I’ve Texted Thousands of Voters in Swing States

What I found surprised me

Photo by Vladimir Mun on Unsplash

I’m not normally hyper-political. I vote, but I don’t knock on doors. I’ve never been to a protest, and I don’t make angry calls to Congress. But recently, I realized that I had to be more involved if we want democracy to survive this bruising year, so I signed up to text voters for the DNC’s coordinated campaign.

You might expect that, texting random strangers in these tense times, you’d get a lot of abuse. And true to that expectation, one of my first text exchanges began this way:

Me: Hi, I’m Addie, volunteering with the Ohio Democrats. Is this Barry*?

B: Go f*** yourself how do you like that???

But you might also assume that a conversation that starts this way can continue in only one direction: vitriol and mutual disgust. But there, you’d be absolutely wrong.

Let’s back up: here’s what it’s like to text for the DNC

The DNC’s text team is a well-run operation. You just sign up here and take a short webinar on how to use their texting technology (you text through a computer program, not your phone, which makes it a lot easier to respond quickly and meaningfully to voters). The campaign has scripts for common questions, so you’re…