Vote Local PA: A Blueprint for State Party Success
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UPDATE: The PA Dems are wrapping up a successful 2023 cycle with BallotReady.org as their Civic Center helped thousands look up their local candidates. The PA Dems have already re-upped their partnership with BallotReady for 2024 and 2025 and are preparing for the upcoming primaries.
Introduction
Since 2021, the Pennsylvania Democratic Party has used BallotReady tools to power their digital and field campaign efforts.
During the 2022 midterm cycle, the PA Dems coordinated campaign, “All in PA” used BallotReady’s Civic Center to show voters their early voting and absentee options and, for the first time in state party history, boost the profiles of Democratic candidates down to the local level using a BallotReady slate card. In fact, according to Mitch Kates, Executive Director of the PA Dems, the PA Dems were one of the only state parties in the country to run a coordinated campaign program highlighting local candidates in every county.
Building on the success of this midterm partnership, PA Dems recently renewed their partnership with BallotReady for the 2023 election cycle, now under the banner of Vote Local PA. Their tool to inform and mobilize voters for candidates up and down the ballot is live (enter any Pennsylvania address to get started).
Earlier this year, BallotReady had the opportunity to speak with Mitch who shared insights about what made All in PA such a unique and successful operation, emphasizing the advantage of starting early and effectively utilizing digital tools within a field program.
No Off Years
Another first for Vote Local PA was kicking off their program in 2021 instead of launching their coordinated campaign at the start of the busy 2022 midterm cycle. Vote Local PA’s 2021 program was the most extensive voter mobilization effort undertaken by a state party in an odd-year cycle that year and was a key stepping stone to their success in the following 2022 midterms.
“We do not use the words off-year election,” said Mitch. Rather, Vote Local PA recognized the importance of local elections as an opportunity to strategically prepare for critical races in 2022.
Kicking off their effort during the 2021 local elections offered multiple advantages:
Organizers and voters alike familiarized themselves early on with BallotReady’s digital organizing tools, significantly boosting onboarding efforts in early 2022.
Voters who researched their candidates and made a plan to vote in 2021 were statistically more likely to have voted in 2022
By kicking off their election coverage in late 2021, their campaign in 2022 was ready to get started earlier in the cycle, including for the primaries. “In 2020, half of Pennsylvanians had already voted before we offered something,” Mitch said. “But in 2022, we were able to launch early with BallotReady, already building out the candidate research before the primaries.”
Building on their progress from the inaugural 2021 campaign was key to the success of All In PA’s digital/field programs during the midterms, where PA Dems provided endorsements for every single Democratic candidate on the ballot in all 67 counties across Pennsylvania. All in PA kicked off early in the 2022 cycle, providing candidate information and resources to voters before many other operations had started.
According to Mitch, “there is no longer an Election Day in Pennsylvania,” but rather an extended election period thanks to early voting policies. That made it critical to get started early and to go live with tools as soon as possible, something BallotReady helped deliver.
Something to leave behind
Another key to the PA Dems success in mobilizing voters was their unique campaign literature distribution program. To support Democratic candidates at both the county and state-wide levels, PA Dems created engaging door hangers, which included a slate card of local candidates and early voting dates. However, these fliers had a new feature: a QR code to take potential voters directly to the BallotReady tool.
Including QR codes on door hangers increased the impact of this distribution program in three ways:
Even if voters eventually threw away the fliers, by initially scanning the QR code, voters still had access to PA Dems resources directly on their phone to return to later. As Kates emphasized, “The most important thing you have when you're doing fieldwork is something to leave behind.”
Normally, while there is value in leaving door hangers, doing so does not convey back any data points to the campaign. By using QR codes, PA Dems could track these interactions on the digital tool, helping them more quickly and accurately update their lists in the same way as a door knock.
The inclusion of the digital slate card directly on the door hanger gave these voters a true action to take normally not present on such materials. Voters not only had access to a slate of endorsed candidates (where they could directly donate or sign up to volunteer), but could also use the tool to make a plan to vote in person or by mail, increasing the likelihood of voter turnout.
Voter turnout and down ballot success
The power of this program in 2021 and 2022 is well reflected in the electoral outcomes in PA during those cycles. Between the 2018 and 2022 midterms, Pennsylvania stood out among the nine states that experienced increases in voter turnout across demographics including among their 18-to-29-year-old population. Additionally, only eleven states saw turnout increases for nonwhite voters during the same period, with Pennsylvania being one of them.
The 2022 cycle in particular was highly successful for Pennsylvania Democrats, not only in the widely publicized Gubernatorial and Senate races but also down the ballot. Most notably, Pennsylvania Democrats achieved a milestone by gaining control of the Pennsylvania House for the first time in over a decade. Their victory in securing 12 seats provided them with a one-seat majority over Republicans and speaks to the high value of promoting these candidates in the coordinated campaign effort.
Conclusion
As mentioned earlier, this success prompted the PA Democrats to re-up their partnership with BallotReady for the 2023, 2024, and 2025 election cycles.
And, in classic PA Dems fashion, their digital slate card and turnout tool is already live for the upcoming cycle as they look to replicate these outcomes and increase their scope even further leading into 2024.
Try out their tool today and then sign up to learn more about how BallotReady empowers state parties to inform & mobilize their constituents.
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