I will be celebrating my birthday at Netroots Nation to discuss the importance of leading with the Obama Model and Ranked Choice Voting!

Want to meet up at Netroots Nation or chat about the Obama Model, Relational Organizing or Ranked Choice Voting? Comment below or Email me at jimmcbride@networkforprogress.com or Message me on Facebook / Twitter / LinkedIn!

Today is my birthday but I will be spending the day driving to Netroots Nation ’22 in Pittsburgh to talk to Democrats and Progressives about new ways we can work together by doubling down on the Obama-Biden Campaign Model that I learned while organizing the first Virginia and Young Professional events for OFA in 2007.

One example is a new organizer-driven networking app called “Unified” that will debut in September and if you want to sign up early let me know below. This could be a powerful new tool that can build on the growing trend toward “relational organizing” techniques that allow activists to leverage their various social contacts to Get Out The Vote via their personal networks or other conversations in online and offline communities.

Anyone who wants to be a political leader needs to understand that Obama wasn’t a “unicorn” that should be dismissed as a cosmic fluke but just a regular guy who ran his campaign based on 5 simple principles based on the values he learned growing up that anyone can use to succeed as a leader in life:

“Respect. Empower. Include. Organize. Win.”

President Biden’s campaign built on these principles with Joe’s Code.

Unfortunately, too many people are focusing on themselves or their opponents instead of these principles and forget that a short-sighted mindset and lack of accountability often doesn’t work in the long-term OR the short-term. This was a key weakness for Democrats in 2021 during our Virginia Governor’s race which led to an upset win by future Presidential Candidate Glenn Youngkin.

Democrats can solve this problem by focusing on a better internal organization and retention strategy for their current supporters combined with a better external organization and recruitment strategy for voters not officially with our coalition.

So, at the September 8–10 DNC Meeting in National Harbor, Maryland I will be advocating for both a “United” Caucus and a “Forward” Caucus to accomplish these two goals.

In the meantime, in the spirit of achieving greater EMPOWERMENT for voters please consider donating to my birthday fundraiser for FairVote which is a non-partisan organization working to make our democracy more effective via innovations like Ranked Choice Voting that allow voters pick SECONDARY CHOICES on a multi-candidate ballot thus ensuring the winning candidate can always achieve MAJORITY SUPPORT from the voters.

Therefore, “instant runoff” elections eliminate the “spoiler effect” from three or more candidates running which was a huge factor in both the 2000 and 2016 presidential elections. And most recently, the 2021 Nominating Process for Virginia Governor which greatly benefited the Republicans over the Democrats!

Democrats have already passed RCV legislation nationwide and its being used in Maine and Alaska and soon in Virginia! Let’s keep it going!