A Look Back at 2023
2023 Impact Report for All Voting is Local
All Voting works every day to expose and dismantle threats to voter freedom and build democracy for us all. Our theory of change recognizes that the business of running elections is year-round work, and so too is the work to build bridges with election officials who want to expand access to the ballot – and push back against those who don’t.
Only through consistent engagement can we ensure they use this authority to expand voter access to the ballot to the fullest extent. Our organizational principles help guide us in achieving this goal:
- Our work is always nonpartisan. Every voter should be confident that no matter how they vote, their vote will count.
- Accountability to communities is core to protecting voter access. We believe in holding accountable those who deny the will of the people. It’s time they make our elections more fair, equitable, and accessible and build a better democracy for everyone.
- Our work is sustainable and scalable. Through our year-round, cycle-over-cycle focus on the decisions that election officials make about voters’ ability to register and cast a ballot that counts, we cut off voter suppression at its source before it has the chance to spread.
- Our movement is stronger when we work hand-in-hand with national and in-state partners. We believe that this work has to happen in partnership with both in-state and national groups to ensure we all have the expertise, relationships, and resources to build a more equitable and inclusive democracy that works for everyone.
- We fight authoritarianism. The politicization of election officials, the intentional spread of disinformation, the stoking of political violence (especially toward election officials), and the attempted corruption of our elections are all tenets of the modern authoritarian playbook. We work in the face of it all to protect voter access, fix our election systems, and safeguard our elections from conspiracy theory-driven and even violent sabotage.
- Ending election sabotage is our “moonshot” – and we believe that it is not only achievable but also absolutely critical to resisting authoritarianism and fulfilling the promise of our democracy.
As our work continues into 2025 and beyond, All Voting will implement our Pro-Voter Agenda – an affirmative and achievable vision for the future of voting at the state and local levels. Drawing on best practices from across the country, it lays out how state and local officials can exercise their wide-ranging authority over election administration in a way that expands, rather than constricts, access to the ballot for every voter. As All Voting continues advocating for policies that expand access to the ballot, especially for voters of color, this agenda will serve to clearly and accurately define our positions and our priorities – across our eight states and across the country.
Check out some of our wins from 2023 below.
Arizona
In 2023, All Voting co-led state and national partner engagement for the Election Procedures Manual (EPM), which establishes practices for administering elections across the state. Through this, our team shaped nearly 100 statewide rules for elections in Arizona to make them more protective of voters in 2024 – including expanded in-person early voting options, requiring tribal governments to be consulted when selecting voting locations, and increased language access and voter assistance.
Florida
All Voting Florida successfully pushed for a much-needed early voting site on the campus of Jacksonville’s historically Black university, Edward Waters University, after years of fostering a space for voting rights organizations to connect with and empower local activists, faith leaders, and concerned citizens in Duval County, Florida – which is more than 30% Black.
Georgia
All Voting Georgia drove a multi-county strategy against conspiracy theorists’ attacks on local election offices and on voters. Since 2020, election deniers in Georgia have brought tens of thousands of mass challenges to voters’ eligibility, and they have attacked election systems, including machine tabulation of ballots and Georgia’s involvement in the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC), a nonprofit that helps states maintain their voter rolls. We testified and advocated at election board meetings, met with officials, worked with partners to speak with a unified voice, and briefed the media, all of which has helped to keep the pressure on Georgia’s elections officials to protect voter access and ensure that every Georgia voter will be able to cast a ballot that counts.
Michigan
In 2023, All Voting Michigan kicked off a campaign to ensure the effective implementation of Proposition 2, a voter-passed constitutional amendment that added protections for vote counting and certification. All Voting Michigan successfully helped 20 priority communities secure additional funding to implement the nine days of early voting now required under the state constitution.
Nevada
All Voting Nevada advocated for access to the ballot for jailed voters and rural and Tribal communities and expanded Spanish-language voting materials in some of the state’s most vulnerable areas. In an effort to head off the voter suppression and election sabotage threats that have characterized Nevada’s rural counties in the last two cycles, All Voting deepened our relationships with officials in six rural communities, as these areas have been a hotbed of election denial in the state since 2021.
Ohio
Using a collection of real-life experiences from voters and nonpartisan election observers, All Voting Ohio created a best practices guide for election officials that addresses some of the state’s most critical voter suppression issues. All Voting Ohio also led the expansion of the Peacekeepers at the Polls program during the 2023 election cycle, which brought voters to the polls for two high-profile ballot measures and helped to defend against voter intimidation.
Pennsylvania
In 2023, All Voting advocated for expanded access to the ballot for at least 198,000 voters across the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania who speak a primary language other than English. This included programming in Montgomery County, a dense Philadelphia suburb, where together with the Woori Center – an Asian American and Pacific Islander advocacy group – we convened a coalition of more than 15 nonpartisan, immigrant-led organizations that secured a commitment from officials to create voting materials in multiple languages.
Wisconsin
All Voting Wisconsin leveraged the opportunity created by the high-profile state Supreme Court election to advocate that officials tackle pressing election administration and voting issues in the state. With the race garnering unprecedented campaign funding and national media attention, our staff drew the focus to the ongoing critical voter suppression issues that have long impacted the state’s Black, Latino, and Native American voters and to the ongoing threat that election denial poses in Wisconsin. Our nonpartisan candidate forum at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee called on the judicial candidates to commit to upholding the foundations of our democracy. And we worked with local clerks to use the opportunity presented by the “off-year” election to address critical voter access issues, including intimidation, lack of access to voter ID, the spread of disinformation, and a refusal to accept or certify the results.
To read more about the work All Voting has done, check out our full impact report below.
You can read about our work in our first year as an independent organization (2022-2023) here.