Progressive Democrats - Moving Forward, Not Back: What We Should Be Doing On Our Campaign

Your County and State Democrats should be working to organize weekly phone banking and door knocking in your district.

If you wish to help your Democratic Party door knock and lit drop (literature drop) simply contact your County Democrats and offer to sign up for a door knock lit drop event.

Democratic Party online websites are another way that you can get signed up for Door Knock lit drop/Phone bank events. You can check out their website, find an event nearest to you and get signed up! Your Democratic Party needs you and will be so happy for you to join in!

Door Knocking and Lit Dropping

When you sign up for a door knock lit drop event your Democratic Party will schedule a place for a group meeting before you go out door knocking.

At this meeting you will be given a packet with a printed out map and copies of the names and addresses of the neighborhood that you will be door knocking at. These people will all be registered voters in your district. They will include on this list, along with the name of the person, their age, their political party, and if they have volunteered in past elections. In your packet you will find brochures for all of your Democratic Candidates at the Local, State and Federal levels. This is the informative literature that you will be handing out to the people on your walking list. It is to help educate our community about who is up for election/ re-election and general information about what they plan to do for “We the people” if they get elected or re-elected.

At the meeting your Democratic leaders will be giving you a short training/question/answer session before you go out on your way to door knock.

For door knocking the things that you should bring are:

1. Mode of transportation

2. Bring a bottle of water

3. Bring a cell phone if you can

4. Ink pen to mark your door knocks

5. Clip board to write on (should be provided by the county party).

6. Wear comfortable clothes to suit the weather conditions and comfortable walking shoes.

7. Have knowledge about your Democratic Party and Candidates because there will be questions.

8. Bring your smile!

To door knock you simply walk up to the door with the correct address and knock or ring the doorbell. If the door is answered you simply say “Hello” and ask for the person or persons that are on your list at that household. When the person comes to the door simply introduce yourself as a Volunteer for the Democratic Party helping to drop literature off about our Democratic Politicians and Candidates.

Be prepared to answer any questions about your candidates and Democratic Party.

Ask if they would like to volunteer for the Democratic Party.

Mark on your address sheet that you have made contact with this person

Make a note on your address sheet if the person or persons are interested in volunteering for the Democratic Party and how they would be willing to help out.

If no one answers the door, simply leave the literature in their door. DO NOT PUT THE LITERATURE IN THEIR MAIL BOX! IT IS A FEDERAL OFFENSE TO TAMPER WITH SOMEONES MAILBOX!

Move on to the next address and continue until you are at the end of your list. When you are finished with every address, return to your designated meeting place. Turn in your finished packet. All done!

Your Democratic Party should be organizing these events every week on certain days. Each week you will be door knocking and phone banking for different reasons. You will be trained for these changes before you are allowed to go to work. It is not hard work, it is enjoyable work. Most people that you talk to are very interested and want to talk to someone about our politics. I have had some very pleasant conversations with the people that I meet during door knocking, even made new friends! They are the people of your community, it’s great to get out and meet them!

Phone Banking

If you wish to help your Democratic campaigns by phone banking you can sign up the same way you do for door knocking. Sign up with your Democratic Party online.

Your Democratic Party will establish a meeting room for phone banking and phone banking events. They normally supply cell phones or cordless phones for you to make the calls from. They will provide you with a call script and a list of names along with their phone numbers. These names are registered voters taken from the VAN. The VAN is an updated electronic list of all registered voters from your county and state that your county party has access to. You will be making different kinds of calls for different phone banking events. You will be trained by your County Party leaders at each event.

For phone banking the things that you should bring are:

1. Bring your cell phone just in case the group you are volunteering for does not have phones for you to use.

2. Bring a bottle of water

3. Bring scratch paper to take notes

4. Bring an ink pen or pencil to mark your tally sheet and to take notes

5. Bring your reading glasses if you need them

6. Be well informed about the types of calls that you are making. Be able to answer questions.

7. Be ready to encourage people to get involved in the campaign. Use a good motivational line to get them to sign up.

8. Be polite and courteous

9. If you cannot answer a question, find someone who can.

Right now your campaign should be making phone calls to identify who is supporting your candidates. Then you will have another group of phone bankers calling the supporters and trying to get them signed up to volunteer for the campaign. We are now at a stage where we are building an army of Democratic volunteers which we intend to grow and grow all across the country!

Gathering for door knocking in Scott County, Iowa