We’re almost home

Here’s our closing argument

Yesterday, I found myself standing on the UNC campus while a student organizer yelled into a bullhorn at her fellow students as they walked by: 

“Hey - who wants to meet Jeff Jackson? The congressman from social media! You knoooow hiiiimmmm. He’s right here. Who wants to meet Jeff Jackson?”

A few heads swiveled. We already had a good crowd of students for our event, but she wanted to grab a few more passers-by. And it worked. Our crowd grew.

We had a great conversation. Folks asked whether I was exhausted from running a statewide campaign (“Nope - marching right along”), what my top priority would be as Attorney General (“Day One has to be about combating the fentanyl epidemic”), and whether I had any funny stories about serving with George Santos (I did).

I had started the afternoon in Durham to help launch a canvassing event with a room full of energetic volunteers. My message to them was that most people won’t read the handouts you give them, but they’ll read you. Your message is mostly about being a kind person. That’s what people will remember, so don’t lose sight of that when talking politics with folks on their doorstep.

I finished the day in Raleigh with an event for a number of local and statewide candidates. The vibe was strongly positive, people were fired up, lots of good energy.

My message: Let’s spend a little time thinking about after the election. We need to find ways to bring the country back together, and that means not treating politics as a constant source of outrage. Civility, honesty, decency, competence - that’s what politics should really be about, and it’s an approach most people can get behind.

Now I’m heading home to see the kids for a few hours, then out the door again. Gotta keep up the pace.

Our internal polling still has our race basically tied. One of the things I can still control is how much effort I put forth in the last week, so I’m going all out.

We’re going to win, but it’s going to be very close.

Campaign update - good news/bad news

I’m proud of our last TV ad.

In a time of wall-to-wall negativity, we wanted to end on a positive note.

You can watch it here:

That’s the good news. We’ve got a strong closing argument.

The bad news is… $14 million in attack ads against us are hitting on TV. That’s more than 7x what was spent against our current Attorney General in 2020. And that race came down to just 0.2%.

We’re trying to beat them back but we’re not quite fully funded in all six media markets in NC.

Going dark in some of those markets - while dishonest attack ads against me are blazing across all six of them - would be an easy way to lose a tied race.

I think you can tell just by looking at a calendar that I won’t get too many more chances to ask for your support. That’s why I’m being very straightforward.

We are writing our last check to the TV stations tomorrow. Everything we raise with this email will go to making that check bigger, which means we can run more spots on Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy, Law & Order, etc. - which is, by far, the biggest way we reach undecided voters.

There isn’t a more powerful lever to win this election than the one I’m giving you right now, and I hope you’ll pull it as hard as you can.

You can do that here (ActBlue) or here (non-ActBlue).

Thank you - and we’re almost home, folks.

Best,

Jeff