The Vermont Secretary of State’s Office recommended a deadline of Oct. 24 for people to get their ballots to the post office, and now political campaigns and candidates are adjusting their messaging in the final push before the Nov. 3 election.
With ballots sent to all active voters in Vermont, candidates have concentrated on making sure people understood how to cast ballots, with an emphasis on getting it done by this weekend.
Now campaigns are switching focus, targeting undecided voters who have still not sent in their ballot ahead for the November election.
“You want as many people to vote as possible, especially people you think are going to vote for you,” said Jason Maulucci, Republican Gov. Phil Scott’s campaign manager.
“We’re focused on those who still have a ballot and are pushing to get as many of them to send those in as soon as possible because those who do, that’s a vote in the bank,” he said.
Maulucci said candidates should have a good idea about who has still not voted and will be able to focus on that segment of the population.
“We’re just focusing on making sure people understand their options,” he said.
Colleen Jackson, deputy campaign manager for Lt. Gov. David Zuckerman’s gubernatorial effort, said after this weekend there will be a definite change in the messaging from the Progressive Democrat’s team.
“Everything that we’ve been saying up until now has been ‘mail your ballots back’ and now we’re going to shift dramatically into ‘drop your ballots off,’” Jackson said.
“We need to be saturating lines of communication so people understand that shift,” she said.
Spencer Dole, who heads the House campaigns for the Vermont Democratic Party, said with Oct. 24 come and gone, “the messaging then turns to ‘fill out your ballot and hand-deliver it to your town clerk’s office before Nov. 2 or vote on Election Day.”
As of publication, more than 184,000 Vermonters have already voted, about 60% of the 320,467 votes cast in the 2016 presidential election.
Dole and others view this as an opportunity to reach undecided voters given that 40% have yet to vote.
“Candidates have been chasing votes and ballots since they were first sent out and will continue chasing up until Nov. 3,” he said. “The strategy doesn’t change after Oct. 24; candidates are still chasing ballots, it’s just that the messaging is different.”
Former Essex Junction state representative Paul Dame, Dole’s counterpart for the Republican Party, said he’s been telling GOP candidates for the Legislature to think of every day between Sept. 20 and Nov. 3 as Election Day.
“You have to assume that anybody could vote at any time, which I think has caused candidates to start their election process a lot earlier,” Dame said.
Dame, like Dole, said the large percentage of people who have yet to cast a ballot signals that there is still time for candidates to capture votes in the days leading up to Nov. 3.
He believes many Vermonters who have not yet voted have probably decided who they will support for president and governor, but perhaps not in the lieutenant governor’s race between Democrat Molly Gray and Republican Scott Milne, or for other candidates lower on the ballot.
“We’re telling all our House and Senate candidates, people may have made their mind up about the top of the ballot but not down where you are, so there’s still full opportunity to go out there and win those votes on the local level,” Dame said
“The lieutenant governor’s race has a few people holding on to their ballots” to get another week or two of information on what the two candidates are doing, he said.
Moving up the timetable
The mail-in voting push has altered the campaign schedule.
“My advertising went out earlier, my radio ads went out earlier, my direct mail piece went out earlier,” said Joshua Terenzini, a Republican running in the crowded Rutland County Senate race.
In his campaigning, Terenzini said he has focused on making sure people understood that if they wanted to vote by mail it should have been posted by Oct. 24. Now, he’ll be telling people about delivering their ballots to town clerks or going to the polls to vote in-person on Nov. 3.
Terenzini also said he plans an intensive visibility campaign during the week before Election Day.
“I need to make sure people aren’t forgetting the message that I put in their hands six to eight weeks ago,” he said.
Many candidates, like Terenzini, have bought ads and had campaign material inserted in local newspapers, and have been mailing informational postcards to potential voters, according campaign finance data.
Michael Wood-Lewis, co-founder and CEO of Front Porch Forum, said the online community platform has had a record number of ad purchases from candidates for the Legislature, statewide offices, Congress and President.
Wood-Lewis said there is always a bump during election years and ad revenue has been trending upward, but it accelerated this year.
Plus, “many candidates also ask their supporters to simply post for free on their local forums to help spread the word about their campaigns,” Wood-Lewis said. “That’s definitely on the upswing as well.”