Richard J. Daley Quotes

So few people vote these days, and I think it's partly because they don't feel like the institution really means anything to them. If you want them to vote, give them opportunities to do something else other than vote, to help.

If they're not voting, we're not touching their heads and hearts.

When you are not running for office, the people in the party listen to you more.

Democrats in 2020 can't just drive by red counties. You have to stop, get out of your car, ask for people's votes, and engage with them on issues that relate to their lives.

I've been reaching out to voters across the political spectrum from the very beginning.

One of the big learnings both out of the referendum, and out of 2017 general election is that parties that don't have a professional network on the ground slightly lose the ability to hear what local people are saying, so we've reestablished our network of campaign managers out in the field.

The basic job of any campaign is to translate grassroots energy into turnout.

African-American women are the most loyal constituency of the Democratic Party, and we need to do more to make sure that we engage them, that we don't take them for granted. We need to be there. And again, I keep thinking about that woman I met in Detroit shortly after my election, who said, "You've got to stop showing up every fourth October and telling me that you care."

The black vote is always important, and the reason is it serves as a tremendous base for the Democratic Party. On the national level, Democrats traditionally receive at least 90 percent of the black vote.

Grassroots organizing tends to be most available to big campaigns, but it's actually most useful to small ones. You can't win a presidential campaign without going on TV, but you can win a local election simply by organizing your community. NationBuilder levels the playing field.

In politics women type the letters, lick the stamps, distribute the pamphlets and get out the vote. Men get elected.

We have to be focused on growing the party and getting young people to see us as a viable option.

I think it's very important to always make sure that you're talking to the entire coalition and to as many Americans as possible; not to go chasing after one little group or another. The Democrats would bring new groups into their party and not notice that larger groups are going out the back door.

The way to get people civically engaged, not just during the election but throughout the year, is to tap into Facebook and let them do it with their friends.

Campaigns fail if they waste resources courting voters who are unpersuadable or already persuaded. Their most urgent task is to find and persuade the few voters who are genuinely undecided and the larger number who are favorably disposed but need a push to actually vote.

When you have an election campaign, it has to be simple and something everybody can relate to.

There are as many jobs for younger Americans as there are for other Americans of every age group in political campaigns. Campaigns are very labor intensive and volunteer dependent.

My focus as part of the leadership is to keep talking about the independent voters, independent voters - how do we get the independent voters back?

There are a lot of people who worked extremely hard in the election who are still organized who know how to do door to door and phone canvassing, who know how to raise money.

Politics is there the way men and women are there, the way the Atlantic Ocean is there. Sometimes I've written about politics specifically, I mean about politics as it's understood on television and in newspapers.

A political campaign should be an education for both the voters and the candidates.

We'll get out the [black] vote, but we need the white vote to win.

They hustled the indifferent to the booths; they lent shawls and held babies; they carried the sick and dying to the polls on mattresses—and they won. May black shame fall upon the individual or the party who, having the trust of these women, ever betrays it.

Sometime between elections we should concentrate on doing something.

Low turnout in off-year races is always a challenge for Democrats. Many of our voters require information and must be contacted way ahead of Election Day - and reminded of what's at stake.