Company Profile
Vote From Home
Company Overview
Vote From Home is a grassroots organizing movement founded by campaign veterans and Let America Vote alums, Ben Tyson and Suzy Smith in May of 2020, to connect swing-state voters with vote by mail applications and ballots in the 2020 general election.
https://www.fastcompany.com/90504629/this-group-will-make-sure-swing-state-voters-get-a-mail-in-ballot-so-they-dont-have-to-risk-in-person-voting
The idea for the organization germinated with the “terrifying” Wisconsin primary, when Suzy Smith, the organization’s cofounder, was making get-out-the-vote calls and frequently heard that people were too fearful for their health to vote—or even to deposit their mail ballots if they had them.
As social distancing dramatically reduced traditional, in-person voter outreach, Vote From Home 2020 was founded to provide organizers and volunteers the remote tools they need to engage voters. Specifically, Vote From Home 2020 developed and promoted a comprehensive set of digital and remote organizing tools to anyone who wants to help voters sign up for and cast mail-in ballots.
Focusing on the swing states of Michigan, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania this included:
? Direct mail of absentee ballot applications including instructions for filling them out, messaging on why voting by mail is safe and important, and pre-paid return postage.
? Phone calls and text messages from volunteers to voters who have not signed up for an absentee ballot, letting them know to look for their application in the mail, and asking them to commit to filling it out.
? Online advertising to targeted audiences highlighting the benefits and importance of voting by mail and at home in 2020.
? A social media campaign engaging high profile celebrities, political officials, and other validators to highlight the benefit and importance of voting by mail and at home.
Company History
Vote From Home launched in May 2020, began voter contact in mid-July, and in just 4 months of operation, with a full-time staff of only 5 people, had made a sizable impact on the 2020 elections.
Highlights of the VFH2020 General Election program:
• Targeted over 600,000 key “dual-risk” voters across 3 swing states (MI, NC, PA).
o Dual-risk voters are voters that are most likely to contract and die from COVID-19 and the least likely to request mail-in ballots. We outlined this term, our path to victory in a Medium post: http://tiny.cc/vfh-ptv
• Sent over 19 million text messages and made over 450,000 calls to these voters as part of our “life-cycle” model of organizing: http://tiny.cc/vfh-organize
• Were featured by a nationally recognized campaign, “Suppress This” that secured over $1.8 million in free media and digital advertisements: http://tiny.cc/vfh-suppress-this
• In our 2 most successful states, Michigan and Pennsylvania, that had the greatest amount of voter contact and organizing, had a significant impact on voters’ voting habits – VFH targeted voters increased their rate of voting by mail by 7.4 and 19.2 points respectively compared to the overall general electorate increase. These increases are strongly correlated with the number of phone/call attempts VFH made in each state.
• Worked with University of California Berkeley researcher to run a controlled experiment testing voters’ attitudes towards vote by mail and our programming – establishing that after 1 month of outreach from Vote From Home volunteers that voters were 6 points more likely to say voting by mail is safe, easy, and convenient.
After the General Election, Vote From Home ran a successful program for the Georgia U.S. Senate runoff elections. The nimble structure of the organization allowed us to put together a program in less than 2 weeks to get out the vote for Jon Ossoff and Reverend Raphael Warnock.
Working with in-state and national partners – the New Georgia Project Action Fund and America Votes – Vote From Home mobilized its volunteer base to make calls and send text messages that encouraged Democratic base voters to sign up to vote by mail in the runoff. Additionally, for this election Vote From Home used our organizing expertise to put together a local team of canvassers in Savannah – an area under covered by in-state partners – to run a door-to-door turnout program among critical Black voters.
In just 7 weeks, Vote From Home’s organizing program sent over 6 million text messages, made over 15,000 calls and knocked on over 45,000 doors. This effort helped turn out a record number of Democratic voters necessary to capture both U.S. Senate seats, allowing Democrats to gain a governing trifecta in DC for President Biden’s administration.