Needham resident and Kamala Harris supporter Moe Handel knows the Electoral College votes from the blue state of Massachusetts are all but certain to go to his preferred candidate. It’s seven swing states that will decide the Electoral College tally. So he and his wife, Elizabeth, recently traveled to North Carolina, won by former president Donald Trump four years ago. Mecklenburg County, said Handel, has a large number of registered Democrats but a traditionally low turnout. The couple knocked on doors and had some nice conversations. “In North Carolina, one vote in every precinct can mean the election,” he said, adding that his training at Pennsylvania Military College taught him you can’t sit back and just wait for things to happen.
Democrat Tom Bean left Needham for Bucks County, Pennsylvania, Saturday morning to meet up with more than two dozen of his fellow Washington University of St. Louis alumni from around the country. Their mission? To make sure likely voters in this swing state have a real plan to get to the polls on Election Day. “It’s so close. It’s likely to all come down to Pennsylvania,” Bean said. The group of Democrats travel to a different election hot spot each October to get out the vote. It’s part civic participation and part college reunion, “an opportunity for us to reconnect,” said Bean.
Stacie Shapiro has canvassed for Democratic presidential candidates in New Hampshire beginning with the Bush/Gore race in 2000. She remembers being asked why, as a Massachusetts resident, she was “butting into” New Hampshire politics. “At first, I wouldn’t tell people where I was from,” Shapiro said. This weekend she is headed to more friendly territory in Pennsylvania for her third visit since August. “I have to wake up in the morning after the election and say I did everything I could,” said Shapiro, who added that Boston Mayor Michelle Wu and about 170 other canvassers from Massachusetts will also be there.
On the Republican side, a small group of Trump supporters has been holding a series of outdoor rallies to get out their message that “Needham isn’t a one-candidate town.” Their numbers were small last week at the intersection of Gould Street and Highland Avenue, but their activism provoked a lot of horn honking and thumbs-ups from commuters. Only one member of the group, identifying only as Stephen, would talk to this reporter, saying the pro-Trump rallies are bigger further out from Needham.
Returning home on Monday, Bean said his experience on the road was wonderful. “Some people wouldn’t tell us who they are voting for,” he said, “but we had substantive conversations with others. Our goal was primarily to get out the vote.” Bean agrees with Harris, who has said, “No one can sit on the sidelines” in this year’s election. In the end, Bean feels, “We’re trying to save democracy in this country. It sounds rather big … but it is.”
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