Yes on Prop 8: This is How they Won

The 'Yes on Prop 8' folks somewhat gloated about how they won. In Politics Magazine, Cultural terrorists, Frank Schubert, president of Schubert-Flint Public Affairs, and partner in crime, Jeff Flint broke it down.

I will highlight several points from the article:

• On the first day that same-sex marriages took place, June 16, we fielded nearly 300 media calls from reporters around the globe. Our message was calm and low-key: Our fight was not with the gay couples getting married, our fight was with the fl awed reasoning of a narrow majority of the California Supreme Court.

• A survey released by the Field Institute in mid-September showed that fully 55 percent of likely voters were opposed to Prop 8, with just 38 percent in favor. The political elite all but wrote off Proposition 8 as being dead once the Field Poll was published. To make matters worse for us, less than a week after the Field Poll came out, the No on 8 campaign began its television advertising in the state’s major media markets. We worked hard during this period to urge our supporters to have faith that Prop 8 could still be enacted despite what they saw on the news. We organized countless meetings and conference calls of pastors and other campaign leaders. And we restructured our online presence and delivered a stream of messages to supporters designed to keep them informed and engaged.

• The dynamics of the Proposition 8 campaign were unique. We were asking voters for a Yes vote to ban same-sex marriage and restore traditional marriage. We strongly believed that a campaign in favor of traditional marriage would not be enough to prevail. We needed to convince voters that gay marriage was not simply “live and let live”—that there would be consequences if gay marriage were to be permanently legalized. But how to raise consequences when gay marriage was so recently legalized and not yet taken hold? We made one of the key strategic decisions in the campaign, to apply the principles of running a “No” campaign—raising doubts and pointing to potential problems—in seeking a “Yes” vote.

• We built a campaign volunteer structure around both time-honored campaign grassroots tactics of organizing in churches, with a ground-up structure of church captains, precinct captains, zip code supervisors and area directors; and the latest Internet and web-based grassroots tools. Our campaign website was rebuilt to serve as an incredibly effective organizing tool. Online volunteer sign-ups were immediately sent electronically to the appropriate ZIP code supervisor for follow up. We set up a statewide voter fi le with remote access for regional volunteer leaders, which allowed them to input results for canvassing efforts remotely, and then download and print updated voter lists.

• The final phase of the volunteer campaign, GOTV, was really a month-long operation. California allows early voting, starting 29 days ahead of Election Day. From Day 1 of this period, we tracked voters who either appeared on the permanent absentee voter list, or had applied for a vote-by-mail ballot. Those who were identified as persuadable received additional volunteer and direct mail contacts. Definite Yes on 8 voters were reminded to return their ballots as early as possible. The effort paid off, as the early returns reported on Election Night—which consisted of votes cast before Election Day—showed us with a commanding 57 percent to 43 percent lead.

• Fundraising was also a critical activity of this early period, the success of which enabled us to ultimately exceed our initial voter contact objectives. By this time, leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints had endorsed Prop 8 and joined the campaign executive committee. Even though the LDS were the last major denomination to join the campaign, their members were immensely helpful in early fundraising, providing much-needed contributions while we were busy organizing Catholic and Evangelical fundraising efforts.

There's more, but I wanted to give some key points from the article. It's an interesting read.

Thanks to Queerty for posting