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Cross-posted at The Bilerico Project
I've been writing a lot on what happened in Maine (most recently this piece yesterday in a Los Angeles LGBT magazine), and where our movement should go from here. NGLTF had run much of the field program in Maine, as well as within the No On 8 campaign in California, so I sat down yesterday to do an interview with Rea Carey, the Executive Director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, to address some criticisms and her thoughts on the marriage equality movement. We were joined by Dan Hawes, Director of Organizing and Training, who heads up NGLTF's national field operations and ran the field program in Cumberland County, the most populous in the state.
This is part one related to the No On 1 campaign in Maine and the marriage equality movement in general. I'll be posting the second part, related to LGBT rights at the federal level and the performance of the Obama administration.
Among the highlights:
- Dan commenting that the campaign "could have had a more direct message", "more lengthy conversations at the door with voters", and done more persuasion rather than "just trying to GOTV our supporters"
- Rea commenting on marriage equality at the ballot box "we simply don't have enough people to win at the ballot box yet"
- Rea and Dan declining to say whether re-run campaigns in California and Maine could have won, or definitively whether marriage equality is winnable in the short-term
- Dan defending against criticisms made with respect to the field program in Maine, and praising various aspects of the campaign
- Rea and Dan arguing that provided there is a plan and the time is right, despite the movement's recent losses and overall record at the ballot box, donors will "step up" to contribute the tens of millions necessary to win a Prop 8 repeal effort in California
Full transcript below the fold.
Q: What did you both think of the No On 1 campaign, the result, and where we go from here?
Dan: I think generally it was a well-run campaign with a disappointing result, where we were unable to build a solid majority who supported marriage equality. Our various polling within the campaign and outside the campaign showed we never started with 50% or more of Mainers who were on our side, but I felt like we could probably look piece-by-piece at the campaign, and there's always things we could do differently. But I felt like folks gave their best effort generally to work to win across the board.
Q: What could be done differently?
Dan: It's clear that we haven't yet built a majority of support for marriage, which is part of the problem- we go into these campaigns trying to build a majority rather than defend a majority at the ballot box which is very different. We need to figure out what message will be effective at moving voters to stand with us on marriage quality, which is a venture across the board on all these campaigns, which stands true in Maine as well.
Rea: I would just add to that, one of the things that's so striking having been in California and Maine and having many years under our belts with these things is this challenge in creating a majority vs. defending it. I was so struck, I went canvassing [Election Day] morning, and spoke with a number of voters including some Yes voters, and a gentleman who told me he had voted Yes, he was very nice, very kind about it, but he had voted Yes, and explained why and it was interesting because he said you know I have gay friends, he was a father of three, I have gay friends who were married in Massachusetts and I just feel I want them to have the protections, but I'm not there yet on voting for marriage.
I think there are unfortunately what we've seen in a number of states with trying different messaging and different tactics- and I agree with Dan that every campaign has some different and something that can be learned from and improved upon- we simply don't have enough people to win at the ballot box yet. I absolutely think we're going to get there. I think if you look at the trajectory over the last twenty years, even in a state like California where we used to be behind by twenty points, now we're behind by about four, the trajectory is moving in the right direction, we're just not there yet.
Q: You both have said that we don't have the number of votes, we're short, which is certainly an important point with regard to the electorate. My question originally, though, was what could be done differently? Or was it a flawless campaign, was it near-flawless?
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