Community Justice Action Fund 2020 Elections & Post-Elections Engagement Memo
MEMORANDUM
TO: INTERESTED PARTIES
FROM: GREG JACKSON, COMMUNITY JUSTICE ACTION FUND
DATE: NOVEMBER 3, 2020
RE: COMMUNITY JUSTICE ACTION FUND 2020 ELECTIONS & POST-ELECTIONS ENGAGEMENT MEMO
The Community Justice Action Fund builds political advocacy power to advance policy through year round engagement in communities most impacted by gun violence and are critical to further efforts to end gun violence.
Elect Justice Texas and Wisconsin:
Powered by hundreds of volunteers, committed digital organizers, surgical targeting and an amazing digital team, the Elect Justice Campaign built tremendous political power while playing a major part in the 2020 elections while uplifting community based efforts to end gun violence. Historically, progressive electoral efforts have ignored the issue of gun violence in Black and Latinx communities, as well as overlook voters most impacted by this issue everyday.. Elect Justice targeted, engaged, and turned out voters who are directly impacted everyday by one of the most critical voting issues of our time.
The Community Justice Action Fund (CJAF) was the only national gun violence advocacy organization laser focused on building power with and for communities of color to turnout voters on the issue of gun violence. The Elect Justice Campaign targeted sporadic and first time voters in communities most impacted by gun violence in the states of Wisconsin and Texas. This list of voters was identified by our “Communities Impacted Model”, that prioritized voters based on how many shootings have occured near their residents and individualized voter turnout projections. This trail blazing approach to voter targeting allowed us to prioritize voters by their likely turnout and by the number of shootings within their neighborhoods. We engaged these voters because while they may not be headlining the news, we knew these voters had the most at stake from the outcome of this election.
Wisconsin and Texas Voter Contact Program Engagement:
9 campaign staffers, including 3 full time organizing fellows
Recruited and trained over 950 volunteers on voter turnout messaging and engagement tactics to reach voters in communities most impacted by gun violence
Directly reached out to 1.5 million Black and Latinx voters in communities impacted by gun violence across Texas and Wisconsin through phone calls and text messages
Identified 65 volunteer leader “captains” that will be engaged for future volunteer leader roles, as we develop Community Justice Chapters across the nation.
National Partnership Engagement:
CJAF also partnered with social impact firm Revolve Impact to engage national influencers in entertainment, sports and politics, including: Snoop Dogg, Angela Rye, Common, Gwen Jorgensen, Hayley Bieber, Vic Mensa, Congresswoman Maxine Waters and many more.
Our national partners organized two major initiatives, the Schools Not Prisons Stop the Violence Tour that virtually engaged 8 major cities and the Elect Justice Live Event sponsored by Tidal that was hosted in Inglewood, California with 10 auxiliary streaming events.
750,000+ people watched the #SchoolsNotPrisons “Stop the Gun Violence” Tour events featuring local activists, artists and uplifted local issues connected to the 2020 elections. You can view the tour stop events here.
1,819,223 video views and 150 Million social media impressions for the Elect Justice Live Event hosted by Angela Rye and Terrance J, as well as featured live footage of Snoop Dogg registering for the first time and live performances from various up and coming artists across the country. You can view the full stream here.
7,007 social media impressions per post received on average throughout the campaign
Invest in us: Black Women and Gun Violence/Police Violence Digital Engagement:
In an effort to turn out Black Women voters on the issue of police violence, CJAF partnered with Annie's List Training & Engagement Fund, a Texas based 501(c4) advocacy organization to advocate for policy change on all levels of government. This partnership was able to engage Black Women to turn out for and vote for changes to police violence that include removing violent officers from their position, investing more in social workers, drug intervention programs and mental health first responders. The final video for viewing is here.
This targeted digital campaign yielded 673,907 completed video views and 1,376,471 social media impressions.
Moving Forward into 2021 and Beyond
Investing in Us: Federal, State and Local Funding and Building Power
When the 2020 elections are over, CJAF’s primary focus will continue to be organizing and supporting established local grassroots movements through our “Invest in Us” coalitions. Year-round, we are on the ground across the country helping community leaders build capacity to create meaningful change by advancing policy. We strengthen these local efforts by organizing regional-, state- and national-level advocacy campaigns through our coalitions.
CJAF will continue to work with partner communities in Texas, Wisconsin, North Carolina, Illinois, California and Maryland to change negative narratives that ask “what’s wrong with our community?”, to tell the story of “what’s happening in our community” and advocate for solutions that uplift the community while ending the crisis of gun violence. We will hold public officials accountable at all levels of government to ensure that a community-led public health approach to violence prevention is adopted across the nation. Preventing violence proactively can also instigate a cascade of community-wide benefits that allow people to thrive, not just survive. We will push for the establishment of offices of violence prevention in every city and state with dedicated funding sources for community-led solutions beyond policing, the dismantling of structural barriers to violence, work to end gender-based violence and advocate for research that empowers Black and Latinx communities.
Elect Justice Post-Election Briefing
CJAF will host an Elect Justice virtual briefing on Tuesday, November 17th at 6:00 pm CT. We will review the results of the election and discuss what they mean for the communities we are fighting for across the country. We'll take a deep dive into our policy priorities for 2021, and preview the next set of policy fights for all of our coalitions. The virtual briefing, What Now: A Conversation on Post-Election Next Steps for the Country, is free, and open to people who want to join the fight of building power with and for communities of color to end gun violence. To register, click here.
CJAF's 2021 Policy Agenda
We will be releasing our national policy agenda, including specific policy proposals for the core communities where we work. In addition, we'll be advancing sample legislation that policymakers can use to invest in community-led solutions to violence.