Politics & Government

LTE: Grassroots Over TV Gets My Vote

A past volunteer talks about the conviction of those working for political campaigns.

This past Saturday, I was invited to join a group of canvassers out knocking on doors for Jennifer Boysko. I’d completely forgotten there was an election on June 11. The newspaper has already been covering the governor’s race for months, and I remember hearing about delegate primaries, but I got busy with school graduations and summer plans and forgot the date. Many of us in Northern Virginia are used to these campaign visits in the months leading up to the November elections, but not in June primaries. However, this group of Boysko volunteers felt so strongly about her candidacy that they decided to spend their Saturday morning asking people to go vote in a primary.

We all learned from the 2012 Presidential election that candidates with deep-pocketed supporters have TV ads. But candidates supported by real people also have door-to-door canvassers. After that election, I don’t have any faith in TV ads, most of which are nasty and full of lies. They feel like someone’s trying to buy your vote and they’re willing to say anything to get it. When political commercials come on, I hit the mute button and head to the kitchen.

I went door to door campaigning for President Obama. For those who haven’t done that before, it takes a lot of conviction to spend a weekend walking through the rain, cold or the hot sun talking to people. People are mean, dismissive or outright hostile. Some slam the door in your face. Some call you names. After someone does that, knocking on the next door takes a strong belief that the candidate you are volunteering for is going to make your life better. People knock on doors because they believe. That belief is way more convincing than any TV ad could ever be.

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Kelly Keiter
Ashburn, VA


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