Posted on 09/29/2004 8:57:39 PM PDT by neverdem
PHILADELPHIA, Sept. 28 - Jeffrey Anderson, a paralegal from Brooklyn, took three vacation days and more than $600 out of his bank account to canvass this city this week, registering voters in the hopes of defeating President Bush.
Daniel Aikin, a college student in Buffalo, gave up a weekend of rock climbing and studying to take a bus trip to Ohio to campaign for the president.
Genevieve Christy stays up into the wee hours to finish her management consulting work in her apartment in Boerum Hill, Brooklyn, so she can spend a few days a week here painting posters and knocking on voters' doors. "It's the most rewarding thing I have done all year," said Ms. Christy, who supports John Kerry.
While the campaign may not be coming to New Yorkers - both candidates rarely visit, hardly advertise and have more or less written the state off as Senator Kerry's - New Yorkers are going to the campaign.
Over the last month, thousands of New Yorkers have piled into buses, trains and cars and headed for Pennsylvania, Ohio, and, to a lesser degree, Florida. They register voters, campaign against the other guy and woo people to the polls, often at some personal cost. It is a cross-state effort without recent parallel, said people in both parties.
Thousands of voters desperately want to have an impact on a hotly contested race. Many are fueled by the memory of 2000, when several states were won by a margin of a few hundred votes. Several political groups, making their debut in this election cycle, have used the Internet with great success to bring volunteers together.
"The Internet has made all the difference in the world," said Patrick Gaspard, national field director for America Coming Together, a Democratic advocacy group. "It is an amazing multiplier that we have not had in the past." He added, "There is the sense among activists on both the right and left that the ground game matters again."
On any given Saturday, about 1,000 residents of non-swing states - a majority of them New Yorkers - visit regions that are in play, the group's leaders say. Dozens of other far smaller organizations, like Downtown for Democracy, pack their own buses weekly with people going for days or even weeks to canvass voters.
New York Republicans have also taken to visiting swing states, but in fewer numbers, a spokesman for the Bush re-election campaign said. "The reason we are going to Pennsylvania and Ohio is because it gives us a chance to realistically change the election," said Tony Marrone, the spokesman for the New York College Republican State Committee.
Campaign officials say that given the close margins at stake, the weekend incursions could have a significant influence.
"If one person can help knock on that many more doors and make that many more phone calls, it makes a difference," said Kevin Madden, a spokesman for the Bush campaign. "Any time you have close elections in states, and a perfect example is Pennsylvania, the ground game is what makes the difference."
Many of the New Yorkers descending on swing states are people who have never done any significant work on a campaign, but are annoyed by their uselessness in the one race they view as the most important in years, if not decades.
They are young and old, urban and suburban, more female than male. Some are retired; others are taking vacation time from work, or even unpaid leave. Many more give up time with children and friends, or skip grocery shopping and movies to spend $100 a night for inexpensive hotels. Some go for a day, some for weeks.
They pile into overnight buses late Friday night, returning Sunday, or spend entire weeks slogging through the streets. Kerry voters tend to get in touch with the political groups - known as 527's - or create small, ad-hoc organizations of their own that use word of mouth and mouse to get support. For those who cannot travel, there are groups like Democracy in the Park, which organizes people who have free weekend cellphone minutes to gather in different parks and call voters in swing states.
Bush supporters work closely with the campaign or the Republican National Committee, which tells volunteers exactly where to go and sometimes meets them with a T-shirt and a game plan at their destination. All of the volunteers, regardless of party affiliation, seem possessed by a need to do something, quickly.
Kimberley Euston, 34, who has three small children, has decided to spend much of October (except for her twin boys' birthday on the 15th) in Minnesota or wherever else the Bush campaign sends her. "It is going to be a very tight election," said Ms. Euston, who lives in Fleetwood, N.Y., in Westchester County. "And New York is already decided for Kerry. I thought, having been a working mother and being from New York, I thought I could add some value by speaking to some other women in the swing states."
On Tuesday, as clouds began to darken the sky, Ms. Christy and Jacob Fisher, a New Yorker and a paid worker for America Coming Together, made their way to Delaware County, a suburban area outside Philadelphia that swings like a clock pendulum. There are twice as many registered Republicans as Democrats, but Al Gore won the county by 29,025 of 240,697 votes cast in the 2000 race. It has a Republican congressman, but voted for the Democratic candidate in the last governor's race. Unlike, say, the Upper West Side of Manhattan, Delaware County personifies the "who knows?" territory of a good political street fight.
And so Ms. Christy and Mr. Fisher never knew what might be on the other side of a knocked-on door. Standing under giant black umbrellas, little white stickers attached to their shirts, the two made their way down a row of lovely stone houses in a middle-class neighborhood in Havertown. They rapped on Kathleen Garvey's door. What was the No. 1 issue in the campaign for her? "Downsizing government," she proclaimed. Did she know whom she was voting for? "Absolutely, Bush!"
They thanked her and moved on. It is not worth their time, they reasoned, to convert people. The object is to register people to vote and to get Kerry supporters to join the ranks of volunteers to canvass other voters, work the phone banks and decorate signs for events like "the big squeeze," in which volunteers swarmed upon drivers during the afternoon rush with free orange juice and their views on Bush administration policies that affect the middle class.
Next stop, a Democrat who had yet to register. His pet issue? The economy. "Did you know that in Pennsylvania we've lost almost 100,000 jobs?" asked Mr. Fisher, using the "we" rather broadly, as he hails from Brooklyn. He handed the man a registration form.
"We got a registration," said Ms. Christy, as the rain began to drive hard. Shoes and jeans were getting soaked. Umbrellas barely covered the clipboards.
Next was the house of Andria Bianchi, who said abortion, religion and education drove her vote. "I don't pay attention to parties," said Ms. Bianchi, a schoolteacher.
None of these potential voters knew they were being questioned by New Yorkers, but when Ms. Bianchi was asked if she minded, she seemed puzzled.
"No, not at all," she said. "I don't think people should be separated by states. I want people in New York to think like I do, too."
Daniel Cappellazzo for The New York Times
Members of the New York College Republican State Committee at Canisius College, in Buffalo, preparing for a trip to Erie, Pa.
Sabina Louise Pierce for The New York Times
Jacob Fisher, one of many New Yorkers working politically in several swing states, asks Andria Bianchi, a teacher in Havertown, Pa., about her political opinions.
Let me know if you want on or off my New York ping list.
Hey, Idahoans: We can use your help over here.
Well, since the hurricanes struck north of the notorious "Tri-Counties" of Southeast Florida, there will be many New Yorkers pouring down into Florida and bringing their votes with them (provided they already filled out their absentee ballots for New York of course).
As the article notes, he's getting paid by the Soros-run campaign. He hardly counts as a volunteer, IMHO.
does anyone know what recent polls are saying about the race in NY?
We are making New York a race.
I am finding more and more people voting for President Bush.
If they aren't, they are after they get done talking to me..
It will get better, 5 weeks and counting. We are in the last 2 minutes of the game.
Bush supporters ought to think twice about leaving New York this time. Oue state is getting closer. If it doesn't, I'm doing the 72 hour blitz in Pa and I hope other NY Freepers do as well.
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