Category: Volunteers
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“I do everything I can for the campaign in Nevada. I volunteer more than 40 hours each week. Every day, other volunteers and I go throughout the city to register voters and knock on doors. Some days I leave my home at 8:30 a.m. and don’t return until 9 that night.
“But it doesn’t bother me. I will continue volunteering until the last minute of this campaign because I want to see President Obama re-elected.
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With day two of the voter registration weekend of action in full swing, folks across the country are out making sure everyone they know is ready to hit the polls. Here's an update from one Virginia team.
Virginians put on their comfiest sneakers and hit the streets in their neighborhoods yesterday. Together, we did a lot: We knocked on doors (some of us in the rain), empowered our neighbors by registering them to vote, and signed up a bunch of new volunteers who will help us fight the big-money-backed misinformation from the other side.
It may seem like a bit of a frenzy, but we’re doing all this because—with 37 days left—time is ticking, and there is no time to stop and smell the roses. That can wait until after the election.
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At just 16 years old, Riley McKenna is one of Ohio’s youngest neighborhood team leaders. On Wednesday in Bowling Green, she not only saw President Obama speak for the first time in her life, she got an unforgettable hug.
A high school student with a part-time job, Riley leads a growing neighborhood team in Fremont, Ohio. She refuses to let her age or busy schedule get in the way of making a difference:
Read More…“I volunteer to make up for the fact that I can’t vote. Getting out the vote is my way of making sure we keep our country moving forward. I started off phone banking and canvassing in March. That first phone call wasn’t easy, but I got it used to it after a few calls. Now I enjoy talking to people in my area, getting to know them, and sharing my reasons for supporting the President.”
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Jesse Hyde is a legal recruiter by day, and a superstar call tool volunteer by night. Listen to him breeze through phone calls to Iowa voters, and let him show you the ropes on the Obama 2012 online call tool.
After hearing Jesse in action, get on the phone yourself—join the National Call Team right away.
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Supporters in Manchester recently came out for a Latinos for Obama block party to get pumped up for all the organizing happening in New Hampshire from now until Election Day. Behind all the action, there was one volunteer who took on a lead role in bringing his community together for the event.
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My name is Jackie Morgan, and I was born and raised in Salt Lake City. I’m 16 years old, so I’m a junior in high school. I was a spring and summer fellow for the campaign and I’m going to continue helping out this fall. I always tell people that I’ve been involved in politics since I was a little kid. When I was five, my mom did a lot of canvassing for local Democratic candidates and she would get me to come along by telling me that it was like trick-or-treating.
Utah is kind of a funny state because we’re such a small operation. One of the biggest things I do, though, is help out with border state trips. Obviously, Utah isn’t a battleground state, so a lot of what we do revolves around making trips to Colorado. That can be tough, but it also shows people’s dedication to the campaign, which is really inspiring. I make all of the arrangements and lead a lot of the trainings leading up to the trips. So I put together carpools, coordinate housing arrangements—that sort of thing. It’s important to me that we make sure the trips run smoothly because these volunteers are doing such an important thing by offering up that kind of time for the campaign, and I want to make sure they don’t have to worry about the details. I want to make it as easy as possible for them so that they’ll continue doing all of that great work. We’re doing a Colorado trip this weekend and we have 80 people going, which is the biggest trip we’ve had yet. People are getting more and more excited. We just have to keep up the momentum!
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Volunteers and organizers are finishing up day one of the September weekend of action—check out the photos to see which special guest showed up in Virginia, where students are registering other students to vote in Colorado, and more.
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Blake, left, and her friend Adrienne, showing off 2012 convention credentials
Name: Blaike Bibbs
Campaign role: Neighborhood Team Member, Chapel Hill team
Hometown: Morristown, New Jersey
Based in: Raleigh, North Carolina
How did you first come to the campaign?
In 2008, when I was 10 years old, I heard President Obama’s speech accepting the nomination. I remember I got the impression that everything he was saying was really about equality and fairness: treating people who aren’t well-off fairly, treating women fairly, treating disadvantaged people fairly. So, being the person I am, I started researching his positions on everything, and the more I learned, the more I realized that these are the same things I believe government should be about.
In 2010, I was asked to speak at a rally in North Carolina about health care reform. I talked about my family—my mom had a cerebral aneurysm and my two brothers are autistic. We were lucky because we had health care, but I can’t imagine what it would’ve been like if he didn’t have it. Again, health care is about fairness—making sure every family can afford it.
Soon after that I started volunteering, and started the North Carolina Association of Teen Democrats Minority Caucus. And next week, our group will be doing the Let’s Move! dance at the 2012 convention!
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“I was sitting in my Brooklyn apartment in May scrolling through Google News when I came upon an article about the likelihood of the Supreme Court reversing President Obama's health care law. As someone who's had plenty of trouble getting affordable insurance based on pre-existing conditions, this was the last straw. I had to show my support for President Obama's hard work.
“I logged on to barackobama.com thinking I would find a phone bank nearby or maybe knock on a door or two. I ended up becoming an Organizing for America-Minnesota summer fellow and moving to Minneapolis 10 days later.
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Thousands of volunteers in North Carolina have guaranteed their spot at the 2012 convention thanks to OFA-NC's 9-3-1 program. By completing nine volunteer shifts—three shifts of three hours—volunteers earned one convention credential.
Read More…“We were planning on volunteering anyways,” explains Cecilia who, along with her husband Keith, took part in the program. “But when we heard about 9-3-1, it was the extra motivation that showed us that now was the time to get involved. Plus, the chance to be part of history and see President Obama give his acceptance speech—how can you turn that down?”