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Ethnic Vote & Small Business Vote
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Staff:
Name Role Email Phone
- David Burd: Director dburd@barackobama. com 914-552-3660
- Joshua Teitelbaum Volunteer joshuatbaum@gmail. com 631-804-1634
- Jen Risen Volunteer jenrisen@gmail. com 812-219-7570
- Lauren Kunis Intern lauren. kunis@gmail. com 267-535-0505
- Martha Plante Intern martha. plante@gmail. com 847-707-6290
Targets:
Ethnic Vote
We are focusing on the following ethnic communities:
- Arab Americans: 1. 5 million nationally; focus in Detroit-Ann Arbor, MI; Northern VA
- Armenian Americans: almost 400, 000 nationally; focus in Philadelphia and Detroit
- Bosnian Americans: 100, 000 nationally, focus in St. Louis, Columbia & Kansas City, MO
- Croatian Americans: 400, 000 nationally, focus in Greater Cleveland area, OH; Pittsburgh, PA
- Greek Americans: 1. 3 million nationally; focus in Detroit, MI; Northern VA; Philadelphia, PA
- Hungarian Americans: 1. 5 million nationally; focus in Pittsburgh, PA; Cleveland-Akron, OH
- Irish Americans: 36 million nationally, focus in Pittsburgh & Scranton, PA; Detroit, MI; Cleveland-Akron, OH; NH; St. Louis, MO
- Italian Americans: 18 million nationally; focus in Pittsburgh & Scranton, PA; Detroit, MI; Cleveland-Akron, OH; Northern VA
- Polish Americans: 10 million nationally; focus in Pittsburgh & Scranton, Detroit, Cleveland
- Slovak Americans: 800, 000 nationally; focus in Pittsburgh, PA; Cleveland-Akron, OH
- Ukrainian Americans: 900, 000 nationally; focus in Cleveland; Philadelphia; Detroit
Small Business Vote
- Approx. 25 million small businesses in the US. We are targeting small businesses in all 18 battleground states, but tailoring our efforts based on the state’s demographics and staffing
Achievements to date:
Organizational Infrastructure/Field
- We have been identifying staff who can organize these efforts as part of their jobs, as well as full-time or part-time volunteers or interns. We have identified such staff and/or volunteers in: CO, FL, IA, IN, MI, MO, MT, NH, NM, NC, OH, PA, WI, VA,
- Colorado: Small Business: have identified 250 supportive small business owners.
- Connecticut and Rhode Island (Export States): planning phone-banking to ethnic voters in OH
- Florida: Small Business: Have identified 10-15 supportive small business leaders.
- Michigan: Ethnic: Formed broad ethnic committee with representatives from different communities. Small Business: Small business committee (10 small business owner volunteers)
- Missouri: Ethnic: Have identified 15-20 ethnic community volunteers. Small Business: Have identified over 100 supportive small business owners.
- New Hampshire: Ethnic: Forming an Irish-American committee in New England.
- Ohio: Ethnic: Have developed Irish, Italian, and Central Eastern European ethnic committees. Small Business: Small business committee (10 small business owners)
- Pennsylvania: Ethnic: Broad ethnic committee (15 ethnic volunteers, including 2 volunteer organizers). Small Business: Small business committee (10 small business owner volunteers)
- Virginia: Ethnic: Volunteer leaders in the Irish, Italian, Russian, and Arab communities (10 ethnic volunteers). Small Business: Have formed small business committee (30-40 businesses)
Press/Outreach
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- Illinois: Organized surrogate event at Taste of Polonia Polish festival with Rep. Melissa Bean, including chum and volunteers (September 1).
- Ohio: Organized four Irish American Biden Speech-Watching Parties on nomination night, covered by five local television stations (August 27).
- Pennsylvania: Ethnic: Assisted with off-the-record drop-by with Sen. Biden at Italian festival in Scranton (9/1). Organized presence at Irish festival in Pittsburgh (9/ 6-7). Organized presence at Polish festival in Doylestown, PA (9/ 6-7). Coordinated interview with IL State Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias New York tri state area, including parts of PA (9/15).
Specific plan for the next 60 days:
Specific events at which we are currently preparing for a surrogate or organizing a presence at:
Press/Outreach
- Colorado: Small Business: Two surrogate events on the economy with Austan Goolsbee (9/17).
- Indiana: Ethnic: Irish festival in Indianapolis (September 19-20).
- Michigan: Ethnic: Arab American surrogate and town hall (9/9) and meeting with ethnic leaders with Dr. Susan Rice (9/10). Small Business: Three economic roundtables (Grand Rapids, Lansing, and Detroit), date TBD. Several Arab American field events (starting 9/ 9).
- Missouri: Ethnic: Bosnian festival in St. Louis (October). Ethnic surrogate event with Sen. Claire McCaskill or other internal state surrogate. Missouri River Irish Festival (September 19). Oktoberfest in Kansas City (October 3).
- New Hampshire: Ethnic surrogate event with Rep. Niki Tsongas at the Glendi Greek festival (9/ 13-14). Potential foreign policy event with former Secretary Madeline Albright (10/28).
- Ohio: Surrogate event with Rep. Rosa DeLauro in Cleveland and Columbus (10/ 3-4). Surrogate Eastern European event with former Secretary Madeline Albright (tentatively 9/30). Request for surrogate event with Mario Cuomo on Columbus Day in Youngstown (10/13).
- PA: Surrogate Irish fest. & ethnic leaders recep. w/ AFL-CIO Pres. J. Sweeney in Erie (9/12).
- VA: American Hellenic Institute Greek festival (10/17). Arab American events (Arab-American Instit. Candidate Night (10/5); Arab-American Med. Assoc. convention (10/ 10-13).
Overall, National Plans Moving Forward:
Please find a summary of our plans and goals for our overall ethnic and small business organizing efforts here along with key national events and programs we are organizing.
Ethnic Organizing
- National Events/Programming:
- National Rollouts: most important event is the rollout of 5-10 national ethnic leadership committees (e. g., Irish-Americans), with Sen. Biden or a high-level surrogate.
- Irish Americans Events: Given the size of the Irish American community in important battleground states we will organize an Irish American event w/ a high-level surrogate.
- Columbus Day (10/13): Columbus Day is by far the most important holiday for Italian Americans; we will organize events around parades with high-level surrogates.
- Export State Program: Ethnic volunteers (“Ambassadors”) to make over 10, 000 phone calls; knock on over 2, 500 doors from our “export states” – states that are not targeted but have large ethnic populations: NY, NJ, MA, MD, DE, CT, RI, MA, VT, and IL.
- Goals:
o Volunteer Recruitment (Ambassador Program): We aim to recruit 300 new volunteers.
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o Voter Reg: We aim to register over 250 new voters of various ethnic backgrounds.
o Phone-Banking & Canvassing: make 10, 000 phone calls, knock on over 2, 500 doors.
o Surrogate Efforts: Organize at least 15 surrogate events with ethnic leaders.
o Press/Outreach: Work with our Ambassadors, state constituency, political staff, and our press and surrogate scheduling teams to organize 15 press or outreach events in targeted states or to targeted audiences (e. g., surrogate interviews on ethnic media, op-eds and/or letters to the editor, organizational endorsements, and festivals or other events).
o GOTV: recruit 250 volunteers to help with GOTV in our targeted states. The focus of our efforts will be recruiting volunteers and connecting them with the field staff in their areas, with a special focus on outreach to voters in ethnic communities.
- Support: providing state staff & volunteers w/ the following resources from our Chicago team:
o Ethnic Organizing Toolkit: 1-page fact sheets for ethnic communities; Ethnicity-specific chum/paraphernalia; & Demographic maps of key ethnic populations in targeted states.
o Web presence: A web page for the overall ethnic effort and individual state-based MyBarackObama. com group pages as state staff and volunteers want.
o Staff support: Support in (1) recruiting key volunteers to help with this effort and (2) recruiting state-based ethnic committees to organize this effort.
Small Business Organizing
- National Events: would like to organize a day of small business events
- US Hispanic Chamber of Commerce National Convention (September 24-27).
- Goals:
o Asset-Building Program: We are working with small business owners to make use of the prime asset they can provide the campaign: their physical locations.
§ Voter Reg Locations/Obama PoP Displays: Hope to ID 250 locations to be used as voter reg locations or in which to place OFA point-of-purchase displays.
§ Phone Banking Locations: Hope to ID 50 sm. businesses to locate phone banks.
§ Staging Locations: Hope to ID 50 sm. businesses that can serve as staging locals
o Small Business Leaders for Obama Recruitment: We aim to identify over 2, 500 small business owners supporting the campaign.
o Surrogate/Press Events: We will work with state constituency and political staff, our Small Business Owners for Obama, and surrogate scheduling staff to organize over 10 small business-related town hall or other surrogate events, state-based small business rollouts, endorsements, or other locally-driven small business events.
o Letters to Editor: will organize over 200 letters to editors by sm. business owners.
o GOTV: We will work with our small business supporters to utilize the assets they are uniquely suited to bring to bear on election-day: the use of their offices for staging locations, in-kind donations of food and other supplies, etc.
- Support: We are providing state staff and volunteers with the following resources
§ Small Business Organizing Toolkit: A state plan and timeline, our small business policy, Small business chum/paraphernalia, Compare/contrast pieces with McCain on small business and broader business issues.
o Web presence: A web page on the main site for small business (which includes a formal sign-up form for business owners to become a Small Business Leader for Obama and endorse the campaign), one national small business MyBarackObama. com group page, and one such MyBarackObama. com page for each state.
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