Democrats should stop mocking Trump's ground game and start learning from it

[Jk23]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2024/nov/25/democrats-organizing-get-out-the-vote

(Note this is a very long piece and I found it very informative.,I highly recommend people read the whole thing.)

Since campaign season began, experts have assured us that Donald Trump had “no ground game”, a phrase that generally refers to a campaign’s effort to mobilize voters through local outreach offices, phone calls, text messages, and door knocks. Pundits, politicos, and partisan observers repeated this charge and scoffed at his ramshackle, amateur, and fraud-riddled efforts, with some seasoned Republican operatives even sounding the alarm.

A slew of articles and commentary unfavorably compared Trump’s “paltry” get-out-the-vote operation to the Democrats’ supposedly well-oiled and professionally managed machine. Alex Floyd, the Democratic national committee’s rapid response director, issued a confident statement in April: “Donald Trump’s Maga takeover of the [Republican national committee] has left the Republican party in shambles, lacking the ground game and infrastructure to compete this November.”

And yet many Democrats remain reluctant to reassess their views, both of Trump’s ground game and, perhaps more importantly, of their own. Soon after the election, Tom O’Brien, chair of the Democratic party in Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, told the New York Times that Republicans “really didn’t have a ground game”. The Democratic strategist Christy Setzer went further, telling the Hill that “Trump had no ground game and ran only on rambling hatred”, while insisting that the loss “wasn’t the fault of Kamala Harris”, who had “the best campaign any of us has ever seen”. But if that’s true, why did Trump succeed where Harris failed?

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A few weeks before the election, in Greensboro, North Carolina, Nikki Marín Baena was outside her home when she was approached by a canvasser from Libre Initiative, a Koch-backed organization that targets Latino communities with a libertarian agenda. The canvasser told her about all the services the group offers: Spanish language workshops for parents on how to apply for scholarships, English language tutoring, computer classes and more. In Baena’s words, Libre’s goal is to get people in a room, help them meet their basic needs, and then preach the gospel of small government.

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Having people in the community help each other is much more effective than people parachuted in to knock on doors every two or fours years and endless texts begging for money. We are missing the effectiveness of what the Republicans are doing. They may mock community organizers on a national level, but they are using them in underserved communities and working class enclaves around the country. (And yes, I know one of the reasons the communities are underserved is Republican policies. The irony is not lost on me. )

[Blue_Tires]

1. I'm supposed to believe we weren't doing the same?

[LonePirate]

2. His ground game was non-existent. He won due to social media, new media, traditional media, inflation and racism.

Those last five overwhelmed the far superior ground game Harris had. By new media, I mean podcasts and blogs. By traditional media, I mean television and radio.

[Hugin]

5. I agree.

I have some researching to do figuring out visualizing how the reach of new media with a boost from traditional media equals the final tally of Retrumplicans on Nov 5, 2024.

I’m guessing that it’s nearly a straight line.

Some other variables:

-intimidation.
-suppression.
-drip, drip, drip
-pulpit preaching.
-blinders.
-speaking over, gagging opposition messaging.
-WoM (word of mouth) #A favorite of conmen.#

[DeepWinter]

7. I had

3 Trump campaigners knock on my front door. I had zero Harris campaigners knock on my front door. I am in a Red State, but none the less, he did have a ground game. And appearing on Joe Rogan's show and Harris skipping it was a major coup.

I do think the ground game matters a lot less than past years and the media/online game matters more now. How people consume information has changed and there's no going back.

[travelingthrulife]

10. This is funny. Seriously? You have to personally have your door knocked on

and she had to go on a known liars show?

[Jk23]

8. As the article points out there are a lot of related groups with a year round ground game.

Thier strategy ironically seems more community based. With neighbors talking to neighbors instead of out of state volunteer door knockers.

[stopdiggin]

3. let me repeat, "the Trump organization did not have a ground game."

Now we can talk, if you wish, about social media, mainstream media, influencers, mis-info ops and algorithms ... All fine and good. But please don't try to sell me the 'boots on the ground', 'neighborhood organizers', 'ground game' crap ... 'Cause the fact of the matter is, Trump didn't do that.

In a word - what utter twaddle!

[DetroitLegalBeagle]

6. Trump outsourced it

And in Michigan, it was visible, depending on where you lived. I live in Oakland County. I had 4 door knockers in the last 2 weeks before the election, 1 Dem, 3 gop. The gop weren't from the party itself, they were all with different gop affiliated groups. Heard roughly the same from family and friends in Macomb and Wayne County. In Macomb, some gop group were at some of the trunk or treat Halloween events. They were handing out candy to the kids and talking and handing out flyers to the parents.

[stopdiggin]

9. In large part (despite your own anecdotal experience) it didn't happen

and whatever small measure of this might have happened - it had almost zip to do with swinging the election. If 'people knocking on doors' had anything at all to do with it - Harris wins this contest going away.

There's going to be - has been - a lot of analysis and words devoted to 'what went wrong'. It's what journos and politios do. This article/piece ventured completely off the mark into unreasoned speculation. And ended up building a case around a vague theory that essentially didn't describe anything having any really significance. (IMHO) In pain terms, they just flat got it wrong!

[travelingthrulife]

11. He had 4 door knockers! Well, that clinches it for me.

[Jk23]

12. Well people working on his behalf did something right.

Because he got out his voters and we certainly did not get out ours.

[stopdiggin]

13. Trump's message was, "pissed off' "taken advantage of" "THOSE people" and "angry yet ..?"

and THAT - rather than community organizations - is clearly what carried him over the line.

People just LOVE to be pissed off ...
And if you throw in the government and a politician or two ... ? Yeeha !!

[taxi]

4. Why not keep it short? It

We with memory problems, we who choose to believe chocolate rations were cut from 30 to 25 grams per week, need to do our research before opening our mouths. The records clearly indicate that the ration was increased from 20 to 25 grams. It really is no big deal though. We can all agree that 25 is 25, how it got there is a matter of perspective. The Guardian wears its moniker proudly.