The Grassroots General Election Action Series addresses one Essential Grassroots Responsibility at a time. Step 3 gives the grassroots the responsibility to make certain the voter knows the candidates before the opposition defines them.
A candidate who is not clearly defined by supporters will eventually be defined by opponents. The definition may come through a misleading comparison, a carefully selected quotation, a repeated accusation, a nickname, a television advertisement, or a social-media message designed to create an emotional reaction before the voter ever examines the facts.
Once that image takes hold, the campaign is forced to spend valuable time denying someone else’s version of the candidate. That is why defining a candidate cannot begin during the final weeks of a General Election. It must begin immediately.
The grassroots must help voters answer three fundamental questions:
1. Examine the candidate’s record, experience, accomplishments, failures, decisions, votes, and previous responsibilities. Do not rely entirely upon campaign biographies or opposition advertisements. Look at what the candidate has actually done when given authority, responsibility, or the opportunity to lead.
2. Understand the principles that guide the candidate’s decisions. Voters should know the proper role of government, how taxpayer money should be used, which responsibilities belong to individuals, families, communities, States, or the federal government, and what principles remain negotiable — and which do not.
3. Determine what the candidate specifically intends to accomplish, which priorities will come first, and whether those promises are realistic within the authority of the office being sought.
The voter should know what the candidate believes strongly enough to defend after the campaign is over. A candidate should not be evaluated by slogans alone, nor by generalized endorsements alone.
The grassroots must help voters compare:
Record. Principles. Judgment. Priorities. Results.
This is not about teaching voters what to think. It is about giving them enough truthful and defensible information to think for themselves.
Oponents will attempt to define candidates through association. Consultants will attempt to define them through carefully tested language. The media may define them through whichever controversy attracts the most attention, or the financial resources financing them.
But the voter deserves something better. The voter deserves to know:
Who is this candidate? What has this candidate already demonstrated? What will this candidate do with the power of the office?
And most importantly: Has this candidate earned the voter’s trust?
That trust must be earned by the candidate’s own record — not borrowed from a party label or destroyed through association with someone else.
Arizona provides a current and unmistakable example. Governor Katie Hobbs’ coordinated reelection campaign has explicitly described Republican nominee Andy Biggs as a “carbon copy” of Kari Lake, Hobbs’ unsuccessful 2022 opponent.
The intended message is clear: Kari Lake lost to Katie Hobbs in 2022. Then Hobbs states that Andy Biggs shares certain political positions, supporters, and election concerns with Kari Lake. Therefore, voters should view Andy Biggs as another Kari Lake—and expect the same conduct, the same campaign, and the same result.
But two candidates may belong to the same political party, support some of the same policies, receive endorsements from some of the same people, or appeal to some of the same voters. That does not make them the same candidate.
Andy Biggs and Kari Lake have different personal histories, professional backgrounds, records in public office, leadership experience, communication styles, governing experience, campaign organizations, strengths, and weaknesses.
The grassroots does not need to erase Kari Lake from Arizona’s political history. Nor should it pretend that the Republican Party has nothing to learn from previous campaigns.
When an opponent attempts to define a candidate through someone else, ask specific questions:
What actions make the two candidates alike? Which votes are the same? Which leadership decisions are comparable? Which policies are identical?
A comparison that cannot survive specific questions should not be allowed to control the election. The standard should remain: Show the record. Identify the evidence. Explain the relevance. Let the voter decide.
The longer a false or incomplete definition circulates unanswered, the more difficult it becomes to correct. That is why candidate definition cannot be left entirely to paid advertising during the final weeks of the campaign.
Precinct Committeemen, volunteers, neighborhood leaders, local writers, podcasters, candidates, and grassroots organizations should begin developing factual answers immediately.
They should know:
The candidate’s background and qualifications. The offices previously held. The responsibilities carried in those offices. The candidate’s most important votes and decisions.
The promises that were kept — or broken. The controversies that will predictably be raised. The honest answer to each reasonable criticism.
This information should not be hidden inside a fifty-page research document that most voters will never read. It must be converted into clear, accurate, defensible, and meaningful communications.
The goal is not to manufacture an image… The goal is to prevent a manufactured image from replacing the truth.
The same standard must apply to both parties. Katie Hobbs should not be evaluated merely as another Democrat. Andy Biggs should not be evaluated merely as another Republican.
Nor should either candidate be judged solely by national party leaders, political allies, campaign labels, or personalities from a previous election.
Each should be required to answer for an individual record. What did the candidate do with the authority already entrusted to that person? Which decisions improved the lives of citizens? Which decisions failed?
How did the candidate respond to pressure, opposition, crisis, and responsibility? What does the candidate believe government should do? What will the candidate attempt to do next?
Those are harder questions than repeating a familiar political comparison. They are also the questions responsible voters should be asking.
