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Here It Comes: RNC, Team Trump Launch Digital GOTV Campaign More Than 20x Larger Than 2016 Effort
Hotair ^ | 10/07/2020 | Ed Morrissey

Posted on 10/07/2020 9:06:43 PM PDT by SeekAndFind

One question may loom larger than any other in this election cycle: just how much does traditional politicking matter? Both campaigns have placed large bets on diametrically opposed answers, seemingly without hedging them much, if at all.

Joe Biden, his campaign, and the DNC insist that voters won’t respond to in-person appeals such as larger-scale events and door-knocking. They have directed most of their money to national TV ads and national messaging, although last week began to explore some rudimentary door-knocking. Team Trump, the RNC, and especially Donald Trump himself all insist on traditional events, door-knocking, and more granular personal-contact efforts, while arguably underfunding the TV campaign.

With that as the status quo ante, Team Trump and the RNC doubled down on their GOTV strategy, the New York Times reported — tenfold, according to the numbers:

With voting underway in more than 30 states, the Republican National Committee has begun a $60 million digital get-out-the-vote campaign that will harness social media, text messages, emails and other platforms to digitally chase voters.

The expansive effort leverages the vast data operation the party has built over the past three years, and will involve quickly filling the newsfeeds, inboxes and text threads of potential voters with information on how to vote and reminders about key deadlines. …

The $60 million investment is a marked jump for the party’s digital get-out-the-vote program, which it invested just $2.9 million in for the 2016 cycle.

“It’s a new priority from the G.O.P. because typically this is not the type of money they would invest in that type of campaign,” said Filippo Trevisan, a professor of public communication at American University. “They’ve had get-out-the-vote efforts in the past but never to the level that we’re seeing.”

The RNC has worked on building this capability ever since their shock defeat in the 2012 presidential election. The key part of their overhaul was an in-house voter-contact system that emulated Barack Obama’s innovative campaign models, only to make sure it remained independent of candidates. In 2016, they had the framework of the human model built, and had a small but effective digital campaign to complement it. At that time, however, Team Trump preferred to focus its resources on rallies and earned media from them rather than the personal-contact politics that Reince Priebus wanted to enhance. They were fortunate, however, that Hillary Clinton largely ignored that too in favor of Mitt Romney’s data-analytics, national-messaging strategy.

This time, both the RNC and the Trump campaign have leaned into the personal-contact efforts. Reportedly making a million door knocks a week, the combination now have a massive GOTV file on voters, especially in battleground states. But will that succeed in driving turnout in Trump’s favor?

“It’s difficult to say whether they’re going to work or not for get-out-the-vote, because get-out-the-vote efforts really work best when you can involve some contact with the person that you are trying to persuade,” Mr. Trevisan said.

And this is where the big bet comes into play. If Biden and the DNC spend dollar for dollar on digital GOTV, they still won’t be able to compete. They have not had the voter contact necessary to grasp what moves voters in individual states, cities, and even precincts. They don’t even know who to contact to help them find out, because they haven’t done any of the basic blocking and tackling to get and organize those volunteers and local surrogates. That’s why this part of the NYT report isn’t a comparison at all:

Though the Democrats have not outlined their digital get-out-the-vote operation, both the Biden campaign and the Democratic National Committee have been spending heavily on digital ads. The Biden campaign has regularly outspent Mr. Trump on Facebook, often by more than a third, and the D.N.C. reserved $22 million on YouTube for the general election.

Without any granularity or context for what people specifically care about, all this means is that Team Biden will run the same national messaging on social-media platforms as they do on TV. It doesn’t hurt, but it’s essentially duplication of the same kind that drove the Clinton campaign in 2016. They looked at all of those voter contacts and just assumed that the quality of the contact didn’t matter — only the quantity.

Republicans, on the other hand, have made the personal contacts necessary to at least have the ability to microtarget messaging and ensure the best possible contact for their money. It’s why all those stories about the lack of door-knocking by Democrats mattered — they’re now essentially flying blind on the electorate and the reception of their messaging. The GOP at least has made the right moves to create the feedback loops and develop targeting strategies to maximize the impact of their GOTV messaging and activities.

Are they doing it well enough to matter? We’ll know after the election, but this is a critical capability, one that Obama proved would not just succeed in one election but produce sustainable results in future elections as well. It’s quite possible that Democrats will live to regret not learning that lesson, and not once but twice.



TOPICS: Campaign News
KEYWORDS: 2020election; campaign; election2020; gotv; landslide; rnc; trumplandslide
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1 posted on 10/07/2020 9:06:43 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
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To: SeekAndFind

Demoncats are throwing this election

Still running bullcrap polls nonetheless


2 posted on 10/07/2020 9:13:57 PM PDT by Truthoverpower (The guv-mint you get is the Trump winning express ! Yea haw ! Trump Pence II! Save America again)
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To: SeekAndFind
In 2016 I contributed more to the Trump campaign than I had given combined in the previous 3 decades to all candidates.

This year I increased that 10x over, spacing it out. Glad to see that it is being well-spent. Might contribute some more. GO TRUMP/PENCE 2020!!!!

3 posted on 10/07/2020 9:17:11 PM PDT by Simon Foxx
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To: SeekAndFind

bookmark


4 posted on 10/07/2020 9:17:32 PM PDT by GOP Poet
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To: SeekAndFind

My daughter is going door to door in the City of Phoenix for the Susan B. Anthony pro-life organization. She gets as many door responses as you would expect. Not all, but most.


5 posted on 10/07/2020 9:20:02 PM PDT by Dr. Sivana (There is no salvation in politics)
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To: SeekAndFind

Just focus on hitting your turn out numbers. 3.am in PA and 2.4M in Michgan. Polls are silly. Hit your numbers and you win. Turnout! it largely doesn’t matter what the candidates do or say (see Biden’s primary). Ground game and turnout. That’s the game


6 posted on 10/07/2020 9:23:02 PM PDT by wiseprince
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To: Dr. Sivana

Very good to hear. That’s what will win the election. Enthusiasm matter if that turns into volunteers and door knockers


7 posted on 10/07/2020 9:24:26 PM PDT by wiseprince
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To: wiseprince

Very true.


8 posted on 10/07/2020 9:33:05 PM PDT by fortheDeclaration
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To: SeekAndFind

Doing it this way, the media/Dems will have an easy time revving up their “protestors” when Trump wins. The low info voters/protestors will have been convinced Biden was winning, so when Trump wins they will go into a rage thinking (won’t take a whole lot of thinking because the media/Dems will be telling them it was stolen) the election was fixed. Nice little way to start a war.


9 posted on 10/07/2020 9:36:50 PM PDT by Sir Bangaz Cracka (Slamming dat white cracka'a head into dat sidewalk causin he be scared)
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To: Sir Bangaz Cracka
Nice little way to start a war.

Crazier things have happened in 2020, just sayin.
10 posted on 10/07/2020 9:56:51 PM PDT by JoSixChip (Its not about color, its about character.)
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To: SeekAndFind
On the subject of he democrats granting Statehood to places that they know will be voting solidly for them, why not have Trump make GUAM a state as well?

Guam is a military base and I'm sure they would vote Republicans.

What's good for the goose...

11 posted on 10/07/2020 10:06:10 PM PDT by prophetic (Trump is today's DANIEL. Shut the mouth of lions Lord, let his enemies be the Cat Food instead.)
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To: wiseprince

I saw a tweet from some mainstream outlet or other that Trump’s campaign is pulling ads in Minnesota, Michigan and Wisconsin now, in addition to Iowa and Ohio. Seems like a bad move to me. Is the campaign going broke or have they simply decided digital GOTV is more effective?


12 posted on 10/07/2020 10:17:03 PM PDT by TheDandyMan
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To: TheDandyMan

I have seen the add pulling story from Ohio and Iowa, which looks like locks for Trump. Doubt it on MN, MI, WI,,,,


13 posted on 10/07/2020 10:19:26 PM PDT by gswilder
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To: TheDandyMan

GOTV is more effective. And let’s stop this nonsense “campaign is going broke”. There’s roughly 25 days left, they’ve got access to all the resources they need for a 25-day sprint.


14 posted on 10/07/2020 10:28:31 PM PDT by No_Mas_Obama
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To: No_Mas_Obama

I’m glad that the Trump campaign is learning from Romney’s mistakes. Beating Biden in the get out the vote push is crucial and will overcome whatever the polls say.


15 posted on 10/07/2020 10:46:25 PM PDT by convoter2016
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To: TheDandyMan

Don’t watch networks, can’t on the golf course, do get messages on cell.


16 posted on 10/07/2020 11:03:54 PM PDT by Varsity Flight (QE 2020. All Quiet on the Western Front)
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To: SeekAndFind

GOTV = Get out the vote


17 posted on 10/07/2020 11:11:00 PM PDT by UnwashedPeasant (Trump is solving the world's problems only to distract us from Russia.)
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To: Dr. Sivana

I am up to 1,696 since Aug 19. Goal of 2,000+ by election day


18 posted on 10/08/2020 4:59:38 AM PDT by Jimmy The Snake
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To: Simon Foxx

Me too!


19 posted on 10/08/2020 5:02:58 AM PDT by View from the Cheap Seats
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To: SeekAndFind

They need to do something so I hope this helps.


20 posted on 10/08/2020 5:11:33 AM PDT by JerseyDvl ("If you're going through hell, keep going.")
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