Vanguard
Campaign Corps
Vanguard is an independent group of volunteers with experience in distributed asynchronous data organizing. We offer our experience and volunteer our time to support transformative progressive campaigns’ field operations. Vanguard originated as part of the Bernie 2020 presidential campaign and continues to work with numerous national and local candidates and organizations.
We can help support campaign staff by:
- Providing advice on VAN setup and processes such as turf cutting
- Semi-automating data integration workflows (e.g., MiniVAN, Spoke, ThruTalk)
- Coordinating and training in support of turf cutting for canvassing
The Vanguard team was essential to our data needs on the Bowman For Congress campaign. They helped clean, organize, and manage data. We could not have done this work without their help. They jumped on as the campaign was taking off, and became reliable team members. I hope to work with them in the future. Their talent and efforts were greatly appreciated!
— Bilal Tahir, Field Director, Bowman For Congress
Thank you for all the help Vanguard! We ran an aggressive field operation like no one had ever done for this office and it couldn't have been done with out you all!
— Erik Oas, Field Director, Sara Innamorato for Allegheny County Executive (Pennsylvania)
The help you all have provided is absolutely indispensible. You've saved days' worth of vital field staff time, and made things look crisp and beautiful in the process. Thank you!
— James Cersonsky, former Field Director, Summer Lee for Congress
Vanguard played a critical role in the Alex Morse for Congress campaign. They were always responsive to our requests and prompt in fulfilling them. There is no way we could have completed these tasks with our internal capacity and we are immensely grateful for the support their team provided. One massive project they spearheaded was receiving daily reports from over 87 city and town clerks of folks who had requested, been sent, and returned ballots to vote by mail in the election, and importing and tagging them in VAN. This made our ballot chase efforts much more effective and allowed us to be intentional about who we were contacting. They also cut all of our turf. Furthermore, they trained fellows on our team to be a part of these processes. It is easy to take for granted the work they did for us and the capacity they provided, but the immense undertaking of these projects and the critical role they played cannot be understated. It would be an honor to work with the Vanguard team again in the future.
— Elvin Bruno Jr., Director of Operations, Alex Morse for Congress
Vanguard was an essential component of AOC's data strategy. They were timely, professional, and provided a trustworthy infrastructure for data volunteering. They served as a huge force multiplier by cutting turf, building lists, and delivering just in time data to our field team. Vanguard offered a passionate group of progressive volunteers that could help with minimal intervention. Their willingness to build processes and work intimately with the data team was hugely beneficial.
— Nick Hara, Data Director, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for Congress
The Mike Siegel for Congress campaign knocked 75,000 doors in less than a month, and we absolutely could not have done it without Vanguard. We also had a robust vote tripling program, which likewise wouldn't have been possible without Vanguard's help. They were responsible for cutting thousands of turfs for us, for cleaning and sorting all of our vote tripling data, and did both tasks reliably and with constant professionalism. This talented group of volunteers is an incredible asset to any campaign or organization that is lucky enough to work with them!
— Shana Gallagher, Organizing Director, Mike Siegel for Congress
Vanguard became my go-to partner throughout my work. Their volunteers quickly responded to requests and worked creatively to solve problems, such as creating an automated volunteer sign-up system that saved me countless hours of follow-up work. Vanguard approached the work humbly and thoughtfully, always willing to troubleshoot issues and receive feedback. I would recommend Vanguard to anyone working in the progressive field needing technical and creative assistance on field and digital work!
— Elias Newman, former Digital Director, Rashida Tlaib Campaign
The Bernie 2020 Vanguard volunteer team:
- Made over 16,000 one-step VPB lists
- Made over 2,500 multi-step VPB lists
- Cut canvassing turf for over 1,300 precincts across 10 states
- Generated over 6,600 reports across 4 states for virtual GOTV
- Performed sophisticated data analysis within Votebuilder (especially those of us who were full-time campaign staffers)