This week, I was thrilled to stop through JD Vance’s hometown—Middletown, Ohio—to take part in something which needs to happen absolutely everywhere.
Watch the short VIDEO above to see what it was.
What the Butler County Democratic Party was doing was adopting an essential strategy: creating real and deep ownership over organizing at the neighborhood level.
Whatever you call it—precinct organizing, or neighborhood teams—it’s by far the lowest hanging fruit in politics. Here’s Butler County’s basic description:
Here is how Butler County lays out the key responsibilities of the Neighborhood Team, and leader:
What are the benefits of organizing this way? Once again, Butler County explains:
Amen to it all!!
There’s a reason I spend pages in “Saving Democracy” on just this type of work. Here’s my description of why what Butler County is doing is so important:
Low Hanging Fruit
There’s one aspect of political party work that may be the most overlooked in all of politics. Which means there’s a single shift that could bring life to every county party in every state in the nation. And that shift isn’t reliant on national forces and big dollars and grand, top-level plans to happen. In fact, back to the theme of this book, this is a shift you can help make happen.
They go by different titles. In Cincinnati, we call them “precinct executives.” Elsewhere, they are called “committeemen” or “committeewomen.” In other places, “ward chairs.” Whatever they’re called, they are the basic unit of each city or county party structure in the country.
These are elected positions—or appointed by a county party if there is a vacancy. As members of the executive committee of the city or county party, these posts play a formal role in the operation of the party, in its endorsement process, and in the selection of its leadership. Often, that governing role is what drives folks to run for these roles, or why they’re recruited to do so.
But here’s the thing. . . each precinct executive (to use the term where I live) also, formally, represents a specific voting district of their community. That precinct or ward—a handful of specific, contiguous blocks of a community—comprises the most basic building block of the entire nation’s political geography. Fortunately, these precincts usually include hundreds of voters—a manageable number. In cities, highly concentrated— which means walkable. In rural areas, more spread out—but still drivable. All callable.
Now, amid all the postcards and digital messages and fancy TV ads aimed at voters, do you know what single change would forever lift turnout and alter outcomes in American elections more than any other?
Simple: if every Democratic precinct executive or committeeman or committeewoman in this country took ownership of the precinct she or he is elected to represent. If they all made the simple decision to engage and organize the manageable number of residents living in those small geographic regions.
It’s that straightforward.
But, in my experience, almost none do this. Precinct executives dutifully go to meetings and pitch in in other ways, but only a tiny percentage actually work their precincts. Even worse, many precinct and ward positions sit vacant. Add it up, and the lack of engagement at the precinct level marks the single most wasted voter engagement opportunity in American politics.
Why don’t precinct executives take ownership of their precincts?
In many cases, it’s because no one ever asks them to. No one ever sets that basic expectation, or gives them a job description of what the role they ran for means, or could mean if they did it well. No one lays out even the most basic tasks that could make such a difference in the role they chose to occupy.
Tasks as simple as:
recruit a street captain for every street of your precinct, who then takes ownership of that street.
recruit an apartment building captain for every building of your precinct.
engage every public-serving business in your precinct, and get them in the game if they’re interested—(i.e., do what Vashitta did).
task every one of those captains to engage and get to know the voters on their street or in their building—long before actual elections—and whenever new folks move in.
bring residents together on a regular basis, both captains and anyone from the precinct who is interested; or send them regular emails.
do a sweep of the community months before each election to ensure folks are registered.
do the same for early voter opportunities.
do the same for election day voting.
Or go even bigger: create a standing precinct organization—ten, thirty, fifty members—that comes together regularly, then uses the footprints of all its members as the basis of broader work. With that group, build a long-term plan for the precinct.
One of the greatest benefits of robust precinct organizing is that it, like community-based organizations, fills gaps otherwise left by political operations. First, it engages people far earlier than last-minute knocks on doors; those late knocks are no longer stand-alone transactional moments, but the last of a steady series of engagements. Second, the conversations are more authentic, led by a neighbor—not a stranger. And third, the precinct strategy can target all voters, with extra focus on disengaged and suppressed voters, as opposed to the far narrower approach of most campaigns.
Doesn’t this all sound pretty straightforward? Common sense? What a political outsider would assume is already happening?
Again, in my experience, almost none of this happens anywhere!
Which is why I say, again—if every single Democratic precinct executive took ownership of her precinct, doing this work, outcomes would change. Heck, if 50 percent of Democratic precinct executives did so, outcomes would change. Thirty percent, still a big change.
What does it take to make this happen?
It takes people deciding to do it—deciding that our democracy matters enough to make these critical roles about engaging the community, and not just going to insider meetings. And it takes leaders asking them to do it—setting that new expectation that you own your precinct.
Once party organizations and individuals have decided to take that ownership, then do the following:
write up a basic job description for the precinct executive role;
share it with every new precinct executive as soon as they’re elected—set the expectation from the outset;
organize early training for precinct executives on how to do the described job;
have the broader city or county organization establish goals and deadlines for what each precinct should achieve by when;
do the work; do it so broadly and actively that you build the social proof that this is what you do if you are a precinct executive. This is the new expectation—the new normal; and build a long-term plan.
So wherever you live, know that you’re sitting on the greatest untapped opportunity to change outcomes in American politics:
If you’re a precinct captain, own your precinct. That is one hell of a footprint.
If you’re not involved in the party, but you’re a registered Democrat and you’re sitting in a precinct that’s vacant, run for it next time and do this work. See if you can get appointed to it in the meantime.
Whether you’re involved in the party or not, if the precinct you live in is not being organized by anyone, figure out who the precinct executive is, track them down, see what they’re doing, and offer to do the organizing work that needs to be done. Of course, build a long-game plan for the precinct.
Whatever you do, start the conversation and work to make this happen. Wake up this dormant infrastructure.
Can this really work, you may be asking? Yes it (we) can! It’s exactly what the early Obama campaign did when people organized house parties in communities across the country; they didn’t see active precinct organizing where they were, so they did it themselves. That model drove one of the most historic campaigns our nation has ever seen.
This is the lowest hanging fruit out there to save democracy. Let’s care enough to grab it.
Disengaged Voters
One other excerpt from “Saving Democracy”—ongoing precinct organizing also battles a worsening problem in politics today:
If you ever knock on doors like I did as a candidate, or more recently as a volunteer, you notice something immediately. Something both frustrating and sobering.
Of the houses you visit, most residents are registered, and vote at least sporadically. Many vote every election. Following the campaign’s guidance, you always knock on these doors. If they’re not home, you leave a reminder to vote. And another volunteer will likely call or knock on that same door later to make sure they got the message.
But when you come upon apartment buildings, even though countless Americans live within, you usually walk right by. Compared to their homeowner neighbors, the residents inside are often people of less means—many living on the edge. Most move a lot. And in states like Ohio, they are the most likely to be purged from the rolls.
Those skipped addresses and buildings provide a stark reminder of the downward spiral of disengagement—an entire world of people, many in need, removed from politics. It’s a crisis for American democracy, one which the political machinery largely declines to solve.
But it’s one that you can help solve….
To cost-efficiently expend precious dollars, campaigns and most political organizations hyper-target the voters they now reach out to. This means that once voters are no longer on the rolls, they are left unengaged by a political world doubtful they will show up, and therefore unwilling to make an investment to re-engage them. In a sad irony, Team A’s government strategy of pushing voters off the rolls is rewarded by Team D’s political strategy, which removes those voters from the entire political conversation.
That’s right—the standard political response to the shrinking of the rolls is to accept those smaller rolls as the new electorate. It’s not exactly what Tim Snyder calls “obeying in advance”—but it’s definitely a damaging example of obeying.
Combine all this together, and we’re seeing the emergence of two separate Americas. Not red versus blue. But one that’s politically involved, and one that’s not involved. How big is the latter? In 2020, the “not involved” portion comprised a staggering eighty million people. And in 2022, JD Vance won an Ohio Senate seat with 23.9 percent of Ohio’s eligible population voting for him. Mike DeWine won his governor’s seat in a blow-out, but only garnered 28 percent of the population’s vote.
And again, those non-voting Americans disproportionately hail from the diverse majority—voters of color, young voters, low-income voters—that made up the Obama coalition and successive generations. Specifically, in red states (which have aggressively pursued those suppression tactics), Black voter registration and voting both declined between 2008 and 2020, while white registration and voting rose in those same states. Compare that to blue states in the same time period, where Black registration and turnout both rose. The suppression is hitting its intended target.
The “loss” of these voters from the political world bears an enormous impact on politics and democracy. It alters outcomes, changes the conversation, and impacts policy. And in many places, it transforms who the voting majority actually is.
Neighborhood and precinct organizing on a massive scale is one of the best ways to combat this enormous problem.
Thank you Butler County Democrats for showing the way.
Please do the same wherever you are, and share this so others do as well…
