Meet Spread The Vote
A little over a year ago I quit my job in Los Angeles, drove to Atlanta, and launched the first chapter of Spread The Vote. I knew voter ID laws were a blatant form of voter suppression, I knew we had an idea of how to solve it (simply put: GET PEOPLE IDs), and I knew I had to try. So I blew my savings (those student loans weren’t getting paid anyways), started a nonprofit, and gave it a shot.
A year later we have over 30 chapters in five states, five awesome staffers, and hundreds of volunteers working every day to help people get the IDs they need. We also have a totally different understanding of what we do than what I thought it would be on that long drive from LA to ATL. I thought I was starting an effort to get people IDs to go to the polls. What we’ve actually done is find a scaleable, sustainable, and tech-enabled grassroots solution to help people get the IDs that will change their lives. We get IDs for jobs, housing, medical care, access to food banks and shelters, access to education, access to life. And yeah, access to the polls too.
So now we’re starting a blog to show you what life is like on the ground. Every week one of our team members will take you on a tour of life at Spread The Vote. We want to share the hard work that our volunteers do every day, the incredible stories of our voters, and what it’s like to run a grassroots anti-poverty voting rights nonprofit.
We are incredibly proud of the work we do at Spread The Vote, and we can’t wait to share it with you. Thanks for reading.
Kat Calvin
Founder, Spread The Vote
