Obama Pride Chicago joined nearly 100 other local Obama supporters on Saturday on a three hour bus ride to the Obama field office just outside of Davenport, Iowa. As it happened, John McCain was holding a rally downtown at the same time we were set to knock on doors in the city's precincts. His presence in the Quad Cities made us even more fired up to get out into the neighborhoods and get out the vote for Obama…
Read the rest of Ben Z.'s post HERE.
Or, plan your own target state trip by emailing us at pride@barackobama.com
We arrived at the bustling field office at about 10:45 a.m. and sat down for training. We were given a large stack of information we'd need as we headed into the neighborhoods: maps with our homes' locations, scripts, voter registration forms, early vote by mail request forms, campaign literature, and the names of registered voters we'd be speaking to. As we got into our chairs for training, a man in a blue shirt and tie went around the room introducing himself as "Tom" and thanked us for coming. After we began the training, we were introduced to him as Tom Vilsack, the former Governor of Iowa! "I flew here from Boston at 2 a.m. today to talk to you guys," he said, addressing the room that had filled up to standing room only in the back of the office. "That's how important what you're doing here today is to me." Kerry lost by only 10,000 votes in Iowa, he informed us, and our work in Davenport was key in helping close that margin. The packet we received from the staff was a daunting (and heavy!) set of information, but the office's staff gave us guidelines for how we should distribute our information, answered our questions, and rallied us in a cheer of "Fired Up! Ready to go!" before we got in line to be driven out to our precincts. After my friend Anthony and I acclimated ourselves in the neighborhood, we began knocking, slightly nervous. But we quickly got into the swing of things, especially after coming across friendly residents of all persuasions. Shortly into our canvassing, a guy about our age named Kenneth told us he didn't believe in voting anymore. He had voted in the 2004 election and was discouraged at the fact that Bush had won. He felt his vote didn't truly count. We told him that Iowa was an important state for Obama to win back in 2008 and that his vote would absolutely count. After we informed him of the options he had in voting this year, we left his apartment feeling that he was less skeptical of the voting process. A number of houses later, a young girl answered the door for her father, Chris. As her older sister fetched her dad from another room inside, we asked her if she knew if her dad was going to vote for Obama. "Of course he is," she said. "Obama is awesome." We said we thought so, too. "I wish I could vote," she said. "Only 7 years until I can!" When Chris came to the door, we confirmed he was voting for Obama and made sure he knew of his voting options. In some cases, we came across households looking for one Obama supporter from our list. The person at the door would respond, "Oh, our whole house is voting for Obama!" and eagerly accepted the early vote by mail forms. Towards the end of our afternoon, we met Dorothy, an 82 year-old woman who is dependent on an oxygen tank in her home. She informed us she was supporting Obama this year and welcomed us into her apartment so she could fill out her early voting ballot request form. "It's a beautiful day out there, isn't it?" she said, as she sat down "Ever since I got sick, this is the only way I can vote," she said as she carefully filled out her form. As we left, we could tell she was genuinely thankful for the help and we knew we could count on her support when it came time for her to fill out her vote by mail ballot. After three hours of walking around the small area we were assigned, we'd filled out dozens of sheets of information for the campaign and dropped off a majority of our campaign literature and vote by mail request forms. We were given a ride back to the Davenport office, where we tallied our canvassing results: we knocked on around 60 doors. The final tally for all of us? The two hundred volunteers who showed up to canvass today, including those of us from Obama Pride, knocked on over 5,000 doors in the Davenport area. We were informed that those 10,000 votes Kerry lost by translates into 3 votes per precinct. Thinking of people like Dorothy, Kenneth, and Chris, and the thousands of other residents volunteers talked to today in Davenport, I know we're well on our way to making sure that gap is closed. We arrived back in Chicago around 7:30 p.m. - a long, but exciting and inspiring 12 hour day. As we get closer to election day, I can now say for certain that giving even just one day to volunteer for the campaign will make all the difference on November 4th.
We arrived at the bustling field office at about 10:45 a.m. and sat down for training. We were given a large stack of information we'd need as we headed into the neighborhoods: maps with our homes' locations, scripts, voter registration forms, early vote by mail request forms, campaign literature, and the names of registered voters we'd be speaking to. As we got into our chairs for training, a man in a blue shirt and tie went around the room introducing himself as "Tom" and thanked us for coming. After we began the training, we were introduced to him as Tom Vilsack, the former Governor of Iowa! "I flew here from Boston at 2 a.m. today to talk to you guys," he said, addressing the room that had filled up to standing room only in the back of the office. "That's how important what you're doing here today is to me." Kerry lost by only 10,000 votes in Iowa, he informed us, and our work in Davenport was key in helping close that margin. The packet we received from the staff was a daunting (and heavy!) set of information, but the office's staff gave us guidelines for how we should distribute our information, answered our questions, and rallied us in a cheer of "Fired Up! Ready to go!" before we got in line to be driven out to our precincts. After my friend Anthony and I acclimated ourselves in the neighborhood, we began knocking, slightly nervous. But we quickly got into the swing of things, especially after coming across friendly residents of all persuasions. Shortly into our canvassing, a guy about our age named Kenneth told us he didn't believe in voting anymore. He had voted in the 2004 election and was discouraged at the fact that Bush had won. He felt his vote didn't truly count. We told him that Iowa was an important state for Obama to win back in 2008 and that his vote would absolutely count. After we informed him of the options he had in voting this year, we left his apartment feeling that he was less skeptical of the voting process. A number of houses later, a young girl answered the door for her father, Chris. As her older sister fetched her dad from another room inside, we asked her if she knew if her dad was going to vote for Obama. "Of course he is," she said. "Obama is awesome." We said we thought so, too. "I wish I could vote," she said. "Only 7 years until I can!" When Chris came to the door, we confirmed he was voting for Obama and made sure he knew of his voting options.
In some cases, we came across households looking for one Obama supporter from our list. The person at the door would respond, "Oh, our whole house is voting for Obama!" and eagerly accepted the early vote by mail forms. Towards the end of our afternoon, we met Dorothy, an 82 year-old woman who is dependent on an oxygen tank in her home. She informed us she was supporting Obama this year and welcomed us into her apartment so she could fill out her early voting ballot request form. "It's a beautiful day out there, isn't it?" she said, as she sat down "Ever since I got sick, this is the only way I can vote," she said as she carefully filled out her form. As we left, we could tell she was genuinely thankful for the help and we knew we could count on her support when it came time for her to fill out her vote by mail ballot.
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