The right for every vote to count is being taken away from us. It is our duty to restore the health of our democracy, while we still can.
In a healthy democracy, we have a say in how our daily lives are run, how our neighbors are treated, and how our tax dollars are spent. Right now, the majority of Americans are dissatisfied with how the country is being run, and where it is going. In a healthy democracy, we would be able to demand the change of direction we need with our votes.
Yet our democracy is not healthy. This fundamental right - for every vote to count and be counted - is being taken away from us as we speak. That is why it is our duty to rise up and restore the health of our democracy, while we still can.
Republican-led states have rushed to use the Supreme Court’s recent Callais decision to redraw maps so they can stop Black voters from electing the candidates of their choice. Many see this shameless act as the destruction of the Civil Rights Act, or even the rise of a new Confederacy.
It is a wake-up call to every one of us that we cannot take our right to vote for granted. Yet the truth is, there have been powerful forces that oppose full and free participation in democracy ever since our country was founded 250 years ago.
Indeed, the project to restrict our democracy stretches back more than two centuries. As historian Nancy McLean points out, the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, which mapped out many of the Right’s current efforts to restrict voting rights, could just as easily have been called Project 1825 - since that’s when vice president John C. Calhoun launched a plan to permanently undermine majority rule to protect the interests of white slaveowners.
Every major expansion of our democracy - from the 15th Amendment, which extended the vote to African American men in 1869, to the 19th Amendment, which granted women the right to vote in 1919, and the Voting Rights Acts of 1965, which removed racial barriers to voting - only came to pass when organized people rose up to demand their voices be heard, and overcame incredible odds to give us all the right to cast a vote. It is our time to defend this right, and secure it for generations to come.
That's why People’s Action Institute invites everyone to take our pledge to defend democracy and equip yourself with the skills you will need to do so. The pledge lays out the key steps all people can take to ensure their votes are counted, and the integrity of elections where they live.
We also invite you to join our new series of training sessions, “The Organizer’s Guide to Election Protection.” These sessions, which will be held every two weeks through Election Day, will equip organizers with the practical tools they need to keep voters safe and ensure every vote is counted this election season.
While these trainings are geared towards experienced organizers who may be new to election protection, all are welcome, especially at our introductory session this Wednesday, June 3 from 12 to 1:30 CST.
These sessions will build on the curriculum we developed for our Pro-Democracy Organizing Revival Bootcamps, which we have used over the last nine months to train thousands of organizers across the country, with more being trained every day.
These new sessions create a space where organizers can now go deeper, and compare notes from their interactions with elections officials, opponents and volunteers as we prepare to defend our right to vote this November.
We also invite everyone to join our Hear America listening sessions: our goal is to have more than a million conversations with voters nationwide between now and Election Day. These phone banks, which are open to all and held every Thursday, are complemented by in-person efforts across the country
These conversations will help us bring people together around shared values, across party lines, as we seek to overcome the twin crises of affordability and the rise of authoritarianism.
Why does organizing matter in this moment? Because as organizers, we can build the foundations for a stronger and more inclusive democracy on the other side of this authoritarian moment. Because too many people have lost faith in our democratic process and institutions, we must rebuild our trust in one another at the same time as we defend our right to vote.
We can bring people together around shared values now. If we do, we can restore our faith in and rebuild the foundations of our democracy. This is up to us, but it is not too late.
