Chase Russell: What Political Consultants Get Wrong About Grassroots Campaigns

from Season 2 Episode 3 of The Art of Campaigns

In this episode of The Art of Campaigns, I sit down with Chase Russell, president of Grey Eagle Strategies and author of Winning Without Millions: A Framework for Modern Grassroots Campaigns, to break down how to build a political movement instead of just a campaign. If you want supporters who show up next cycle on their own, not just voters who turn out once, this one is worth your time.

You can watch here, or read below to get the strategy guide based on that conversation.

The tactics should be part of your goal

Most firms are paid to sell you mail, texts, and digital. The more you spend, the more they make, and that incentive quietly turns the tactics into the objective. Chase and I both think mail and phones and texts matter enormously, but only as avenues to something larger. Grey Eagle works on a retainer instead of taking a cut of the mail buy, which removes the pressure to recommend the expensive thing over the right thing. When the tactics stop being in service of a goal, you end up with a very well-executed campaign that leaves nothing behind.

"Grassroots" has sort of become a dirty word

Somebody once told me that the the idea of "Grass Roots" sounds great for candidates who don't have money. That reaction is the whole problem in one sentence. Grassroots now reads as the consolation prize for campaigns that couldn't fundraise, when it's actually the only approach that compounds into a movement long-term. You can absolutely buy a state rep race for a million dollars but then you have to buy it again in two years, and again after that, because you never built anything underneath the win.

The trust number that should scare every campaign

In 1967, a survey found roughly 80 percent of voters trusted their government to do the right thing. When it was run again in 2016, that number was around 10 percent. Every campaign in America now starts in that hole. You cannot mail your way out of a trust deficit that deep, and this is exactly why resume-style messaging fails. "I'm Joe, I'm a veteran, I've done this and this and this" gives a voter logical information with nothing emotional attached to it. Chase's point is that you're not connecting, you're reading them your CV.

Getting the in-person energy onto a screen

The hardest translation in modern campaigning is taking the thing that works face to face and making it work on a phone. Chase's argument for digital is partly economic: $180 can put an ad in front of 50,000 people, and you can change the creative ten minutes later based on what you're seeing. A $12,000 mailer reaches 20,000 people and tells you nothing about how any of them felt. The sequence usually runs online first because it scales fastest, and then the in-person meeting closes it. They saw the video, they meet you at the coffee shop, you're the same person, and they're off the fence for good.

Keeping the fire lit in the off year

Voters check out the day after the election, and you can't afford to keep staff on payroll through the off year. Chase points to Tim Burchett, the congressman from East Tennessee who builds skateboards in his garage and explains legislation while he does it, in language simple enough for a kid to follow. It looks corny. It is extremely effective, because people conclude he's telling them the truth. That's the shift from campaign mode to something closer to informing people continuously, and it keeps a movement alive without paying anyone to keep it alive.

Do you have to be an influencer?

I hear my past clients screaming at this part. Most candidates did not sign up to make content. Chase's answer is that you can build a movement without it, the same way you can cross an ocean in a rowboat. Go quiet for two or four years, never post, never do a meet and greet, and the movement dies out. Then you'd better have a couple million ready next cycle, which means the entire first campaign was wasted effort.

Give volunteers real authority

This is the part I care most about. If your captains genuinely know the messaging and the culture of the campaign, they will organize without you. Chase describes a mayoral client in Florida whose captains were effectively reading his mind: they didn't need to call the campaign manager to know what the response to a hot local issue should be, so they were already moving. Volunteers who feel ownership will give up a Saturday and a Sunday and time with their families in a way paid staff generally won't. It all traces back to messaging strong enough to clear the trust barrier in the first place.

When to go negative

Rage bait engages fast, but it recruits angry people, and then you're leading an angry movement. Chase's position is that hit pieces have a time and a place and shouldn't lead. If your whole campaign is "my opponent is bad," you run straight back into the trust problem, because I don't trust you either. At the same time, a campaign that refuses to ever throw a punch reads as weak. Each race is different, and part of the job is knowing when it's time to fight back.

Chase's book, Winning Without Millions: A Framework for Modern Grassroots Campaigns, goes deeper on the volunteer and trust frameworks we discussed. Twenty dollars well spent.

If you want help building a campaign strategy that outlasts this cycle, head to HuxleyStrategies.com and get in touch.

Caitlin Huxley hosts The Art of Campaigns podcast, exploring proven strategies for successful campaigns with industry-leading experts.