With fewer than 24 hours to go until the Presidential election and polls showing a tight race in key battleground states like Wisconsin, the ground game will be crucial for getting out the vote on November 6th. In Wisconsin, a poll released Thursday by Rasmussen shows the Badger State all tied up at 49 apiece for both presidential candidates. Some could argue that Wisconsin’s grassroots efforts have made this state competitive, even giving Governor Scott Walker (R-WI) his recall election victory in June.
Most media attention in a presidential campaign can be seen online, through television commercials, the speeches, debates and rallies that the candidates use to get out their message. But in an election where polls show a tie, an effective ground game can make all the difference in turnout which could swing Wisconsin’s 10 electoral votes to one candidate.
Organizations like American Majority Action have an extensive ground operation going on in Wisconsin this year, having knocked on more than 100,000 doors so far. Volunteers armed with lists of targeted voters are marching through neighborhoods with an iPad in one hand, going to those addresses where they know there’s a voter who might support their issues, but who has not yet voted yet.
Technology like Gravity makes it possible for groups to target and mobilize conservative voters across the country. Volunteers use Gravity, a new software tool by American Majority Action, to canvass neighborhoods and ask specific survey questions of voters then take those answers and put them into a database that will ultimately be used for later elections.
“Gravity is tremendously helping conservatives in the ground game here in Wisconsin and in other key battleground states to turn out the vote,” said Matt Batzel, State Director of AMA in Wisconsin told me in an interview.
One self-described undecided voter in Cleveland, WI expressed skepticism on voting for Romney because she was scared he would take away Pell grant funding that would be needed to put her kids through college. After AMA spoke with her on the issue she made up her mind she was voting for Romney and requested a “Fire Obama, Keep America Free” yard sign.
AMA has opened five new offices in Wisconsin—and in the last two weeks, AMA has organized volunteers to knock on 35,000 swing-voter doors in crucial regions including Brown, Milwaukee, Dane, Waukesha, Ozaukee, Washington, Sheboygan, Fond du Lac, Racine, St. Croix, Manitowoc, and Kenosha Counties.
The GOP has also been changing its strategy lately. Democrats who used to dominate Republicans when it came to having a better more organized “GOTV” effort has seen the tides turn. Republican National Chairman Reince Priebus said last Sunday that the GOP has a better ground game this year than the Democrats. “We’re going to do more voter contacts this year compared to all of 2008 and all of 2004 combined,” he said. Reince has been building the ground game since he’s became chairman in 2011.
The Wisconsin recall offered a significant reality check for Democrats feeling overconfident about the impact of their ground game in Wisconsin. The recall election, which the unions spent millions of dollars and campaigned for to help elect Mayor Tom Barrett (D-WI), failed. They went all in. And they lost. It also gave groups like AMA, a dry run to gain familiarity with their GOTV operations now being used for the presidential election.
More than 30 million people have already cast their ballots nationwide, according to the United States Elections Project at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia.
The president has spent final day of his re-election campaign in Wisconsin along with rock star Bruce Springsteen rallying his base in Madison. Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan will be in Wisconsin as well for a night rally at the Milwaukee airport with Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal (R-LA).
