Voting continues with volunteer services and events across the country. And This weekend will be the biggest yet. Obviously the election is going to happen this weekend, but if we look at the results, if we actually show up and have the election in the next few days, we can almost keep this out of the reach of the other guys. One thing I’ve learned over the years: the harder bad actors work to manipulate a story, the more afraid they are of it.

Why this weekend, Turnip?

Since we have all the pieces to win this election, all we have to do is put them together. What do I mean?

• The gender gap among the early voting electorate has remained remarkably stable, and we’re still not done voting this cycle. As I’ve reported before, a fair share of Dem voters want to vote at the door on Election Day.
• We are almost at the ideal ‘firewall’ of 400,000 votes in the PA, if we count party registrations only. And PA is a state where, in my (admittedly amateurish) opinion, some Republicans are more likely to cross over this cycle.
• In Michigan, while we can’t see party registrations, the party relationship modeled by TargetEarly now has Democrats well ahead of Republicans and at the same point (T-11 days) before the 2020 election
• In Wisconsin, we are quite ahead of the Republican Party in early voting, although unaffiliated voters make up a large share of early voters so far. Unless Wisconsin Republicans somehow win over a large number of unaffiliated voters, that lead is likely to hold.
• People freak out about Nevada for some reason, but the bluest part of the state and three-quarters of the population are always late, and automatic voter registration is now the law there, which leans toward lazy, and lazy don’t register a party. We’re bringing a larger number of Black and AAPI voters to the polls than we did this time in 2020, and the Republican Party, which I think needs a large number of new voters to take the state, has seen their percentage of new voters a little bit there collapse.
• Arizona may be the trickiest because we simply have a built-in disadvantage with mail-in ballots this cycle, but the voter distribution is much younger so far. And Gallego is significantly ahead of Kari Lake in the polls and I don’t see anyone voting for Trump but not the female mini-Trump. So I think if election day returns are good, Arizona might be too.
• While not exactly an unbiased source, there is a general sense that we are keeping pace or slightly exceeding 2020 pace in the swing states.
• And I have no evidence to support this last point, but this is the first election where January 6 is directly on the ballot (as opposed to 2022, which is indirect). I think a lot of people underestimate how many people are still angry about what happened on January 6, 2021. And anecdotally, it seems like some Republicans are pissed off about it, too.

Why are you saying all this, Turnip? Get to the good stuff! I say this because in almost every battleground state, the voters we need to go to the polls are going to the polls. And we have the momentum, so we can keep it going. That means we can really deplete the margins this weekend!

But how? The same way we did it, with recruitment, phone banking and texting. If you can knock on a door or direct agents, consider doing so. All evidence points to this election being won at the door. This is the big weekend because if we get enough people to the polls, we can make it much harder for Republicans to close the gap.

My report from earlier this week: I’ve continued to text when I can for When We All Vote, the group that organizes parties near polling places where people have food and then march down to cast their votes. The relational model is also used: asking people who have voted to talk to three friends and let them vote. If you haven’t done so yet, stop and do so now. Tell your friends to go out and save democracy.

The texting went well enough. We don’t get many Trump people, but those numbers decrease slightly between last week’s services and this week’s. The number of people who have already voted has increased, and so has the number of people who, since voting, did not want to hear from us anymore.

Yesterday I went to an event in Darby, PA. Myself, my wife, about fifty activists, and Leslie Odom Jr. were in the room. These people include the people (as Leslie said) who saved the country last time by providing so many votes in the Philadelphia area, and are willing to do it again this time. Leslie spoke for a few minutes about the importance of the campaign, not mentioning Trump once.

What he did do was go up to everyone and offer to record a short video for their friends or social media, telling the people they knew to go vote. So average people and groups of average people received video messages from a celebrity, specifically addressed to themtelling them to vote, and sent to them by a trusted friend or member of that voting group.

I saw someone calling a good friend of his, who went crazy when he realized who was calling, jumping up and down and acting like a teenager.

My wife, an ordained minister, was able to lead the prayer for the event and had Leslie record a video for an “election-oriented” interfaith service she is doing in Philadelphia. It’s not really political, but the people she works for are assisted living tenants, largely Jewish and Muslim, who have been bullied, harassed, literally threatened with their lives and traumatized over the past year. The fact that she was able to get a famous person to help her deliver even a brief message of hope to those, people who really need it, was quite inspiring.

Promotions for the weekend: They still need drivers, so I’m helping with that in Montgomery County and the surrounding area by bringing canvassers from the staging areas to their sites. We may have to make multiple trips depending on how many people show up. I am scheduled for this on Saturday and Sunday.

I was at an organizational meeting of the Progressive Democrats of America last night. They’re appealing to swing states, but also to swing districts in bluer states, where we have a chance to pick something up and take back the House. I signed up for a number of calling and texting services there. I will of course report back on how the recruitment went, and try to get as much detail as possible from my own and others’ experiences.

What you can do:

Read this diary (all of Eater’s open GOTV threads were excellent) and click one of the swingstate links below to sign up!

Volunteer with the PDA, they could use some help!

Register for a GOTV event near you. Just pop in your zipper and see what’s available!

I could post many more links, but you get the idea. Folks, if you’ve been sitting, this weekend is the time to join in! If we get a huge wave of volunteers this weekend, we can sweep a few states and increase our chances of winning in others. We are actually on track to achieve this victory if we keep the momentum going!

I won’t put a survey at the end of this survey, but I do want you to share in the comments any positive GOTV experiences you’ve had. Maybe you helped convert a voter to Kamala, maybe you convinced someone to vote early, maybe you heard from a Republican friend who is voting blue. Whatever it is, tell us below!