The Republican National Committee and the National Republican Congressional Committee are jointly holding “training” sessions aimed at their activists, our campaign managers, our consultants, everyone who’s in our ecosystem on
topics such as working with the voter file, building turnout projections and vote goals, polling and modeling, online fundraising, digital advertising, social media, grassroots voter contact data and TV optimization.
Their goal is to give their election support audiences
a better understanding of how to be efficient with their time, whom they’re targeting, and the tools they’re using in order to make calls faster, send more text messages, and knock on the right doors.
That’s nice. It’s even highly useful, but it’s badly insufficient.
What about training sessions for actual candidates and their aids and surrogates, sessions aimed at getting them to stop being too timid to go talk to voters where they live?
What about sessions aimed at getting candidates and their aids and surrogates knocking on all doors rather than excluding some voters?
What about sessions aimed at getting candidates and their aids and surrogates into black neighborhoods, Hispanic neighborhoods, Asian-American neighborhoods and talking to these folks directly—in their diners, in their rec centers, in their parks and playgrounds, in their streets?
Unless Republicans and Conservatives stop insisting on reaching their non-white constituents by remote control and instead start talking to them personally, they’ll continue to struggle in elections. And our nation will continue to struggle in the elections’ aftermaths.