Showing Up for Racial Justice Southeast Ohio is excited to partner with an organization called Seed the Vote, whose mission is to do electoral politics in a new way. Their vision is to support electoral organizing that goes beyond the ballot box and the traditionally transactional nature of voter outreach to actually bring new people into long-haul movements for racial justice and social change. Their efforts are focusing on 3 states that will be key to the ousting Trump: Arizona, Pennsylvania (in which Trump won in 2016 by just 44,000 votes!) and Florida. The organizations they are partnering with, such as Lucha in Arizona, have been doing deep, intentional organizing in their respective states for years.

To support these efforts as well as voter outreach here in Ohio, we are forming a "seed pod", which is simply a group of people who care about taking action for the November election. In this group, we have a regular schedule of phone banking and trainings to support the campaigns listed above, as well as absentee ballot promotion in Appalachian Ohio.

We will also do check ins every other week that include a short political education component on the importance of getting involved both in elections and longer-term movements. The time commitment for this program is about 6-8 hours per month. No experience with phone banking, elections, or campaigns is necessary.

This group is being organized and focused in southeast Ohio, but it supports national and Ohio-wide efforts, so everyone is encouraged to join us!