The Squad Won Because the Squad Organized
For progressives, it bears pointing out (even if it’s already well-known among political junkies) that every member of the “Squad” won their primary campaigns this Summer, even after Bernie Sanders’s disappointing finish in the presidential primary. This included sound defeats of well-financed challengers against Ilhan Omar of Minnesota and New York City’s Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Rashida Tlaib of Detroit had a little tougher competition, but also won.
In these races, mainstream voices tried very hard to make the odds seem more even than they actually were. In Rep. Omar’s case, for example, she saw her race called less than an hour and a half after polls closed and learned she had won by about 18 points despite being painted as vulnerable for months prior. The Squad is now joined by three new kindred spirits: Marie Newman in Illinois, Cori Bush in Missouri, and Jamaal Bowman in New York, all of whom defeated more conservative incumbents.
These races were won with campaigns that felt, themselves, like social movements and which relied heavily on door-to-door visits, neighborhood organizing, and a sense of building power from the ground up. These ground games worked particularly well in the districts where Squad and soon-to-be Squad members ran.
(It is worth noting that Squad member Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts ran unopposed in her primary. While this is great news, it doesn’t help us analyze movement-based ground games in elections. That being said, we wish her a hearty congratulations.)
I’m going to intentionally dodge the question of whether the ground game matters as much in presidential or even statewide senate campaigns as it does in House races — it may not. Most of the lessons we can draw from recent primary re-election victories for members of the Squad are applicable specifically to congressional districts in urban areas (although the urban-ness may not be the ultimate factor). Yet, if the presidential election comes down to a few districts like it did in 2016, you can bet that many of the lessons we learned watching the Squad’s campaigns will be applicable. Most notably, these campaigns hinged on a kind of organizing that thrives on empathy — empathy that is most effective when the candidates exhibit it themselves and when it’s also reflected in their platforms.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s primary win in New York’s 14th congressional district showed that the Squad has lasting power “and potential to drive a larger movement.” It’s important to note that all the candidates took advantage of new technology for reaching voters — like the Reach app that AOC’s campaign used. Data-driven canvassing, supported by general append companies like Accurate Append, has become an essential part of successful ground games. More human, interpersonal, and “deep” canvassing apps promise to build connections in a way that might uniquely benefit energetic, populist-progressive candidates. And, we can’t say enough about deep canvassing; it can even talk people out of bigotry.
In a tweet after learning she’d won, AOC said: “the people’s movement in NY isn’t an accident. It‘s a mandate.” This tendency to go right to the people and to wear one’s collectivism on one’s sleeve, characterizes and explains the Squad’s success. Ilhan Omar’s tweet after her victory also displays this collective-oriented ethic. She said: “This victory belongs to US. You knocked tens of thousands of doors and made hundreds of thousands of calls and organized your friends and neighbors. Your commitment to our movement made this one of the highest turnout primaries in MN history. I didn’t win — WE did.”
Turnout was higher by 25,000 in Omar’s reelection primary than it had been in 2018. Her opponents argue that this was because of the popularity of her opponent, but obviously the result doesn’t verify that explanation. Omar’s campaign simply got more people to vote. And Omar had painted the campaign as a precursor to focusing on mobilizing voters in Minnesota to block a Trump win there (which is a possibility there if turnout is unusually low — Trump nearly won the state in 2016).
Omar has the support of labor unions and the DFL party in her corner. Specifically, however, it’s what she’s actually doing on the ground that should make people take notice. According to The Hill, “Omar has held regular roundtable discussions with members of the Minneapolis Jewish community and voted in favor of House resolutions condemning anti-Semitism after the Poway synagogue shooting in 2019.” She meets with other constituents both as individuals and groups. and she remembers their stories, frequently recounting them in speeches. Similarly, donors contributing to Omar’s reelection campaign for Minnesota’s 5th District averaged less than $15 in the last quarter, but there were tens of thousands of them, a sure sign of grassroots support.
Rashida Tlaib had the endorsement of labor movements — which is very important in Detroit — but, more importantly, Tlaib “always has a bullhorn in her hand,” according to one political consultant in the city. According to the New York Times, Tlaib “emphasized in-person events, canvassing door to door and attending community events” — all epitomizing the best in ground game techniques.
Visiting people works. While obviously produces votes, it also builds a movement for a few important reasons. First, people feel like they’re part of a mutual investment in well-being. Second, visiting people who are commonly marginalized or who may be struggling materially in some way builds solidarity. Finally, interpersonal interaction increases voters’ information on issues and candidates, and increases their engagement. This was tested in a unique way in France, where a study found that canvassing to immigrant households increased their voter turnout. Researchers following the ground game of French Socialists found that voter turnout for immigrant households increased 3.4 percentage points in the first round of voting, and 2.8 percentage points in the second, after visits from campaign canvassers.
If politics matters and if interpersonal connection and empathy are centered, successful candidates will not just collect votes; they will build movements. The local nature of so many U.S. House races provides us opportunities to integrate real movement-building tactics into campaigns: deep canvassing, organizing and holding lots of (medically-safe) get-togethers, building a constant stream of mutual encouragement and affirmation, combining mutual aid with mutual organizing. Organizing in this way is successful, because it is at its core an antidote to the radical individualism that has clouded our political potential.
