Joe Biden smashes his own $360m monthly fundraising record as his campaign changes course and says it WILL reach out to voters at their homes after halting door-knocks for the pandemic
After months of avoiding direct contact with voters because of the pandemic, Joe Biden's campaign is about to launch door-to-door canvassing across battleground states.
The sudden change in tactics comes as the campaign prepared to announce a stunning cash haul that exceeds the $364.5 million the campaign and the Democratic National Committee raised in August.
That amount includes an eye-popping $24 million raised on a single day, Sept. 30 – the day after the first presidential debate, the New York Times reported. Another $10 million came during prime time the night of the debate.
The decision comes amid growing concern from Democratic officials on the ground in key states who fear that Biden has been giving a significant advantage to President Donald Trump and his Republican allies, who have been aggressively courting voters at their doorsteps for months. The reversal also reflects a sense of rising urgency as polls tighten just a month before Election Day.
Democratic U.S. presidential nominee Joe Biden gestures during a campaign stop outside Johnstown Train Station September 30, 2020 in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. His campaign campaign shattered his own monthly fundraising record
Just weeks ago, the Biden camp was contrasting its strategy, which relies on telephone and digital outreach amid the pandemic, even as Team Trump emphasized in-person voter contacts.
Democratic officials have been extremely critical of the GOP's tactics. Lily Adams, a spokesperson for the Democratic National Committee, tweeted in August that the Trump campaign was 'risking the lives of their staff, the lives of voters and risking becoming a super spreader organization during the middle of a pandemic.'
'We think what voters are looking for right now is responsible leadership and that comes from the VP and what he's saying, but it also comes from the campaign,' deputy states director for the campaign Molly Ritner told NPR in mid-September.
The reversal comes a day after Biden – who Trump regularly accuses of hiding out in his basement – took a train tour through Ohio and Pennsylvania and held events where groups of supporters turned out.
Biden´s campaign, which detailed the new effort to The Associated Press, insists that its existing phone and online voter outreach is effective. The new plans will build upon what's already in place, not replace it.
'Our voter contact operation is the most innovative and technologically advanced of any presidential campaign in history, and it has been thriving in this unprecedented environment,' Biden campaign manager Jenn O'Malley Dillon said.
Biden's campaign shattered his own monthly fundraising record, and will begin initiating voter contacts at people's homes
Eileen Weitzman (L), a volunteer with Brooklyn Voters Alliance, registers a New York resident to vote September 26, 2020 in New York City. For the U.S. Presidential election on November 3, 2020, voter registration forms must be mailed in by October 9, 2020 with absentee ballots postmarked by November 3, 2020
Crowds of Biden supporters assembled to await the arrival his Build Back Better Express tour. The turnout was the largest gathering of its kind in recent memory. Biden rides the Build Back Better Express campaign train, Pennsylvania
Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden greets supporters on the platform outside the Amtrak's Greensburg Train Station, Wednesday, Sept. 30, 2020, in Greensburg, Pa. Biden is on a train tour through Ohio and Pennsylvania today. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
'We´re now expanding on our strategy in a targeted way that puts the safety of communities first and foremost and helps us mobilize voters who are harder to reach by phone now that we´re in the final stretch - and now that Americans are fully dialed-in and ready to make their voices heard.'
Biden this weekend will dispatch several hundred newly trained volunteers to engage voters across Nevada, Michigan, New Hampshire and Pennsylvania. The effort, focusing on voters who are considered difficult to reach by phone, is expected to spread quickly into several more battleground states and include many more volunteers.
Campaign officials and volunteers acknowledge their virtual-contact strategy had holes they're hoping to fill with in-person conversations.
'It´s just harder and harder to get people on the phone,' said Patrick Sullivan, a Biden volunteer who lives in suburban Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. 'So being able to go to someone's door and talk to them makes a big difference.'
Trump's campaign and allied Republican groups have been having in-person contacts with voters since at least June. Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel said over the summer that her team was knocking on roughly one million doors each week.
Republicans quickly seized on Biden's reversal.
'What changed? They know they're being hopelessly outworked on the ground, and down-ballot Democrats in key states have been freaking out about it,' Trump campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh said. 'You can't just parachute in a month before the election and hope to make up ground.'
While Biden leads many polls, lingering questions remain about the commitment of his supporters to actually vote. To defeat Trump, Democrats will need strong turnout from every piece of his broad coalition, including groups that typically don't vote in large numbers, such as younger Americans and African Americans.
And with the pandemic still raging, voters in 2020 face unprecedented challenges in getting counted.
'It is possible that without the face-to-face-engagement, you may have a few voters who fall off,' said Mairi Luce, an attorney and a Biden volunteer who lives in Philadelphia. 'But passions run high on both sides, and a lot of people are motivated to vote. I don't think there are a lot of undecided voters out there.'
Ahead of the voter outreach expansion, Biden's campaign has already opened 109 supply centers across 17 battleground states to help distribute campaign literature, lawn signs and other materials for the canvassers.
Biden volunteers in Pennsylvania and Nevada began dropping campaign literature at voters' homes just last weekend, although they were instructed to avoid any direct conversations. Those conversations will begin this weekend following training sessions designed to ensure Biden's team can engage with people at doorsteps as safely as possible.
All volunteers involved will be provided personal protective equipment, including masks, and will have their temperatures checked. The campaign also plans to send text messages telling voters to expect a knock at their door before volunteers enter a neighborhood.
Biden's team is particularly focused on ensuring his supporters have updated information about how and where to vote as early as possible. Literature used in Pennsylvania in recent days, for example, encourages people to make a specific plan to vote - either by mail, in person early voting or in person on Election Day.
Pennsylvania, a state where Biden leads in the polls, is one where Republicans are planning to contest mail-in ballots. The GOP-run legislature just created a new 'election integrity' committee. Democratic party leaders there warn it could be the start of an attempt by the legislature to send Trump-backing electors to the electoral college if there are problems in the vote count.
Even before Biden executes his new plan, Democrats are leading Republicans in some early voting prodding. Registered Democrats have been issued far more mail and absentee ballots than Republicans in Florida, Iowa and Pennsylvania, according to data collected by The Associated Press.
Response rates from Democrats have also been higher.
Still, local Democratic officials have been concerned. Biden has also eschewed major rallies, events where during normal years party officials try to get voters to commit to a plan, offer them rides, and get them to sign commitment cards.
Just before news of Biden's decision broke, Philadelphia Democratic Party Chairman Bob Brady acknowledged he had worries when asked about the lack of in-person canvassing to date. He wasn't alone. Pennsylvania's Northampton County Democratic Party chair, Matt Munsey, recently warned of the limitations of phone outreach.
'One big difficulty is we don´t have phone numbers that reach everyone and a lot of people don´t answer the phone, especially unknown numbers, so it´s a limitation on being able to reach people,' Munsey said. 'And I think it´s harder, it can be difficult to have a really good conversation over the phone when you´re not talking face to face.'
Monique Jones, left, of Erie, receives a face mask Friday, July 10, 2020 from Rajahnee Hollamon, a member of the Blue Coats, in the 900 block of East Eighth Street in Erie, Pa. A group of volunteers was canvassing the neighborhood to educate residents about COVID-19. (Jack Hanrahan/Erie Times-News via AP)
In this Wednesday, June 24, 2020, photo, Joey Prestley, a staff canvasser for the Progressive Turnout Project, front, talks with Scott Gifford while reaching out to voters in the age of the new coronavirus in northwest Denver. The coronavirus pandemic isn't going away anytime soon, but campaigns are still forging ahead with in-person organizing. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski)
FILE - In this Jan. 8, 2020, file photo, a display of President Trump baseball caps at the Bedford Trump Train headquarters in Temperance, Mich. The coronavirus pandemic isn't going away anytime soon, but campaigns are still forging ahead with in-person organizing. The pandemic upended elections this year, forcing campaigns to shift their organizing activities almost entirely online and compelling both parties to reconfigure their conventions. (AP Photo/Carlos Osorio, File)
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