text message

The College Democrats of NY have ramped up their efforts for Barack Obama and the Democratic ticket with less than a week left to go before the election.

Over 600 college students will be on the ground in the battleground states of Pennsylvania, Virginia and New Hampshire for this Get Out The Vote weekend and through Election Day. A total of 140 students will be going to Virginia for five straight days, while 420 will be going to Pennsylvania and another group of students is heading to New Hampshire to campaign for Jean Shaheen for Senate and Obama for America. Even more students will be calling into swing states across the country reminding students to vote for Senator Obama.

The ambitious GOTV efforts for the upcoming week mark the culmination of student activism across the state and country among young people in the College Democrats organization. In 2004, 70 students from NY were mobilized to swing states to aid John Kerry. In 2006, 75 college democrat members helped get Michael Arcuri and Kirsten Gillibrand elected to Congress. Three weeks ago, 150 students traveled to central Pennsylvania to canvass for Obama. With 600 students participating, this also makes the College Democrats of NY one of the most active state federations in the country.

An additional hundred students will be staying in NY to retake the State Senate for the first time in 40 years and swing four key Congressional seats from red to blue in the NY-29, NY-26, NY-25, and NY-13.

This week CDNY is launching their "Text the Vote" campaign in which college democrats from across the state will be reminding their friends to vote on November 4. The idea is for each college democrat member in NY to text message 5 of their friends, reminding them to vote for Barack Obama and the Democratic ticket. The potential and reach of the project could be enormous in GOTV efforts for young people.

The Young Democrats are starting to push their text message reminder program. As I've noted multiple times this week, these text reminders can boost turnout by 4.6 percentage points on election day.

Dear Michael,

Do you have a million things to do before Election Day? Well, that makes two of us! We're all hard at work, going door to door and street teaming to get young voters to the polls, and we know you have a bunch of things on your plate as well. There are only a few days left and between school or work, trying to sneak in some laundry or a world series game, and making sure we elect Democrats, we're all very busy people.

Sometimes we even forget to set time aside to vote -- us! The Activists! And even more often, we forget to remind all of our friends and family to vote as we narrowly focus on our campaign's targets - forgetting how much of an impact we can have on those closest to us.

The Young Voter Revolution has a solution! We'll send you a text message on Election Day to remind you to get out to the polls. And don't worry, we didn't forget about your friends and family either; you can send them the info they need to get their text message reminders too.

So sign up by visiting
www.youngvoterrevolution.com/mobile

Please pass the above link on to your YD chapter, your email friends, to your Facebook and MySpace friends, to your coworkers, and to your family. Just get your friends and family to sign up for their reminders, and we'll do the rest - that's one thing you can check off your list!

Got your cell phone in your hand? You can also text VOTEDEM to 35328 to pledge to vote for Democrats via phone and sign up for our reminders.

So go back to your volunteering, your laundry, to studying, to work, or to that world series game - and let us worry about the rest!

Don't let up until we cross that finish line,

Tony Cani
YDA National Political Director