Thread Politics

Campaigns

DeSantis’s Striking, Risky Strategy: Not Trying to Trick Small Donors
New York Times
“The ways that campaigns reach out to potential small donors online grew out of old-fashioned telemarketing and fund-raising by mail. Before email, campaigns sent out fake telegrams, letters stamped to appear they had been hand-addressed, surveys and other gimmicks to draw donations.”

Doug Burgum is about to drop hundreds of thousands of dollars on gift cards to qualify for the debate
Politico
“The Burgum campaign’s WinRed page indicated gift cards would be available for up to 50,000 donors — enough to make the August debate stage at a cost of $950,000 to the campaign if all donors only gave $1. A donor can only receive one gift card. His campaign said on Twitter that 50,000 people who donated would receive Visa or Mastercard gift cards at their mailing addresses. The scheme was first reported by FWIW, an email newsletter.”

Vivek Ramaswamy Takes Aim at a Political Fund-raising ‘Oligopoly’
New York Times
“Called ‘Vivek’s Kitchen Cabinet,’ the system will give participants a personal link they can share with others, and the campaign will pay them as independent contractors.”

Disinformation

Social media injunction unravels plans to protect 2024 elections
Washington Post
“The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, whose contacts with social media companies are also limited under Doughty’s order, has played a major role in getting accurate voting information out.”

International

An Indian politician says scandalous audio clips are AI deepfakes. We had them tested
Rest Of World
“The program facilitated three independent tests of the clips. The analysts were divided on the first clip, either finding it too poor in quality to come to a conclusion, or judging that the clip was ‘very likely fake.’ However, they all agreed on the second clip, deeming it authentic.”

Social Media

Platforms run away from politics and news
Anchor Change
“If I want to be less generous to Adam, it seems like Meta - and other online platforms - are shrinking from their civic responsibility. That has real long-term implications that I don’t think we’ve thought through. Especially since these platforms are where people go to stay current on news and events…”

Threads’ big political questions
FWIW
“As of Thursday evening, hundreds (if not thousands) of prominent politicians and political groups have already started posting on Threads - which is far more than ever used a platform like Mastodon or Post or BlueSky. Andrew Solender at AXIOS reports that more than a quarter of members of Congress had joined the platform within 24 hours - which means a lot of digital staffers quickly got their bosses’ approvals to do so late on Wednesday night or Thursday morning. Every major political media brand - from the New York Times to FOX News - has a presence on the platform already.“

Technology

The AI Race is On and Strategists Expect It Will Move Quickly Ahead of ’24
Campaigns & Elections
“Democratic technologists are making no secret of their goal to harness the power of AI to win the 2024 campaign cycle.

“The left’s leading tech incubator has two artificial intelligence companies, Quiller and Chorus AI, included in its latest cohort, but that’s just the beginning.”

Quiller, the Revolutionary Platform Empowering Teams With AI-Generated Fundraising Content, Has Launched Today
Access Wire
“The AI tool is also excited to announce the successful completion of its pre-seed funding round, raising an impressive $1.2 million. The round was led by Grassroots Analytics with participation from Higher Ground Labs, two renowned investors specializing in empowering grassroots movements.”