Our vote is more powerful now than ever before, let’s use it. America can’t wait.

By New Hampshire Democratic Party, Chairman Ray Buckley

America is the country of freedoms, and while we’re on a journey to take on every battle to achieve equality and justice, we’re reminded with every election, presidential, local, and everything in between, how important it is to exercise one’s right to vote and voice their truth. That’s why the recent Democratic National Committee meeting was so powerful. I sat next to my colleagues, and we passed some of the most historic reforms in decades that would revamp the Democratic Party’s presidential nominating process — emotions ran high. These groundbreaking reforms ranged from empowering grassroots voters and making caucuses more accessible to no longer requiring that members identify within a gender binary. Moments like these are critically important as we prepare to flip red seats to blue in this upcoming midterm election cycle and the presidential cycle in 2020, and as we seek to strongly unite as a party and restore faith in our government.

My colleagues from New Hampshire and I had set out to secure the Granite State’s status as first-in-the-nation in the presidential primary, and to decrease the powers of superdelegates. While the superdelegate vote has never determined the nominee, the process did have influence. It created a harmful perception that the votes of party insiders mattered more than those of grassroots voters. Well, those days are over thanks to the leadership of DNC Chair Tom Perez and the members of the DNC.

I was proud to be part of a vote to change that. All of us coming together boils down to winning elections. And it’s not about just winning, it’s about how we win. By stepping up and reassuring Americans across the nation — and newcomers who believe in the American dream — that members of the Democratic Party are fighting like hell for hard working families, children, seniors, young people, and all people regardless of race, religion, or who they love. I believe we have a chance to inspire voters. Inspire them despite the cyber-attacks. Inspire them despite the fact that a Republican spewing racist, hateful rhetoric, who lost the popular vote, somehow manages to sit in the Oval Office, making decisions that affect not just our country, but the stability of our entire world.

By uniting and reminding voters that their voice matters, we can put all of our organizing energy and might into winning every possible seat in our community, and in every state across the nation. Republicans are trying to rig our elections through gerrymandering and voter suppression, and we can’t allow them to stop us. If we do, we’re looking at a world where men make decisions about women’s bodies. We’re looking at a world where quality healthcare won’t see the light of day for those who need it most. We’re looking at a world where our young people won’t be able to afford a college education, and if they make it past graduation, they’ll drown in debt. We’re looking at a world of systemic inequality, barring deserving people from equal opportunity. We’re looking at a world where the rich get richer, and guns continue to fall into the wrong hands. More children hurt. More pain. More suffering.

Like many Republicans across the country, New Hampshire’s Governor Sununu has made it his mission to diminish the votes of young people since his first day in office. He worked up a bill in a private room that would obstruct the voting rights of young people living in the Granite State. He told a college student that he vehemently opposed another voter suppression bill, one that creates a modern-day poll tax, before turning around and signing it anyway. Governor Sununu and New Hampshire Republicans are now forcing eligible New Hampshire voters to pay to register their cars and obtain a New Hampshire driver’s license in order to cast a ballot. A couple hundred bucks might be pocket change for Sununu and his corporate donors, but to a struggling college student, a new citizen who just finished paying naturalization application fees, or a single parent barely making ends meet, this will be a burden. Everyone should be able to participate in our democratic process, regardless of what’s in their wallet, their background, or how they vote. Our democratic process is the backbone America, and Republicans and their corporate donors are trying to ruin it at every turn. Vote them out.

This is the America I so deeply refuse to see our country diminished to, and that’s why I’m doing this work. That’s why I support Democratic candidates every single day. That’s why we fundraise. That’s why we fight back one election at a time.

Speak to your neighbors. Speak to your children. Let’s work together and stand together strong to see to it that we’re uplifting the America we all want to be part of. Remember: November 6 is coming, and we’re not stopping.

New Hampshire Democratic Party

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