Democrats Belatedly Launch Operation to Share Information on Voters

[RandySF]

WASHINGTON — When Hillary Clinton lost the 2016 election, she blamed Russian interference and the former F.B.I. director James Comey’s eleventh-hour resurrection of her emails for her defeat.

But she also lashed out at something that got far fewer headlines: the Democratic National Committee’s failure to keep up with Republicans in the data arms race.

Now, with less than two months remaining before the 2020 election, the party has started the Democratic Data Exchange, a legally independent entity that allows campaigns, state parties, super PACs and other independent groups that are forbidden to coordinate with each other to share information on individual voters.

Democratic officials involved in the new data program say the system will help them narrow what had been a yawning gap between their party and Republicans, who started a similar independent data operation ahead of the 2016 election. Campaigns and supportive independent groups will now have a full, and nearly real-time, view into which voters have been contacted by other Democratic organizations and how those voters feel about candidates.



https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/06/us/politics/Presidential-election-voting-Democrats.html

[DFW]

1. Somebody is certainly sharing something, alright

I contribute to one candidate in Texas, and then within two weeks, I get requests for money in the mail from all over Texas and coast to coast for everything from House races in Rhode Island to dog catcher in small municipalities in Montana.

[RandySF]

2. OMG me too

I even get calls from candidates, themselves, and I am just a small donor.

[DFW]

3. When I'm in the States, I get that, too

And I'm rarely there, though my US cell phone is obviously registered somewhere.

If I see it's an area code in Texas (e.g. Wendy Davis or Candace Valenzuela), or one I recognize (e.g. Jackie Gordon on Long Island), I may pick it up, but I usually let it ring. Money doesn't grow on trees in Texas, and I am already paying taxes in two countries.

[betsuni]

4. I think they should just bug rich people for money. Rich people are always being asked to donate

money for things. They're used to it. In my opinion, continually asking ordinary citizens to finance campaigns is a sort of tax. But I guess I'm the only one. As far as I know, other countries don't do this.