Volunteers gave up lives for campaigns.
As Election Day approaches, many Americans are fired up. This weekend, volunteers knocked on doors across the country in a final push to influence an election that could shift the balance of power in Washington.
But in this election cycle, some Americans have gone to extraordinary lengths — quitting jobs, delaying school, moving across the country — to work without pay for a campaign. Their zeal speaks to the historical political moment, in which a dizzying array of House races across the country have begun to feel as consequential as a presidential election.
Democrats are eager to elect lawmakers who could act as a check on the president. Swing Left, a group formed to help Democrats win back the House, said its volunteers knocked on more than a million doors Saturday, twice as many as the previous week.
Republicans are energized by a desire to support President Donald Trump, as well as candidates allied with him who are locked in tight races. This election cycle, the GOP has trained 25,000 new “Republican Leadership Initiative fellows,” five times more than in 2016.
For die-hard campaigners who have spent months working, unpaid, Election Day will mark the last leg of a marathon. Or the final steps in a personal odyssey. Or the bittersweet return to normal life.
After listening to a piece about politics on NPR, Robert Hill, 43, quit his job as an events planner in California wine country and moved to Ohio to volunteer for Danny O’Connor, a Democrat running in Ohio’s 12th Congressional District, in a special election. He didn’t know much about O’Connor when he started. All he knew was that there was a chance to flip a seat, and that O’Connor had refused corporate PAC money.
“My biggest issues are the money in politics,” he said. “All this money is coming in from corporations. It’s not how this country was supposed to be governed.”
Margo Rushin, 70, a retired schoolteacher in Kingwood, Texas, met Dan Crenshaw, a Republican candidate for the 2nd Congressional District, at a Christmas Party.
Rushin grilled him about everything from the national debt to abortion. His answers impressed her.
“He stood there, with his back as straight as a ramrod and he said ‘I believe in life at conception and I cannot compromise,’ ” Rushin, a born-again Christian, recalled. “That really spoke to me.”
After Crenshaw, a retired Navy SEAL who lost an eye in Afghanistan, opened a satellite office near Rushin’s house, she and her husband signed up to volunteer. But then the office manager broke her foot. “I said to my husband, ‘I’m a retiree. I’ll go up and help them out.’ ”
Rushin has been in charge ever since. She’s worked, unpaid, between eight to 10 hours a day since March, her first foray into political campaigning.
Although she didn’t initially support Trump — she backed his primary rival from Texas, Ted Cruz — she feels that the economy has roared back since he took office. She wants to consolidate those gains.
“This midterm election is critical,” she said.