immigrants, especially undocumented ones, are causing spikes in crime. Instead of gathering data and examining the issue empirically, they are making this broad assertion based on highly publicized individual incidents of crime by undocumented immigrants. Data does not support claims that the United States is experiencing a surge in crime caused by immigrants. Research does not support the view that immigrants commit crimes or are incarcerated at higher rates than native-born Americans. In fact, immigrants might have less law enforcement contact compared to nonimmigrants. Read the details in this report from the Brennan Center for Justice.
Trump and Vance’s Springfield Smear is a Microcosm of Their Entire Campaign - opinion piece by Sidney Blumenthal. After Donald Trump’s disastrous debate with Kamala Harris, he decided to center his campaign on a single incendiary issue: “In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs. The people that came in, they’re eating the cats. They’re eating the pets of the people that live there.” Even after being corrected by moderator David Muir, Trump insisted his statement was factual. Trump’s obsession was not an absurd, spasmodic or random act. It was not an off-ramp along the winding road of his incoherent digressions. Trump homed in on the lie as a strategic necessity. Trump understood that its outrageousness would make it unforgettable and repeatable. The falsehood served to personify the fears he routinely seeks to arouse of an alien invasion. The dogs and cats substitute for his usual horror story about a young woman murdered by an immigrant in the country illegally. He moved the blood libel to lovable pets. Read the opinion piece in The Guardian.
The Senate Isn’t Cooked. Not Yet At Least. With just six weeks to go, conventional wisdom is that control of the Senate is likely to flip to the Republican Party. It’s a reflection of the grim underlying map for Democrats, who have a narrow one-seat majority but must defend roughly two-thirds of the 34 Senate seats up for election this year -- a seemingly indefensible position, with almost no margin for error. Already, Democrats are as good as one seat down because of the near certainty that retiring Senator Joe Manchin’s seat in West Virginia goes Republican. Yet a few races in the unlikeliest places could unravel everything. Beware the longshots! Read this analysis from Politico.
State Attorney General Races Are Heating Up With Big Implications for Democracy. North Carolina is among ten states that will hold attorney general elections on November 5, reflecting a trend of lawmakers leaving Congress to pursue the job, which has traditionally been a stepping stone to the governorship. Unlike a member of Congress, an attorney general can have an impact on day one. An attorney general can bring litigation on behalf of states, enforce laws, and issue advisory opinions, all of which sets a statewide agenda. Read more about what is at stake in this article in Democracy Docket.
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EXTRA CREDIT QUIZ
Based on the actual billboards shown below which party is more qualified to govern?
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(A) Republican billboard in Arizona
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(B) Democratic billboard in Pennsylvania
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SHARE YOUR NEWS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS
Please send us any news or announcements that you would like us to share with our community. We publish on the first of each month, so please send us any submissions at least one week in advance. Please submit to the editor at salsdemsnews@gmail.com.
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