The NAACP recently announced the launch of its “Let’s Do It Again 2010” voter empowerment campaign.
The campaign will mark the return of the group’s highly-successful “Upload 2 Uplift” tool. With the technology, users can register to vote online and upload the e-mail addresses of friends who have not yet registered.
“The technology is huge because it allows people to be activists in their own homes,” Kirk Clay, the organization’s national civic director told the AFRO in a recent interview. “This allows a lot of our young folks—especially those young professionals—that have these really large social networking databases to participate in a surefire way.”
Upload 2 Uplift was originally introduced during the 2008 election season. More than 23,000 people registered using the tool. The latest version includes a mobile messaging feature to remind registered voters to go to the polls on Election Day.
The technology will expand on the organization’s current practices of phone banking and door-to-door canvassing, leading up to its “One Nation Working Together” rally scheduled for Oct. 2. At the event, NAACP leaders will aggressively motivate attendees to cast their votes in November.
While African-American voter registration improved in 2008 from the 2004 election season, the U.S. Census Bureau found that only 69 percent of Blacks are registered, compared to 75 percent of non-Hispanic Whites.
“In 2008 the forces of progress overwhelmingly turned out and voted,” Hilary O. Shelton, NAACP Washington Bureau Chief and Senior Vice President for Advocacy and Policy, said in a statement. “This November 2010 we are facing a critical point for our future–to continue changing this country for the better or to roll the clock back. The NAACP will do everything within our non-partisan power to ensure that voters across our country are informed, empowered and go to the polls to vote to America moving forward.”
