So I have been grateful to have the Third Act community to turn to for support and inspiration and joyful distraction.  We have been called to and joined in action by both the Third Act Central team and our Third Act friends in Maryland and Virginia.  The turmoil in the federal government has inspired countless protests and demonstrations to express support and gratitude to federal workers–at the Lincoln Memorial for the Women’s/People’s March, Capitol Building on President’s Day, and at agency headquarters all around the city including Treasury, HHS, OPM, CFPB, and USAID.  (Sorry for all the acronyms.)  And Third Actors have turned up for most of them, even in the most frigid winter weather.

Perhaps most impressively, Third Act DMV folks initiated a series of  weekly protests at Tesla dealerships throughout the region with calls to boycott the brand and “stop the Musk coup.”  These have been exuberant affairs, eliciting loud honking of support from passing motorists, drawing larger crowds week after week, and inspiring similar efforts elsewhere.

It’s easy to feel helpless and fearful in the face of what’s going on.  The Third Act community offers a powerful antidote.

If you would like to join other Third Actors who are protesting in the DMV you can join our Signal Chat to find out where and when the rallies or events are happening or just be part of the community.  Here is a signal primer to help download the app and get started.  If interested or have questions, send us an email (dc@thirdact.org)  and we’ll tell you how to sign up.

–Mark Rasmuson, Third Act DC Communications

For these reasons Third Act DC decided to focus its 2024 election efforts in our northern neighbors, Maryland and Pennsylvania, especially the latter because of its critical battleground state status. (Supporting the drive for DC statehood remains a long-term priority for us.)  Over the past several months, TA/DC—led by our Democracy and Voting team leaders Jim Lardner and Sandy Wall–has teamed up with other local organizations to make weekend canvassing trips to northern Maryland and to Philadelphia, York, and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

A small but enthusiastic band of DC Third Actors spent the weekend of September 21-22 in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania’s state capital, knocking on some 600 doors to support Harris/Walz and Democratic candidates for the Senate, House, and local offices.

At 11:00 am Saturday in a Harrisburg strip mall parking lot, we were warmly greeted by a team of organizers from the national Harris/Walz campaign and PA Dems who gave us our marching orders.  We were assigned households in 3 widely varied neighborhoods—a suburban enclave of townhouse developments; a lower-income black and Latino community (Allison Hill) next to the Civil War Museum and not far from the state capitol building; and a lower/middle income community in the nearby city of Middletown, a stone’s throw from the Susquehanna River and 3-Mile Island.

A big difference for me since I last canvassed was the new tech: no more pencils, paper lists, and clipboards; each of us was guided by a digital list and map of our voters on a smartphone app (MiniVAN) that we had downloaded on our phones.  It included a script we could follow and spaces to indicate the outcome of each visit—were they following the election; did they have special interests/concerns; who were they planning to vote for, etc.  Or, nobody home.  As you canvassing veterans know, the most common outcome of knocking on a door was that there was nobody home (or at least nobody interested in answering) and we could only do a “lit drop” (candidate flyers) that still counts as a voter “touch.”

Pennsylvania has also been the focus of TA/DC’s postcard writing efforts, ably coordinated by Carol Grodzins, Carol Hamblin, and Sandy Wall.  And a highlight of our visit to Harrisburg was meeting over dinner with a delightful local Third Act PA volunteer, Dorothy Fulton, who agreed to take more than 1000 postcards we have written to PA voters and mail them on designated dates closer to the election so they will have a PA postmark.

The organizers described Dauphin County where Harrisburg is located as the “swingiest” part of this swing state, and over the course of two days, we could see why.  We ran into both Kamala enthusiasts and MAGA types who weren’t in the least interested in exchanging pleasantries; undecided lifelong Republicans who hated Trump but didn’t trust Harris; immigrants who are just happy to be here and not interested in politics or voting.  And I came away with a strong impression that there may be large swaths of potential voters who are just not paying attention to the election process or are alienated from it.  This felt especially true in Allison Hill, where many houses were run down or boarded up and covered in graffiti and no-trespassing signs.  People here are scraping by, and my sense is that some (many?) just don’t see how voting is going to improve their lives.  How to break through with these folks?

It felt disappointing that few people were home or answered the door (or RING video doorbell, of which there were many), not to be able to speak with more people.  But I consoled myself with the understanding that canvassing voters operates on the margins, seeking to add just a few votes that could change a tight election outcome, and in this state every single vote is going to count.  We were also helping PA Dems update their voter database and plan more touches of these potential voters.  And each of us had at least a few exchanges that felt good and impactful and worth the effort.  That maybe this person would remember that old white guy or gal who knocked on their door one day as one of the reasons they eventually pushed the button for Kamala in this election of a lifetime.

–Mark Rasmuson