Hello! This is my first time voting in the USA, i got my citizenship this year. I am going to vote on Nov 8th, but i have trouble finding details (like party association, what people stand for etc) for candidates .... of course except for house of representatives candidates
How do you all get such sort of info? I went to ucnj.org and the list of candidates just lists names, addresses, emails ... Should i just send email to each of them to get their replies?
Thank you! thats good suggestion! but with candidates for board of education - the list does not show their party association at all. So i will probably come up with general list of questions and send them all at once
>the list does not show their party association at al
Board of Education is legally non-partisan so their party affiliations will never show. Your best bet is to try and find if they have Facebook pages and reach out.
thanks! good to know!
This is one thing that truly bothers me— these campaigns will put 1000 signs along the road in my town with people’s names, but it is wicked difficult to find out their platform or intention for running. I had to do a lot of digging to find info on my town’s BOE candidates, but in the digital era it should be way easier than this.
Spend less on signs placed every 20 feet in the median of a highway. Design them with a huge QR code that takes you directly to a well designed, organized website that gives all pertinent info about the candidate. Place signs in tactful positions that will allow drivers stopped at intersections to capture the QR.
Or, at least SOME WAY of providing more context than hoping that quantity + bright colors will make some bonehead vote for you without knowing anything about why you are running for a political position.
Exactly!
Most of these candidates are boomers and not smart. I doubt the average BOE candidate even knows what a QR code is
It’s because they hope you’ll vote for them without knowing what their stances actually are.
I used https://voterrecords.com/voters/nj/ to look up each BoE candidate in my district to find out how they were registered. Your mileage may vary.
> Design them with a huge QR code that takes you directly to a well designed, organized website that gives all pertinent info about the candidate. Place signs in tactful positions that will allow drivers stopped at intersections to capture the QR.
You have already vastly overestimated the effort a voter will take to find info.
This is exactly what you are looking for. it is hosted by the league of women voters. They allow all candidates, from your local all the way up to the top - to enter their own info as responses to a set of template questions.
AND
As a bonus
theyll let you input your address to filter it down to just who YOU can vote for.
Which is a huge part of the problem.
I can design a rad sign with my dog’s name on it, blanket my town with 1500 fluorescent orange and dark blue signs, and probably get an old hound elected as mayor.
No. The signs aren't really for promoting candidates, theyre almost strictly for reminding people there's an election and energizing the folks who already like those candidates (likely for party reasons) to vote for them AND talk about them.
A good solution to the sign problem is to ask your town for an ordinance that bans them on public property - this will severely cut back on the volume and limit it to parties and candidates needing to find individuals willing to host their signs on private property.
Congrats on the citizenship. It's initially a bit difficult to get into (local) politics but I'd first make sure you know where your polling station will be and what will be on your specific ballot. You can just use the official NJ state gov site (https://www.nj.gov/state/elections/vote.shtml) to find out more information. If you're curious about what your ballot looks like online visit this site (https://ballotpedia.org/Sample_Ballot_Lookup)
I'll also say that politics in NJ/US is highly localized and regional. It's really easy to get swayed by national politics but what really matters is your local council from the municipal to county and state. How involved you want to get is really up to you, from voting once a year and reading national headlines to attending local council meetings and staying up to date on mayor & council M&A minutes.
NatAttack50932 t1_iug8nw6 wrote
Firstly, congratulations on your citizenship.
Secondly, it's hard to find info on candidates outside of Congress so your best bet is calling your local Republican Party and Democratic Party and asking about information on local candidates. Obviously they'll be biased but it's a start and they may be able to point you towards Facebook groups or such.