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“This is completely different from what we have done in past cycles,” said Dan Sena, the executive director of the DCCC.
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Democrats seek stronger social media presence to guard against potential Russian interference in midterms | Washington Post
By Michael Scherer
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/democrats-seek-stronger-social-media-presence-to-guard-against-potential-russian-interference-in-midterms/2018/08/10/7345fcd4-972b-11e8-80e1-00e80e1fdf43_story.html?utm_term=.68dfb1d41051
Democratic leaders fearful of potential Russian interference and burned by recent conservative success on social media have begun a new effort to win the midterm election battle on platforms such as Facebook and Twitter.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the party organization in charge of strategy for House races, introduced internal software this spring to identify suspected automated Twitter accounts, or bots, that frequently post about key races and seem similar to the fake accounts that U.S. intelligence officials and technology firms say were part of Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential election, party officials said.
The system also is designed to provide a more aggressive strategy to drive discussions on Facebook, Twitter and other platforms, an area in which Democrats think they were outmaneuvered in 2016 — with the committee hiring dozens of social media specialists to fight daily messaging battles online.
The previously unreported effort has dispatched 43 staff members — called “battle station organizers” — to the most competitive districts in the nation, where they are building grass-roots networks to spread pro-Democratic messages as well as attacks on Republicans in local Facebook and Twitter communities. The DCCC has flagged nearly 10 accounts as malicious bots to Twitter, which shut them down, committee staff members said.
“This is completely different from what we have done in past cycles,” said Dan Sena, the executive director of the DCCC.
Under the new model, Democratic organizers paid for by the national party committee recruit volunteer social media activists like they would people to knock on doors or work at phone banks. The new staff members work to place potentially viral content in local Facebook groups like they once tried to influence the letter to the editor pages of local newspapers.
[…] The National Republican Congressional Committee also has added digital resources this cycle, although it has taken a more conventional approach to social media organizing. The committee offers centralized training and support for House campaigns about best practices and tactics, with staff members assigned regionally to assist in the effort. The NRCC has not deployed candidate-specific staff to work on social media, a spokesman said.
The Democratic congressional plans, by contrast, were developed last year, while studying the campaigns of Jones in Alabama and Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam (D).
[…] The DCCC software does not allow for tracking of Facebook, a platform that political consultants consider far more important for reaching regular voters, because much of the activity on that platform is not posted publicly. But the committee has tasked its local battle station organizers with monitoring the activity in local Facebook communities and political pages, including new progressive communities maintained by grass-roots groups like Indivisible.
The job falls to people like Cale Lockhart, 19, a DCCC organizer in Iowa, who spends his days direct messaging people on local Facebook groups and creating online social content to support Abby Finkenauer, a Democrat challenging Rep. Rod Blum (R-Iowa).
Lockhart says he communicates weekly with a group of about 50 “influencers” who can share content in the local networks supporting Finkenauer.
“The most important thing is that not everyone has a home phone that we can call,” said Lockhart. “There are a lot of people who are energized who haven’t been able to get involved.”