Briefs

Friends,

$750,000.

We still can’t believe it. You’ve given nearly a million dollars to strategically chosen state legislative candidates who could be the difference between Democratic and Republican control over the lives of millions of people.

Your money isn’t lining the pockets of consultants, or contributing to a television air war of attrition. Most of it goes to voter contact, or is the difference between a candidate running a radio/cable ad or not at all.  

We’re rolling out one last round of candidates and asking for a last infusion of money that could mean the difference for these candidates.

We asked our friends at Run For Something (@runforsomething) and Future Now (@FutureNowUSA) to give us eight more candidates. Both organizations are committed to electing progressives to state legislatures across the country.

As with before, these races were carefully vetted to ensure your money goes as far as possible.

So here at Data For Progress we’re making a simple request - spend $80 across these eight candidates. We’ve set up an ActBlue page for you to make those donations, and you can find more about each of the candidates below. We’re calling it our Give Smart initiative. No portion of the contributions to Give Smart goes to Data for Progress. All the money supports candidates.

Friends,

Thank you so much for all your help Giving Smart so far.  Our newest ask is one that’s close to both of us because it’s about our home state of New York.

New York State has voted for every Democratic presidential nominee since 1988, usually by an overwhelming margin. The State Assembly reflects that political reality with a huge Democratic majority. But with the exception of one brief interregnum in 2009, the upper chamber—the State Senate—has remained firmly under Republican control.

This year, that could change.

There’s no reason New York can’t be as progressive as California. The state could be leading the country on climate change, immigrant rights and universal health care. The state could enshrine reproductive justice in the state constitution. And instead of being notorious for anti-Democratic election practices, New York could be implementing a pro-voter agenda with automatic voter registration, pre-registration and expansive early voting.

Right now legislation the Climate and Community Protection Act (CCPA), which would create green jobs across the state and the Child Victims Act, which would raise the statute of limitations on crimes against children are blocked in the senate. We can change that.

So far, we’ve raised $700,000 down-ballot. Data for Progress (@DataProgress) is a New York-based think tank, and we want to make sure Democrats have a solid progressive majority in the state. So we’re rolling eight candidates in New York. We’ve set up an ActBlue page. Our ask is simple: $80 for eight pivotal state senate candidates. No portion of the contributions to Give Smart goes to Data for Progress. All the money supports candidates.