Here in North Carolina, our first electoral opportunity to begin prying back our state and our country from partisan extremists comes in 2026, when what happens at ballot boxes across the state will shape what happens in Raleigh and Washington, D.C. – both in the near term and for years to come.
The great news is that midterms give us a greater opportunity to impact the outcome than presidential years, when the field is saturated with money and activity. And we know what works. Drawing on analysis and lessons from 2024 and 2018 – the last Trump midterm – we can build the blue wave we need for these critical victories.
While FLIP NC is shifting our focus to the courts this year, it’s as important as ever to support Democratic candidates in competitive districts across the state and prevent another Republican supermajority in the state legislature in 2024.
Learn more about how you can help ensure Democrats win critical legislative races across the state in November.
One of the most effective ways to turn out voters who might not otherwise vote is direct contact from someone they know. Your friends and family are much more likely to take your call or respond to your text than to a volunteer’s. The chances are good that you know someone who hasn’t voted yet, doesn’t plan to vote at all, has questions about how/where to vote, or doesn’t plan to vote the full ballot. Or you know someone who knows someone who plans to sit this one out. Maybe you can be the spark. If every North Carolinian talked with three friends about voting between now and the election, our democracy would be healthier for it. And the chances of a blue wave would increase, because Democratic voting increases when turnout is higher.
From its inception in early 2017, FLIP NC has focused on voter outreach in advance of elections. But voter protection and voter outreach on election day and during the early voting period are also key areas where volunteers are needed – and filling these shifts has never been as crucial as it is now.
If you are interested in helping to protect the vote during this election, consider staffing North Carolina’s new Rides To The Polls Hotline, working the polls for the Board of Elections, becoming a vote protector, or joining a MAT team. Learn more below!
A Bay Area attorney, Sara discovered FLIP NC through Vote Save America’s Adopt a State program, selecting North Carolina as the state to focus on because she has family here, attended school here, and first voted and organized in Durham. “I have been appalled at the rampant disenfranchisement in the state over the past several years,” she says. “I am determined to help change that course.”
Sara’s hobbies include surfing, learning new languages, traveling, and running – plus she’s been working on a lot of DIY projects during the pandemic. She has been politically activated for most of her life and has never missed an election.
Read this Q&A with Sara, and then join her as a FLIP NC volunteer in these final days before the election!
Andrew lives with his wife, their 11-year-old son, a chocolate lab, and “what is arguably the worst cat in the greater Chapel Hill area.” He works as an enterprise architect for a financial services company, specializing in architecture governance and standards.
He is a part of FLIP NC’s Social Voter Program, tracking the many productive conversations he is having with friends, relatives, and acquaintances around voting in North Carolina this fall. Voter outreach isn’t just about talking to strangers! Read this interview with Andrew, and then sign up for our next Social Voter Program information session on Saturday, Oct. 3 at noon.
Callahan is from a very conservative part of South Carolina and understood from an early age that she was a feminist who supported a woman’s right to choose, knew climate change was real, and believed people shouldn’t be discriminated against based on race, sexual orientation, gender, and all the other factors of identity.
When she went to college in Massachusetts, she left one bubble for another – on the opposite side of the political spectrum. There, she learned to question her own beliefs and understand her privilege. Joining the university student government really jumpstarted her interest in politics.
“Like much of the country, I’ve been all consumed for the last four years,” she says, “but it’s only in the last year when I started actively volunteering to make sure Democrats win in November.”
Check out this Q&A with Callahan, and then sign up to join her for an upcoming virtual phone bank!
Michal is a retired cancer epidemiologist who came to us through a DC/Maryland/Virginia grassroots political group called 31st Street Swing Left. She has been married 33 years to a bioethicist/lawyer. They have two adult children – both are politically active through their work and outside of it.
Michal says she has been “intermittently politically engaged.” For several years – before she went back to school to become an epidemiologist – she helped run the issues office of Common Cause. More recently, she’s been active with the Sierra Club on climate change. And, of course, she’s made herself indispensable as a FLIP NC phone banker!
Check out this Q&A with Michal, and then sign up to join her for an upcoming virtual phone bank or text bank!
A father and husband, Ian is another fantastic phone banker referred to us by Vote Save America/Adopt a State.
A resident of a purple area of western Massachusetts, Ian often sees homes with Black Lives Matter signs next to homes with pro-Trump signs. “It is unfortunate that many Americans see these causes as contradictory – Black lives matter, regardless of what political party you belong – but that is how the issues have been spun by our president, politicians, and pundits,” Ian says. “I wouldn’t call myself an activist, though I have marched in a few protests, communicated with my representatives, participated in postcard-writing campaigns, and I make sure I vote in every election. After feeling upset at the constant doom and gloom of the news, I wanted to do something. Vote Save America’s Adopt a State program was a great way to roll up my sleeves and get to work.”
Check out this Q&A with Ian, and then sign up to join him for an upcoming virtual phone bank!
We have plenty of reasons why we want to FLIP NC (99 of them, in fact!). We've tried to distill a few of the most critical down to a t-shirt design – and those shirts are now available!
Since FLIP NC's earliest days, Durham-based Humbly Made has printed our popular and high-quality t-shirts. Through Sept. 22, they’ll ship you a special edition “Equal Rights &” FLIP NC shirt and donate $10 from every shirt purchased to FLIP NC. This money will go directly to fund our crucial voter outreach efforts in the state's most competitive legislative districts. Hurry to take advantage of this limited-time event!
Rique is another superb volunteer who came to us through Vote Save America/Adopt a State. He has now phone banked with FLIP NC nine times!
A resident of a rural county in northern Virginia, he works as a business analyst in the business domain of real estate technology and lives with his wife of 42 years. They have three children, two “children in law,” and five grandkids.
Rique is passionate about politics thanks to his parents. His father worked in the Robert Kennedy campaign, served in the Carter administration, and was the first national director of the Southwest Council of La Raza (aka National Council of La Raza). His mother was editor of the “Americans for Democratic Action” flagship publication for more than a decade. Thanks to their belief in public service and progressive politics, Rique has volunteered for Howard Dean, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama.
Check out this Q&A with Rique, and then sign up to join him for an upcoming virtual phone bank!
As the daughter of Mexican immigrants who grew up in a small town in western North Carolina, Vikki says “the personal has always been political.” She first got involved in political organizing as a college student at UNC, advocating for in-state tuition for undocumented students.
Now living in Raleigh with her husband Bill (who is an educator), Vikki is a public policy analyst at a multi-issue advocacy organization for children. “I love being able to take part in shaping public policies in our state and building a state where every family can thrive,” she says.
Check out this Q&A with Vikki, and then sign up to join her for an upcoming virtual phone bank!
The national and North Carolina political landscapes have been changing rapidly over the past decade. While much attention has been paid to persuading white moderate “swing” voters who voted for Trump in 2016 to come back to the Democratic party in 2020, less attention has been given to North Carolina’s other swing voters: the registered voters in the Democratic base who are still deciding whether to vote – or vote down ballot – in 2020. With less than 70 days to go until election day, here are 10 critical reasons why a strong focus on appealing to left-leaning voters is key to flipping North Carolina blue in 2020.
For the 2018 elections, FLIP NC ran multiple forms of voter outreach targeting all left-leaning voters – from moderate to very left-leaning – in competitive legislative districts. These efforts were critical to flipping at least 3 districts in 2018. Following the election, we analyzed all of our voter outreach to determine what worked and with which voters – and what was not effective or worth our time going forward. Here’s what we found.
Another week, another inglorious national distinction.
Our state legislature has once again thrust us into the national spotlight in a most embarrassing way, this time due to our GOP-controlled state university system’s massive failure in the forced reopenings of college campuses across the state, which culminated in the cancellation of in-person classes first at UNC-CH and then at NC State University University just one week after classes began. For universities across the country, the failure offers a warning about the risks associated with attempting similar reopening tactics this fall. For North Carolinians, the debacle is just the most recent example of the misuse of power by the UNC Board of Governors for partisan ends.
With the pandemic forcing FLIP NC to go completely virtual with our voter outreach efforts, many volunteers have recently joined us from all over the country through Vote Save America’s Adopt North Carolina program. In a lot of cases, they chose North Carolina because of a deeply personal connection: They went to college here, their favorite aunt lives here, or they spent part of their early years here. Such is the case with Annie. She was born in Charlotte and spent part of her childhood in the Tar Heel State.
“FLIP NC has been so awesome and welcoming,” Annie says. “Everyone should volunteer!”
Check out this Q&A with Annie, and then sign up to join her for an upcoming virtual phone bank!
Luke lives in Kansas City, Missouri, and serves as the communications associate for the American Jazz Museum. He and his brother have recruited several friends and relatives of all ages to phone bank with FLIP NC. Luke hasn’t always been politically active but has “been passionate about capturing social movements through photography and videography.”
Check out this Q&A with Luke – then sign up to join him on an upcoming phone bank!
Cumberland County (southeastern NC/Fayetteville area) is well known outside the region as home of the Fort Bragg military base. Less well known may be that the county as a whole is strongly left-leaning. It had the 6th highest vote margin for Clinton in 2016 (behind only the larger cities of Charlotte, Greensboro, and the Triangle area) and will be key in 2020 in races not only for President, Senate, and Governor but also – with new maps now in place – for NC House, NC Senate, and US House.
Originally from the Bay Area in California, Rachel first came to North Carolina to attend grad school at Duke. Rachel’s husband works in cancer research, and their 2-year-old happily knocked doors with FLIP NC, pre-COVID. Rachel has focused her career on using business for social and environmental impact and currently works as an independent consultant in design research, brand strategy, startup support, sustainability, and product design.
Check out this Q&A with Rachel, and then sign up to join her for an upcoming virtual phone bank – she’s a FLIP NC phone bank captain!