Help Laurel fundraise for Seed the Vote!!!

We have been in a vicious cycle of collective mourning as a country. Each national event causes a new cycle of grief, compounding what many of us experience in our personal lives. Yet, despite the grief and suffering, I have always returned to movement building as a form of healing. 

Currently, I am volunteering at Seed the vote, where we are saying enough is enough. We come to electoral organizing with a clear vision for what is needed to change our current conditions. Electoral organizing is trauma-informed healing activism. Violence breeds violence, and the United States has modeled violence from local and federal court systems to policing, global militarism, and much more. This bubble had to pop eventually. We believe that we need to employ multiple tactics at various levels to win systemic change, and our tactic is to grow our collective movements through electoral organizing. Will you join us?

This summer (June-August), I am trying to raise $1,000 for Seed the Vote and mobilize 5 community members in the electoral movement. 

When I feel demoralized or disempowered, especially on days like yesterday, I am grateful to know that you are a part of my community and that you have our backs. Will you give $50, $150, or $250, or whatever you can give?

Some really cool stuff in the news about politicians and organizations that is on STV radar! 

• In Georgia, we’re supporting Stacey Abrams’ run for Governor, and Raphael Warnock’s campaign to keep his Senate seat! In a state that has been at the forefront of voter suppression since 2020, having a voting rights champion like Abrams as Governor instead of current Republican Brian Kemp would make a huge difference in limiting the power of the right wing state legislature. 

• In Arizona, our friends at LUCHA are taking a bottom-up approach to the ballot, focusing on an exciting ballot initiative that would provide in-state tuition for undocumented students, undoing some of the legacy of racist bill SB1070. LUCHA will also be supporting a ballot initiative and secretary of state candidate that together would have the power to undo recent anti-democracy attacks from the state legislature. They have an ambitious plan to knock 500,000 doors - the largest electoral program they’ve ever run! By meeting voters where they are and connecting their issues to what’s at stake across the state, they’re preparing a strategy to win up and down the ballot!

• Also in Arizona, we’re planning to knock doors once again with UNITE HERE Local 11, whose rigorous door knocking program in 2020 helped make the difference in Maricopa County, one of the counties that decided the whole presidential election. They’re thinking about how to build on this organizing to have deeper conversations at the doors with their members in 2022, so they can win key races while also laying the foundation for year-round campaigns in 2023 and beyond. 

• In Pennsylvania, we are pumped to be supporting congressional candidate Summer Lee of district 12 who, if elected, will be the first Black woman to represent Pennsylvania in congress! John Fetterman won his primary election for a flippable US Senate seat and we’re also excited to be supporting his run. Our 2020 partner Pennsylvania Stands Up is focusing on ballot initiatives pushing to end solitary confinement at a county level, and creating crisis response units within Allentown and Scranton. 

• In North Carolina, we’re excited about Cheri Beasley who has a strong chance to flip a key US Senate seat, and we’re looking forward to working with groups on the ground to stop Republicans from winning a supermajority in the state legislature, to make sure North Carolinians and others in the region can continue to access reproductive health care. 

• In Wisconsin, we’re excited about Mandela Barnes whose primary is in August.

Seed the Vote is a largely volunteer-led project and our impact is far greater than our budget would suggest, because of the huge amounts of work put in by thousands of volunteers. However, we have key infrastructure needs that will allow us to engage these thousands of volunteers, effectively and to scale. We are aiming to raise $1.2 million for our work in 2022. Contributions help us cover the following key needs:

• Travel, housing and food for volunteers to door-knock with us in battleground states; while we ask volunteers to participate in fundraising to help cover the costs, we guarantee that everyone who is willing to commit their time can join us, regardless of their ability to pay. 

• Our Generation Rising program, a paid fellowship for young BIPOC organizers, through which we develop the leadership of these organizers to lead voter outreach work with our partner organizations in battleground states. 

• Staffing and technology infrastructure: We rely on a core staff team of committed, skilled movement leaders to carry out this work. Additionally, our remote work relies extensively on technology, in order to participate in text and phone banking and to track, communicate with and support our volunteers. Our in-person work also has evolving equipment needs, and we are committed to remaining nimble in our ability to pay for needs from our partner organizations, as they emerge. 

Some concrete examples of how donations may be used:

$100 = Snacks for 50 Volunteer Canvassers

$200 = Lunch for 20 Volunteer Canvassers

$500 = Hotel rooms for 14 volunteer Canvassers