Hi there,
My name is Zack Malitz, and I’m the Managing Director here at Swing Left. Recently I had a long chat about our new Ground Truth program with Micah Sifry for his Substack newsletter, “The Connector.” It was a great conversation, and I wanted to fill you in on what we talked about. If you’d like, you can read the full article here.
Why Ground Truth?
The first thing we talked about was why we’re putting so much effort and so many resources behind Ground Truth. It comes down to the fact that, although everyone has their own theories about why Democrats lost the last election, we don’t actually know what the barriers to voting for Democrats are.
Plus, existing canvassing methods aren’t really designed in a way that will help us find out. Traditional campaigns start talking to voters way too late, focus only on highly likely voters, rely on brief, transactional interactions that are heavily scripted, and use archaic tech and data infrastructure that actually stymies tactical innovation.
That’s why we’re going all in on Ground Truth: to answer definitively what voters’ barriers are to voting for Democrats, and gain insights about how to persuade them that traditional canvassing programs aren’t set up to do.
What Ground Truth Does Differently
Instead of relying on outdated methods, we decided to spend a couple of months having conversations with people where we simply ask them open-ended questions, including what their barriers are to voting for Democrats. Then, using new custom-built tech, we're aggregating what we hear and looking for what voters are thinking about that we might not think to ask about in a traditional survey.
Many campaigns use the voter file to guide who volunteers talk to, but a 2021 study of three commercial voter files found that in 2012 about 23% of potential voters weren’t listed or were listed with incorrect contact information—a striking number of people not to talk to. The voter file is an incredibly valuable resource, but we can’t only talk to people who are accurately listed. Instead, we’re talking to everyone.
And thanks to a new Federal Election Commission (FEC) ruling, we’re able to run Ground Truth in coordination with campaigns—allowing us to share insights directly with state parties and individual campaigns.
In addition to generating valuable canvassing data and sharing it to help Democrats win in swing seats this year, this work can improve the voter file for Democrats running in these swing districts in the future. It’s also innovating not just how Swing Left engages with voters, but provides a new model that the broader Democratic ecosystem can learn from.
What We’ve Learned So Far
I had the opportunity to run the first Ground Truth canvas in Oregon’s 5th Congressional District, and the raw, unfiltered experience of the voters was pretty eye-opening.
I knocked on a woman’s door, and the first thing she said was “You don’t want to talk to me, I’m a Republican.” I replied that I definitely wanted to talk to her, and after a few minutes, she told me that what bothers her is that Republicans and Democrats are both so old. I told her that I agreed, that I find it embarrassing too, and then ten minutes into the conversation, she said “I actually sometimes vote for Democrats.” That’s a voter we can try to win—one conventional canvassing models would have had us skip talking to.
What we found is that the caricatures of people you get, especially from people in the Washington D.C. area, just do not match the on the ground reality of what people are like and what their lives are like.
Plus, having a more human, less stilted conversation is way easier and more fun for volunteers. It’s a not so hidden secret that some of the best volunteers have already been doing many of these things, often against the wishes of campaigns, like talking to people who open the door and want to talk to you, even if they’re not on your list, or knocking on a door with a yard sign outside that makes it clear that someone who lives there already supports you.
Ultimately, all of this stuff is just so human and intuitive that people do it even though campaigns tell them not to, and that’s the point—the things that feel human and intuitive are the things we should be doing, because it helps build trust with voters we’re talking to.
How You Can Help
Later this month, on January 24th, we’re kicking off Ground Truth canvasses in our target districts nationwide. Make sure to be on the lookout for more emails soon about how you can sign up to canvass or phone bank in a district near you.
This is a huge undertaking, and Swing Left is hoping to double our budget this cycle to pull it off. But if there’s anyone that can do it, it’s the incredible volunteers that make up the Swing Left community. We’ve powered big wins together before, and now it’s time to put that experience to use to change the way Democrats do voter contact for the better.
Thank you for reading and hope to see you on the doors!
Zack Malitz
Managing Director, Swing Left
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Since 2017, Swing Left has channeled the energy of grassroots volunteers and donors to elect Democrats, up and down the ballot, focusing on the most competitive races that can swing the national balance of power. Right now, Swing Left is investing in early grassroots organizing in key swing districts and initiatives across the country to lay the foundation to win back the House in 2026. If you’d like to help support our work, you can make a donation using this link. |
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