Nevada was chosen for this effort, in part, because it is also a swing state for the US Senate. After Sen. John Ensign resigned from office, Governor Sandoval appointed Dean Heller as his replacement. Sen. Heller (R-NV) is running against Rep. Shelley Berkley (D-NV) in a tight race.
NobamaNevada's first trip, timed according to the release of absentee ballots, was on the weekend of September 28. The second NobamaNevada trip was last weekend, during the height of Nevada's early voting process. On Friday, one hundred and ten activists from the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond drove to Reno. They met for dinner Friday night at the Eldorado Hotel in Reno:
Project leader Sally Zelikovsky arranged for some after dinner entertainment and had lots of swag to give away:
The chairman of the Washoe County (Reno) GOP, Dave Buell, gave an after-dinner speech explaining how much NobamaNevada's efforts mean to the GOP and the campaign:
Later, Will Batista, the Romney campaign's regional field director (red jacket), explains the ins and outs of precinct walking to many who had never done it before:
Dinner was adjourned late Friday and the crowd gathered again for breakfast Saturday morning:
After a hearty breakfast, the volunteers picked up their precinct assignments:
On the first trip, the goal was to query voters of unknown allegiance and identify Romney-Ryan-Heller supporters. This trip, the goal was to get out the vote of identified Romney supporters.
Using data from the elections office, the campaigns and the independent groups make daily updates of their lists of identified supporters who haven't yet voted. Precinct walkers are sent out only to talk to those who haven't voted. In a swing state like Nevada, some areas are so thick with precinct walkers that a house may be visited two or more times in one day by walkers from different groups.
Americans for Prosperity, one of the independent nonprofit (501c4) groups doing get-out-the-vote efforts in Nevada, warns of a new Obama tactic. They say Obama supporters are trying to video accidental meetings on the street between Romney campaign volunteers and AFP volunteers. Their goal is to claim that such meetings constitute coordination of activities in violation of campaign laws which require that such activities be "independent." The claim would be ridiculous. Also, in my observation, the campaign and the AFP maintained complete operational separation. Truth, however, is likely irrelevant because the goal would be to create legal and political mischief and that they might achieve.
Think about that for a moment: under America's arcane campaign finance laws, friends accidentally meeting on the street and talking about what they are doing could constitute a violation of law. Such is the state of America where the courts have made the First Amendment into Swiss cheese.
The success of NobamaNevada is the result of its indefatigable leader, Sally Zelikovsky. NobamaNevada was a joint project of Sally's Bay Area Patriots and of MyLiberty of San Mateo County. Co-sponsors include the Conservative forum of Silicon Valley, Gilroy-Morgan Hill Patriots, and Marin Republican Women Federated.
If you care about the future of America as a free country, there is still time for you to do something. If you live in California, the Romney campaign is organizing a one last long-weekend effort to get out the vote in Nevada. Wherever you live, you can phone bank from your local campaign office or from your own home. If you are an Easterner, consider helping Volunteers for Virginia.
Steve Kemp has more photos of this trip.
PREVIOUSLY on NobamaNevada:
•Romney campaign ups its game, imitates Tea Party San Francisco
•NobamaNevada: first weekend in Nevada
•2012: the year of innovative tea party projects
PREVIOUSLY on other recent SF Bay Area political activities, left and right:
•San Francisco Tea Party greets Obama; Picks up the trash (Oct. 2012)
•San Franciscans protest against Obama (June 2012)
•Obama visits the San Francisco Peninsula and a Tea Party breaks out
•Global warming provokes laughter, even in the San Francisco Bay Area
•OccupyFail: the "general strike" that wasn't
•San Francisco Tax Day Tea Party
•San Francisco: inmates run asylum
•SF Churches rally: has a second front opened in the war for freedom?
•Reluctant California bureaucrats are shamed into saying the Pledge of Allegiance
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