Special to The Dallas Examiner
The Texas Organizing Project PAC unveiled its plan Thursday to reach 1.6 million voters of color for the 2020 presidential election. The event was broadcast live on Facebook and featured special guests Sec. Julián Castro and actor Kendrick Sampson, along with Brianna Brown, TOP’s deputy director, and Crystal Zermeño, TOP’s political strategy director.
“The stakes in the streets are too high for us not to win at the ballot box. Our lives are on the line,” Brown said. “Our big idea that will transform this country is to transform Texas by inspiring Black and Latino voters to participate in our democracy, continue to dare it to be better, to be big enough to hold our hopes and dreams. Again, I’m reminded of my infant daughter Margaret stepping out on her own terms. We too have to have the audacity to call Texas our own and then go out and make that happen.”
In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, TOP PAC will connect with voters several times through phone calls, texting, direct mail and social media.
“From experience we know that if we talk to people who don’t vote, and help them make a connection between what worries them – things like their kids’ education, their ability to earn a living, finding housing, or getting justice – and we connect those issue to the importance of voting, they will vote,” Zermeño stated. “They will become habitual voters. Since 2012, we have been making progress in Texas because TOP and other groups on the ground have been doing the work of talking to voters who have been left out of the process. In 2016 Texas was one of just four states that grew the number of progressive voters – and that’s because of our efforts reaching out to Black and Latino voters.”
TOP will also have a member GOTV program focused on peer-to-peer texting and an app where TOP members will be able to send messages to friends and family.