Republicans in swing states say they see scant signs of groups door-knocking for Trump:
Republican activists in swing states say they have seen little sign of the teams tasked with knocking on doors and turning out infrequent voters on behalf of Donald Trump, raising concerns about the party’s presidential nominee relying on outside groups for an important part of his campaign operations.
Trump and the Republican National Committee he controls opted to share get-out-the-vote duties in key parts of the most competitive states this year with groups such as America PAC, the organization supported by billionaire Elon Musk.
It is difficult to demonstrate that something is not happening. But with fewer than 50 days until the Nov. 5 election, dozens of Republican officials, activists and operatives in Michigan, North Carolina and other battleground states say they have rarely or never witnessed the group’s canvassers. In Arizona and Nevada, the Musk-backed political action committee replaced its door-knocking company just this past week.
“I haven’t seen anybody,” said Nate Wilkowski, field director for the Republican Party in vote-rich Oakland County, Michigan, which includes crucial Detroit suburbs. He was speaking specifically of America PAC. “Nobody’s given me a heads-up that they’re around in Oakland County areas.”
Trump has relied on the loyalty of his fervent base, in an election expected to pivot on turnout. The spotty evidence, however, of what was portrayed as a sophisticated operation has some party activists questioning the operation’s value. Trump’s campaign views the race with Vice President Kamala Harris as a toss-up among likely voters but believes it has the edge among people who stayed away in 2016 and 2020, making it even more essential to reach them.
The work is particularly important in Michigan, where Trump lost by fewer than 160,000 votes in 2020, and where the GOP began the year mired in debt and fighting an ugly contest over the rightful state party leader.
Michigan’s Republican chairman, Pete Hoekstra, said he was told that America PAC canvassers had arrived in late August and were at work. A spokesperson for the PAC said canvassers were in Michigan, as well as Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin - the seven most competitive states. The spokesperson declined to say how many canvassers there were across the states.
Meghan Reckling, a Republican canvassing firm owner in Michigan, said she spotted two America PAC canvassers Tuesday in Oakland County. Identifiable in blue polo shirts emblazoned with “America,” they were working an area that Reckling’s own data showed to be one with low-propensity voters, she said.
“They had, you could tell, a very pleasant exchange with the lady who answered the door, and probably talked to her for five minutes,” Reckling said. “From what I observed, they were obviously engaging in direct conversations.”
But in interviews with more than two dozen activists and party officials across the seven battleground states, such reports were rare.
“I don’t know what the PACs are doing,” said Mark Forton, the GOP chair in Macomb County, Michigan, a populous, suburban area northeast of Detroit. “I don’t know if they are going door to door.”
Trump aides say the campaign has an estimated 30,000 volunteer captains who are identifying less likely voters at the local level, including through neighborhood canvassing.
Campaign political director James Blair also estimates that close to 2,500 paid canvassers, with America PAC making up a significant chunk, are working in the seven states. The PAC has paid canvassing firms more than $14 million since mid-August for work on the presidential campaign, according to Federal Election Commission spending reports filed by the group. --->READ MORE HERE
Trump-allied Pac fires canvassing vendor in crucial states weeks before election:
Elon Musk’s America Pac replaces voter turnout operations in Arizona and Nevada with fewer than 50 days till election
America Pac, one of the largest and the most ambitious of the groups supporting Donald Trump’s campaign, is replacing its voter turnout operations in the crucial battleground states of Arizona and Nevada, according to two people familiar with the matter.
The political action committee, backed by billionaire Elon Musk, has ended its contract with the September Group and will hire a new company to knock on doors with fewer than 50 days left until the election.
America Pac used non-performance as the stated reason to back out of the contract in the past few days, claiming the September Group was not hitting its door-knocking targets, one of people said.
The shakeup comes at a crunch moment for the Trump campaign, which has outsourced virtually its entire ground game operation to a number of political action committees in this presidential cycle. America Pac is seen as the most ambitious, with a presence in every swing state.
As a result of the shakeup, America Pac has not canvassed any neighborhoods in Arizona and Nevada on behalf of the Trump campaign for the past few days as it resets its operations in the two states.
America Pac hopes the roughly 300 canvassers employed by the September Group will be rehired by its successor but whether that occurs remains uncertain.
To some degree, it would be in America Pac’s interest to rehire the people given the talent pool for knocking on doors in the blazing Arizona and Nevada heat is dramatically reduced this late in the cycle, having already been hired by congressional and other campaigns. --->READ MORE HERE
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