Voters fill out their ballots at the Stamford Government Center on the first day of early voting on October 21, 2024 in Stamford, Connecticut.
John Moore/Getty Images
hide caption
toggle caption
John Moore/Getty Images
Voters fill out their ballots at the Stamford Government Center on the first day of early voting on October 21, 2024 in Stamford, Connecticut.
John Moore/Getty Images
There are plenty of ways to encourage people to vote, as the presidential candidates and their supporters are demonstrating in this final stretch of the campaign.
There’s the direct approach, from former president Donald Trump at a rally in Georgia., borrowing a page from Nike, telling supporters: “Just Vote. Whichever way you wanna do it.”
At another Georgia event, Democratic Vice Presidential nominee Tim Walz encouraged voters to imagine their future selves.
“Even some of you younger people, you will be on your porch in a rocking chair some day and there will be a little one at your knee. They will say, what did you do in 2024 to save democracy?” You will say, ‘Every damn thing I could do.'”
By this point in the campaign, the focus has shifted from persuasion to motivation, and the candidates want to make sure everyone who already leans their way actually casts a ballot.
That’s why you hear former first lady Michelle Obama reminding potential supporters of Vice President Kamala Harris that they don’t have to tell anyone how they voted.
“If you are a woman who lives in a household of men that don’t listen to you or value your opinion, just remember that your vote is a private matter. Regardless of the political views of your partner, you get to choose.”
And it’s why you hear Trump laying out an alternate vision of politics within marriage.
“Make sure you vote and bring all our friends that want to vote for us. Tell them, ‘Jill. Get your fat husband off the couch. Get that—get that fat pig off the couch. Tell him to go and vote for Trump, he’s gonna save our country.”
You’re reading the Consider This newsletter, which unpacks one major news story each day. Subscribe here to get it delivered to your inbox, and listen to more from the Consider This podcast.
The efforts to get the votes for Harris
Behind the scenes, of course, there is a huge operation to back these voting efforts up. Texts and phone banks, and door to door canvassers all trying to make sure no gettable vote is left on the field.
This year, the two campaign strategies look a little different. To break them down, Consider This was joined by two NPR correspondents who have been watching all of this. First, there’s Asma Khalid, who has been covering Vice President Harris’s campaign, and says it’s been an ambitious effort.
“The campaign says it has roughly 2000 staffers and 250 offices across the key swing states. Now, in terms of what that operation looks like, it’s a combination of traditional phone banking and doorknocking, volunteers just making cold calls,” Khalid said.
“And then it’s also about relational organizing, people texting, say, friends and family. One thing I think that is worth pointing out is that when Harris became the Democratic nominee and replaced Joe Biden at the top of the ticket, there was this sudden surge of organic enthusiasm among different demographic groups. You probably remember those Zoom calls, right? Like white women for Harris, Indian-Americans for Harris. And even though these are ostensibly unaffiliated with the campaign, they are an extremely powerful organizing tool that frankly, Democrats did not have before.”
So who did Harris’ campaign try to reach in these final days?
“The campaign has a three pronged vision in the key states, and it’s pretty similar whether you’re talking about Georgia or Pennsylvania,” she added.
“First off, the goal is to solidly win the cities. Secondly, they’re trying to win the suburbs convincingly, and they think they have an edge on issues like reproductive rights and the threat that they believe Trump poses to democracy. They think that this could really resonate with college educated voters in the suburbs. And lastly, they are trying to lose by less in rural areas. This is really interesting because to this point, as an example, the campaign says about a third of their Pennsylvania offices are in counties. Trump won by double digits last time.”
And Trump’s
NPR’s Stephen Fowler says it’s not so easy to cross compare those numbers for the Republican side of these efforts.
“There’s no direct comparison because Republicans don’t share those numbers to the same degree. But it is less than the Democrats, partially because Republicans keep focus on this program, called Trump Force 47,” Fowler said.
“They’re relying on grassroots volunteers with a lot of enthusiasm to be the ones doing the door knocking, talking to their own neighbors and friends in their communities, and also talking to people who don’t often vote instead of primarily using paid canvassers. Now the canvassers are still there, but those are handled mainly by third party groups run by people like Turning Points, Charlie Kirk and billionaire Elon Musk.”
Fowler says despite their reach, these groups are relatively inexperienced, and some Republicans are worried that potential voters for them could be falling through the cracks.
But are these fears rational with the history of Trump’s popularity? Listen to the full episode of Consider This to find out.
This episode was produced by Connor Donevan and Michael Levitt. It was edited by Roberta Rampton and Jeanette Woods. Our executive producer is Sami Yenigun.
