Mitch Perry
To attack Gov. Rick Scott as a so-called climate change denier, Tom Steyer‘s NextGenClimate PAC spent nearly $20 million in ads three years ago.
It wasn’t enough, obviously. The Republican incumbent narrowly defeated Charlie Crist, and Scott is now seriously eyeing a run at Bill Nelson‘s U.S. Senate seat in 2018.
Steyer, a San Francisco-based environmental activist, is now poised to spend more in the Sunshine State next year — it’s one of the seven battleground states selected by NextGen Rising, a grassroots effort formed last June to boost youth participation in elections.
With 12 paid staffers in Florida alone, the organization aims to register, motivate and turn out at least half a million young American progressives for 2018.
Monday marked the one-year countdown before next year’s midterm congressional and gubernatorial elections. To celebrate, NextGen Florida held events on four college campuses statewide: The University of Florida, the University of Central Florida, Florida Atlantic University and the University of North Florida.
During the events, organizers say staff and volunteers collected over 500 survey cards “to begin a conversation with young voters and identify the issues that they care most about.”
In total, they say that during the rallies, NextGen Florida engaged well over 1,000 young Floridians.
NextGen Rising is also running a six-figure national digital buy through Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter and other “popular websites” (unnamed) to encourage young Americans to become politically involved.
In addition to Florida, NextGen Rising is working in six other states — California, Nevada, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Virginia. Officials say the group spent more than $3 million to register over 20,000 new voters and organized students on 26 college campuses ahead of Tuesday’s gubernatorial election in Virginia, which resulted in Democrat Ralph Northam defeating Republican Ed Gillespie by nine points, 54 to 45 percent.
And while they haven’t locked down final plans for 2018, the group expects NextGen Florida to play a key role in next year’s congressional statewide races.
Meanwhile, Steyer doubled down Thursday on an earlier call to impeach President Donald Trump, announcing on a conference call that he will commit $20 million to the Need To Impeach movement. The push, Steyer said, would include two new commercials.
Watch the NextGen America ad here:
