“People Should Care, And People Should Run”
Inside Run for Something’s Work to Build a Bench of Young Democrats Who Get It Done
Have you ever thought about running for office? Maybe you’ve considered the possibility but don’t know where to start. Where do you file for an election? How do you fundraise? How do you organize a grassroots political campaign?
“We realized that a lot of folks were coming to us asking the same repetitive questions about running for office,” said Tyler Goodridge, Digital Comms Senior Manager at Run for Something, a nonprofit that helps recruit and support young people running for office. “And some of their questions were more complex, like, ‘I live in a red district, what is the likelihood of me winning a city council race?’”
“Our potential candidates didn’t know what to do next,” added Leslie Hauser, Director of Community at Run for Something. “So Tyler created a seven-day welcome series to introduce all of the different team members and the different services we provide to candidates, which has really been a game changer.”
As a national organization dedicated to building a bench of young, passionate Democratic candidates, Run for Something is constantly welcoming new potential candidates into its candidate pipeline, where they receive hands-on support and information about how to run for office. The group’s growing list of alumni (1,500 and counting) offer potential candidates expertise about how to run in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
Each potential candidate joins Run for Something at a different stage in the process. Since the organization launched in 2017, over 66,000 candidates have signed up to learn about running for office.
“It’s hard because we’re working with so many candidates, some of whom have elections in February, and some of them are thinking of running in 2026, and everything in between,” added Leslie. “So it’s hard to parse that out and be relevant.”
“What we found in 2020 was that the state legislators, the city council members, the district attorneys, and the school board members were the ones who were really doing the work to protect their communities.”
To ensure that the potential candidates are receiving the valuable information they need to run — tailored to them, their deadlines, and the office they’re running for — Run for Something uses Ladders on Action Network.
Ladders are a powerful and flexible tool for automating emails and mobile messages. They allow you to design sophisticated campaign journeys for your activists as they subscribe to your list or take a specific action, and they give you the ability to send activists down different paths with decision trees. That means that you can simulate a conversation — like asking about an activist’s interests or volunteer capacity — entirely automatically.
Last year, we introduced Ladder Templates, which make Ladders easier to use and much more accessible for programs of all sizes. Now you can also create a Ladder directly from an action, email, or mobile message, instead of having to navigate to Ladders and creating a new Ladder each time.
“We use Ladders to streamline our conversations and make sure they’re getting pertinent information when we need them to get it, which is particularly important for our candidate pipeline,” said Tyler. “We start them off with something very basic to give them an idea of what we do, how we do it, and how we support them. With each email, it gets a bit more comprehensive and a bit more nuanced.”
Run for Something’s seven-day email welcome series for potential candidates covers the mentorship program, which matches alumni with candidates to help build their campaign, gives candidates information about PR and press and building a fundraising plan, and breaks down the myths about running for office.
“We took those questions that people were asking us and said, ‘Let’s answer these questions off the top,’” added Tyler. “Whether you’re at the beginning of the process, which is, ‘I’m thinking about running, but I don’t know where to start,’ or you’re at the end and you come to us saying, ‘I’ve already filed, and I just want to know how Run for Something can help me,’ you’re getting all of that important information within the candidate pipeline Ladder. It’s really important to the core of our work.”
“It’s incredible to see because these are young, diverse elected officials, these are people that have very little experience in the political realm and they’re not just going in, they’re going in and getting it done.”
Since creating the seven-day welcome series, Run for Something has seen an uptick in engagement among potential candidates.
“We have seen a jump in the number of people who have signed up for our weekly candidate intro call,” said Leslie. “Part of that I think is from the seven-day series, so people know what they’re getting into, and part of it is a new tool we introduced where you can enter your name and address and find out what offices you can run for in the next cycle [at RunForWhat.net]. That was the biggest question we’d get from candidates: ‘I want to run, but what can I run for?’”
The new tool helps direct a potential candidate to races for local offices that have the potential to make a huge difference for their community.
“There are thousands of municipal races this year, and these are really the elections that matter,” Tyler said. “We’re coming off of a really devastating year, and what we found in 2020 was that the state legislators, the city council members, the district attorneys, and the school board members were the ones who were really doing the work to protect their communities and making sure folks had access to basic necessities. They were the ones pushing mask mandates, sometimes even against governors’ orders.”
“Our alumni were doing things in 2020 that should have been done decades ago,” added Tyler. “It’s incredible to see because these are young, diverse elected officials, these are people that have very little experience in the political realm and they’re not just going in, they’re going in and getting it done.”
“This is about taking the energy young Democrats are building from their activism, their political engagement, and their lived experiences, and getting them into office to make impactful change now,” Leslie added.
“We really need to be focusing and investing in these down ballot elections because these are the people that are going to protect us every day, whether we see it or not,” said Tyler. “So that is the 2021 message — the all-the-time message, but definitely the 2021 message. It’s important, and people should care, and people should run.”
