RepresentUs
RepresentUs[Nonpartisanism in the United States|] is a
non-partisan not-for-profit organization focused on ending political corruption in the United States. Funded by donations and grants, it is run mostly by volunteers aligned in a grassroots organizing network, and it has brought in high-profile celebrities to advance its message. It advertises, produces videos, and generates publicity with speeches and demonstrations and protests.
Mission and objectives
The chief focus of the organization is to end political corruption. For that end, it pushes for reforms to protect voting rights, eliminate gerrymandering, overhaul lobbying, promote financial transparency particularly regarding political donations, promote ranked choice voting and open primaries and campaign finance reform. It favors independent and bipartisan redistricting commissions for drawing congressional maps. It advocates passage of the Freedom to Vote Act. Its aim is to pass "powerful state and local laws that fix our broken elections and stop political bribery," according to an account in The Verge. It supports the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and the For the People Act. It tries to put "power back in the hands of the voters." Along these lines, spokespersons including Jennifer Lawrence and Khloé Kardashian have called for greater access for at-home voting in presidential primaries.An initial stated goal was to pass the American Anti-Corruption Act. It was written with the insights of political strategists, democratic reformers, and constitutional attorneys from various parts of the political spectrum; one of the authors was RepresentUs's co-founder, Josh Silver. It was unveiled in 2012. It is an example of model legislation in that it was drafted in such a way that it could be used by various jurisdictions with a minimal need for editing, while continuing to be consistent with the current constitutional structure. The act overhauls lobbying, encourages greater political transparency, and reforms campaign finance laws.
RepresentUs generally focuses not on the federal government but instead on local and state governments, since it figures it has the most leverage there; accordingly, it ignores United States territories such as Guam. It chose not to go to Congress directly because, in its view, congresspersons have already been corrupted by special interests and are unlikely to support substantive reform. It calls for a national voting standard by enacting laws at the local level. It has achieved results in progressive states, conservative states, and so-called "toss-up" states, and it tailors its efforts according to the particulars of each locality. It promotes ballot initiatives which allow citizens to vote on reform measures directly, and it ignores in-office politicians hobbled by political gridlock at the federal level. The idea is to build momentum for national reform by starting at the local level with a grassroots approach.
RepresentUs figures that if it can enlist the engagement of eleven million Americans, or about 3.5 percent of the population, it can effect substantive change to protect democracy, citing studies that show that that percentage is needed to effect change.
RepresentUs received the Candid Platinum Seal of Transparency in 2021.
Leadership and organization
Josh Silver and Joshua Graham Lynn co-founded the group in 2012. In January 2022, Lynn became the chief executive officer and Silver became the Executive Chairman. Lynn's professional background is in marketing and creative services. The organization that they founded is a project of the 5014 organization United Republic which is a principal sponsor of the American Anti-Corruption Act. RepresentUs is headquartered in Florence, Massachusetts.The management of RepresentUs is divided into several branches: a board of directors, an advisory council, a cultural council, and a full-time staff. They include numerous high-profile leaders, including former FEC commissioner Trevor Potter, Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig, disgraced lobbyist-turned-reformer Jack Abramoff, representatives from Occupy Wall Street and the DC Tea Party Patriots, and the great-grandson of the former president, Theodore Roosevelt IV. Actor Jennifer Lawrence is on the board of directors.
Numerous chapters nationwide are led by volunteers. They organize public education and activities to support local anti-corruption initiatives. There are more than forty local chapters including ones in Tallahassee, Illinois, the Roanoke Valley of Virginia, and New Orleans. Volunteer Mary Richards of Clarksville, Tennessee explained why she is leading a local chapter; as a nurse, she realized that the problems with the healthcare system were a "direct result of a broken political system" and she became frustrated with a system that is "rigged against us." Volunteer John House, president of the New Mexico branch, feels that "our democracy is under siege", so he organized a demonstration in Santa Fe to call for filibuster reform and for approval of the John Lewis Voting Rights Act. Volunteer Renaldo Pearson walked six hundred miles from Atlanta to Washington, D.C. as a media stunt to show his support for voter protections, safer elections and an end to political corruption. During his journey, he received a positive tweet of support from actor Kerry Washington. Volunteer Ash Orr of the West Virginia chapter organized small business owners into a coalition to support the For the People Act.
RepresentUs is organized into two affiliated nonprofit entities for tax purposes. Its 501 education fund engages in public education, movement building and advocacy; for example, it publishes an online blog which chronicles campaign finance news, called The Bulletin. Its 501 fund engages in legislative lobbying at the municipal and state levels. It is funded by individual donations as well as grants from philanthropic foundations. Donors are listed on its website. It does not accept money from governments, intergovernmental organizations, political parties, or corporations to avoid their influence. In one virtual gala event entitled United To Save The Vote, RepresentUs raised $2.1 million to help promote secure absentee ballots and safe in-person voting locations.
RepresentUs has been working with the organization Princeton Gerrymandering Process to identify and rate each state's congressional redistricting plans. It has worked with organizations such as VoteSafe and the County Every Hero coalitions, to counter misinformation about alleged voter fraud and to educate the public about the need for safe and secure elections. They've reached out to other groups of voters, such as military people; their "Count Every Hero" effort is an effort to make sure that service members' votes are counted appropriately.
Communications
RepresentUs engages in a variety of communications strategies to try to reach and persuade people. They partner with advertising agencies and public relations firms and marketing professionals to create innovative advertisements and promotions as well as manage creative media stunts. They are active on social media. Their leaders write op-ed opinion pieces in major media and make speeches in public venues; for example, actor Jennifer Lawrence and co-founder Lynn appeared together at a high school in Cleveland to speak with students about the pressing need to fight political corruption. The group criticized a redistricting proposal by Florida governor Ron DeSantis in early 2022 to further gerrymander Florida's congressional districts.Advertising and media campaigns
RepresentUs created a fictional presidential candidate played by actor Frank Ridley to be the character 'Gil Fulbright'. The intent was to focus public attention on corruption. They ran a fake senate campaign in 2014, and in 2016, the Fulbright character "ran" for president. The presidential launch video garnered over one million views in less than 24 hours. The fictional Fulbright character went on to beat several real candidates in a 2016 presidential straw poll, and out-fundraised legitimate Democratic presidential candidate Lincoln Chafee.RepresentUs launched a campaign entitled Justice for Sale in 2020 that focused on highlighting problems with America's criminal justice system. Actor Omar Epps and voting rights activist Desmond Meade narrated the video.
The organization hired the advertising firm named Mischief @ No Fixed Address to cause a pizza parlor to restrict its deliveries to within gerrymandered delivery zones, so that persons who lived outside the zone were excluded from getting pizza. The purpose of the stunt was to illustrate the absurdity of gerrymandering with a consumer delivery issue, and it garnered national media attention.
Working with the Leo Burnett advertising agency, RepresentUs had them create a font based on the shapes of gerrymandered congressional districts, called Ugly Gerry; it features gerrymandered characters for the letters A through Z, no numbers, and below each character it says "No rights reserved".
Board member and actor Jennifer Lawrence starred in a short film produced by RepresentUs entitled Unbreaking America: Solving the Corruption Crisis which described how the United States is a "broken democracy" and what actions people can take to remedy the situation. In the Lawrence-narrated plan which proceeded for twelve minutes, she outlined a solution as adopting the American Anti-Corruption Act. She warned, "If you do nothing, nothing changes."
A video starring the comedian Amy Schumer urged support for the For The People Act so that "politicians can't steal our goddamn elections."
The group enlisted the support of various podcasters to promote pro-democracy issues on their podcasts; the podcasters included the publisher Pushkin Industries, Radiotopia, The Sporkful, Avery Trufelman, and Dan Le Batard.
RepresentUs produced an advertisement entitled Transmissions from the Future featuring pop singer Katy Perry and actor Orlando Bloom which issued a dire warning to Americans about the possible upcoming death of democracy. The Perry-Bloom spot was displayed prominently in New York City, on the NASDAQ, at Reuters and at One Times Square.
In another advertisement in 2021, RepresentUs spoofed erectile dysfunction ads with one about electile dysfunction; in it, Mark Ruffalo appeared with comedian and actor Jake Johnson and actor Jonathan Scott to use humor to urge passage of the Freedom to Vote Act. The ad debuted on The Rachel Maddow Show and garnered 300,000 views on social media.
The actor Ed Helms urged action in another video on the student loan debt crisis.
In 2020 the group made a video using deepfake technology which showed current dictators warning about the death of democracy. The intent was to try to show Americans how serious the current issues are.
Often advertisements are bolstered with simultaneous social media campaigns. For example, when they released their deepfake advertisement, they supplemented the advertisements with tandem social media posts by Katy Perry, Orlando Bloom, Lawrence, Ed Helms, Alyssa Milano, and Kathy Griffin.
In another advertisement, they enlisted prominent celebrities to appear "naked" to illustrate how a ballot is considered unusable, or "naked", if it is not filled out properly before being mailed. The spot included Tiffany Haddish, Chris Rock, Amy Schumer, Chelsea Handler, Naomi Campbell, Mark Ruffalo, Sarah Silverman and her father Donald, Josh Gad, Ryan Michelle Bathe, and a fully dressed Sacha Baron Cohen. RepresentUs gave it out unbranded to allow various media platforms to copy it without charge, to enable further dissemination of its message.