There are political developments that show up in news and in polls that are undoubtedly real, or likely to be real — such as broad shifts in public opinion, or a group of voters leaning toward a party they have sometimes supported, or candidate fundraising. And then there are things that might be true, but that I need to actually see reflected in the outcome of an election before I buy them. One of those things is the claim that Turning Point USA is going to become a voter-turnout operation, something it has never done before:
Turning Point Action works to significantly expand its organizing presence in key swing states ahead of the general election, including Michigan, home to this year’s conference. . . . The activist network has morphed into a more pronounced political force, planning to ramp up its organizing ground game ahead of the election. “It’s night and day,” said Turning Point Action spokesman Andrew Kolvet. “Any activities we did, in 2022 for example, in the midterms, was like the Stone Age compared to the level of sophistication and just the resources that we’ve poured into this project to develop it.” Kolvet is talking about the group’s “Chase the Vote” initiative, a get-out-to-vote campaign focused on reaching low-propensity voters in swing states that launched earlier this spring. Trump recently endorsed the program during a separate Turning Point event in Arizona, another pivotal state in 2024. Turning Point hopes to raise $100 million to build up on the ground organizing staff and plans to work with the Trump campaign on canvassing – a notable change from past election cycles following new guidance from the Federal Election Commission. Despite the roots of Turning Point, the program is not solely focused on young voters, though Kolvet said that will always be tied to Turning Point’s work.
Well, maybe. Many stranger things have happened than activist organizations with big budgets and lots of young volunteers learning how to do turnout. But this is also a message that clearly helps the group raise money, and “We have a great ground game” is a thing that lots of people say, that is far from always true, and that is hard to falsify before it has been tested in an election. I will believe it when I see it.