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From the 8th Annual Shorty Impact Awards

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Entered in Social Movement Campaign

Objectives

Vote Save America is the advocacy arm of Crooked Media which focuses on promoting civic engagement and get out the vote efforts. On April 6 of this year Tennessee Republicans expelled Representatives. Justin Jones and Justin Pearson from the state legislature because they stood up for gun safety legislation. Vote Save America reacted by utilizing its platform to launch a social-first campaign to engage its expansive community to get involved and take action, because it’s up to each of us to do our part to improve our democracy and build a better world. Through a targeted campaign aimed at galvanizing its base the initial goal was to raise $10K but the Vote Save America community responded so effectively that the efforts were shifted away from the initial objective of reinstating Representatives Justin Jones and Justin Pearson to helping the Tennessee Democratic Party overall. Over the course of the campaign they fundraised $167K—nearly 17x over the initial goal. In 2022, Tennessee had the lowest turnout in the country so Vote Save America shifted focus in real time following the reinstatement of the Reps. Jones and Pearson to rallying voters to replace the racist, anti-democracy Republican majority in the Tennessee House and strike down the gerrymandered maps and ultimately help Tennessee Democrats break the supermajority under new maps.

Strategy and Execution

Vote Save America is Crooked Media’s one-stop-shop for all the resources people need to get informed, get involved, and get out and vote. As such, when all eyes were on Tennessee following the expulsion of Representatives Justin Jones and Justin Pearson, Vote Save America reacted swiftly implementing a rapid response campaign to inform and inspire action through integrated fundraising across Vote Save America’s socials, Crooked Media socials and the network’s podcasts. 

Crooked Media has a history of highly-successful political action fundraising campaigns via Vote Save America and has raised over $56 million for progressive candidates and causes to date. 

In today’s ever changing news environment, rapid response campaigns require organizations to be nimble to react to real-time news updates and Vote Save America is uniquely positioned to do so. Vote Save America created an ActBlue donation page that was quickly circulated across their Twitter and Instagram and shared on Crooked Media’s main Twitter and Instagram accounts. Within 12 hours of launching the campaign the Vote Save America community raised $100K for Representatives Jones and Pearson. The news in Tennessee brought national attention to not only the Representatives but also to the overall state of politics in the state. Following their reinstatement less than a week later the campaign switched gears to donate additionally raised funds to the Tennessee Democratic Party to help strike down gerrymandered maps and ultimately help Tennessee Democrats break the supermajority.

Results

The Tennessee Three campaign for Vote Save America was a resounding success raising a total of $167K from 3,689 contributors almost entirely via social media. The Vote Save America Instagram saw over 275K impressions on Tennessee content and the Twitter account saw 512K impressions on campaign content. Within four hours of launch community members raised $30K which increased to $100K within roughly 12 hours. It was so successful that we were able to shift efforts to help the Tennessee Democratic Party in addition to the Representatives. Vote Save America set out to galvanize their community around an unfolding political and news event and lit a fire under its social followers to show Tennessee we have their back and to try build a better world.

Media

Entrant Company / Organization Name

Crooked Media

Links

Entry Credits