Hello Merge Tag: Where Social Media and Politics Intersect

Joe Gallina is an attorney and the founder of Call to Activism, a digital media organization dedicated to countering MAGA rhetoric and advocating for democracy, transparency, and justice. On the day of Donald Trump’s inauguration in 2017, Gallina left his legal career to commit fully to this mission. Through Call to Activism, he has built a massive social media presence across Twitter, Bluesky, Fa...

“Democrats who have been in office for a long time follow polls instead of trying to change them. So while they’ll attack Republicans for threatening to cut Medicaid in order to fund tax cuts for the rich, they’re mostly shy about making a big picture argument about Trump’s fascism.” So says Micah Sifry in a piece called “3 Things Democrats Could Do That They Aren’t (Yet).” If you don’t know him,...

“Folks… need to be able to trust communications that we send them. By poisoning the well with some of the[se] texts and emails… people can’t trust the communications they’re receiving.” What happens when the backbone of Democratic fundraising comes under scrutiny? I checked in with some of the organizers of that open letter to ActBlue. In December 2024, a group of 142 consultants, campaign and non...

"Creative work isn't going to be an option anymore. You have to do creative work." Ashwath Narayanan is the Co-founder & CEO at Social Currant, a platform that helps nonprofits and social impact organizations collaborate with creators to reach audiences more effectively. He founded Social Currant while still a student at The George Washington University. He’s now graduated, but the work contin...

“It doesn’t feel like you’re joining a community, it feels like you’re joining a list.” On February 1st, the DNC will elect new leadership. Those elected will be tasked with leading the Democratic Party at a critical time, as they work to rebuild while Republicans control every level of the federal government. They will oversee fundraising and operations, but they will also play a key role in shap...

On February 1st, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) will elect a new chair to replace outgoing party chair Jamie Harrison. The next DNC chair will lead the Democratic Party at a critical time, as they work to rebuild while Republicans control every level of the federal government. This person will oversee fundraising and operations, but they will also play a key role in shaping the strategy a...

On February 1st, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) will elect a new chair to replace outgoing party chair Jamie Harrison. The next DNC chair will lead the Democratic Party at a critical time, as they work to rebuild while Republicans control every level of the federal government. This person will oversee fundraising and operations, but they will also play a key role in shaping the strategy a...

On February 1st, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) will elect a new chair to replace outgoing party chair Jamie Harrison. The next DNC chair will lead the Democratic Party at a critical time, as they work to rebuild while Republicans control every level of the federal government. This person will oversee fundraising and operations, but they will also play a key role in shaping the strategy a...

In this episode, I'm joined by Wisconsin State Representative Francesca Hong and her Chief of Staff, Nada Elmikashfi. Full disclosure: I have the pleasure of serving as Rep Hong’s digital director.  But even if I didn’t, I’d be tuned in. They are two of the strongest progressive voices currently active in Wisconsin politics. Rep Hong, along with being a chef and a community organizer, is also the...

Sarah Keyeski is a mental health care provider, a mom and this past cycle, she was a first-time political candidate. She ran for State Senate in Wisconsin against an incumbent who's been an elected official in her community since 1991 — and Sarah won! Emily Tseffos is a former educator, a community advocate and a mom who ran for office in an extremely Republican district. While she didn’t win, she...

I've been posting pretty much daily to TikTok for two years. I've built up a bit of a following in the process . I also write thefyp.news , a weekly pop-up newsletter from FWIW spotlighting the top political content, creators, and trends on TikTok ahead of the 2024 Presidential Election.  After my first year posting, I wrote a blog post. You can find that here . Now that I'm 2 years in, I pulled t...

Tareq Alani is a product leader who operates at the intersection of media, technology, and civic engagement. He is a Co-Founder at Chorus AI, where he leads product and growth. Chorus AI was designed to transform the way nonprofits and campaigns engage with media and content creation. Before Chorus AI, Tareq co-founded and served as the Chief Product Officer of PushBlack, the largest non-profit me...

If you know me, you know I’m a HUGE NERD for newsletters and email . Over the years, they’ve become one of the primary ways I get my news. Along with reading those Republican candidate emails (so you don’t have to), I also read dozens of digital marketing newsletters. Literally . And loads more about politics.  I’m kind of obsessed with the medium. Of all of the many newsletters that I read, one o...

Dan Pfeiffer is a giant in the progressive messaging space. Along with many impressive titles under his belt, he worked on the Obama campaign and served as senior advisor and White House Communications Director for President Obama. He then went on to become an influencer for democracy (my term, don’t blame him). He’s a best selling author and a co-host of Pod Save America. He also hosts the podcas...

We checked in with Josh Nelson, CEO of Civic Shout, to talk about the rampant spam and scam currently overtaking Democratic fundraising. We talked about how we got here, and how we can fix things. He walked us through a fascinating timeline of digital fundraising, starting with Howard Dean's presidential campaign and their innovative digital work (which started with Meet Ups!). But which new gener...

“People are desperate to turn digital into television and at the same time, they are desperate to have social be the thing that saves them from the small-dollar apocalypse.” Andy Barr is Managing Director at Uplift, an agency that provides creative, ad buying, data and software to Democratic campaigns, firms and organizations throughout the country.  Prior to founding Uplift in 2015, Andy was a po...

“We deployed a competitive search strategy to disrupt pathways to misinformation and lead people to our fact-based narratives instead.” Britt Bischoff is a reformed corporate digital strategist, analyst, click baiter, and algorithm chaser.  Over her career, she’s led digital strategy and data-informed campaigns for national brands, social causes, and progressive campaigns as a proponent for change...

Congressman Mark Pocan represents Wisconsin’s second district. He’s a small business owner, a labor union member and a surprisingly good magician! Along with serving on the Appropriations Committee, he’s served as co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and serves as chair of the Equality Caucus and co-chair of the Labor Caucus. To say his politics are righteous is an understatement. Whil...

“Where the memes are and where the conversation is, is constantly evolving.” ------ Nancy Leeds is a veteran political operative with over 18 years of experience in the field. She has worked on Democratic campaigns all over, from Minnesota to California to Arkansas, as well as with several politically oriented non-profits.  She is also the author of Campaign Sick, a job serve and blog about best p...

Hilary Stohs-Krause is a senior software engineer at a cybersecurity startup.   She focuses on the intersection of tech, entrepreneurship and social good.  In her free time, she's a primary organizer for Madison Women in Tech and a board member for Madison Wisconsin’s Forward Festival.  She joined us on the pod to talk about how campaigns and organizations can better protect their digital programs...

Deepak Puri is an engineer and Silicon Valley exec with over 15 years experience at Oracle, Netscape and VMware.  He co-founded Democracy Labs after the 2106 Presidential election with the mission to apply innovative technology and storytelling to progressive, social justice and voting rights causes.  DemLabs is a nonprofit that exists to share details on free and affordable solutions that activis...

If you work in Democratic politics, you probably know Organizer Memes. If you don’t… well you probably don’t spend too much time on Twitter. Organizer Memes is one part voice of the people, one part movement psychologist, one part anonymous messaging board, one part influencer and one big old part expert meme artist extraordinaire. Memes, as they refer to themselves, is always spot on with the per...

Gina Keller co-founded Distill Social, an independent media nonprofit based in Michigan. With a focus on effectively messaging to millennial, Gen Z, and disengaged voters through social media, Distill Social serves as a vehicle for driving meaningful change in the digital age. One of the tools in their messaging arsenal: TikTok . They launched their account just 18 months ago. But in that time, th...

We checked in with Beth Thorpe, Digital Director for Colonel Pam Stevenson, candidate for Kentucky Attorney General. We talked about scaling intimacy through digital, why Col. Pam is lighting a fire with the youth in Kentucky, how Beth got her start in politics and so much more. Connect with Colonel Pam at PamForAG.com and find her on all the social channels at @PamForAG. Find Beth on Twitter at @...

A while back, a conservative organization acquired our email address and started spamming us with one of the worst email marketing programs we've ever seen. This was next-level bad. So bad in fact that we just had to write up some takeaways we could learn about writing better emails from their no-good-very-bad- what-is-even-happening-here email program. We covered 9 key takeaways: 1) Don’t Buy Ema...