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Clubs shall notice their full membership by email of an endorsement consideration at least two weeks prior to the endorsement meeting.Clubs invite all prospective candidates and provide details on the club’s process.Clubs should publicize their endorsements widely.
Candidate surveys, which should be sent to all candidates for a race under consideration and received at least five days prior to the scheduled endorsement meeting. Bylaws can state whether a candidate or campaign representative must be present to be considered and how extenuating circumstances will be handled. Candidates can be asked to step out of the room during discussion and voting. A synopsis of completed candidate surveys can be made available to all club members eligible to vote.Successive votes in races with multiple candidates, so that if no candidate receives the required percentage for endorsement, further rounds are taken deleting the candidate receiving the least number of votes and those receiving no votes on the previous round.Instant Run-off Voting (also know as Ranked Choice Voting) can be used for members to enter all of the voting rounds on one ballot. This speeds up the voting process and enables members to drop their votes into the the ballot and leave, if they can't stay for the whole meeting, knowing that their votes will be counted in each round of voting.No Endorsement is always an option on each round of voting.Those voting on an endorsement must have been members for a fixed period of days (e.g., 30, 56, 90) before the endorsement meeting. A specific quorum for endorsement meetings, which may be higher than the quorum required for regular business.A specific vote threshold for endorsements, which may be a supermajority rather than a simple majority (e.g., 60%).If no candidate nor 'No Endorsement' achieves the threshold for endorsement the clubs bylaws should stipulate the next steps. For example the members may first consider 'No Position' (enabling the club to return to consider the race at some time in the future), then consider 'No Endorsement', and then rate all, or some, of the candidates Qualified/Acceptable or Unqualified/Unacceptable.
Endorsements
Clubs may take positions on candidate races and ballot measures, in accordance with their bylaws. While the power to endorse candidates can greatly strengthen a club’s influence, it should be used with discretion. A vigorous, thoughtful, and democratic process should be used for making endorsements by the club membership.
Requirements
Recommedations
Notes
When inviting candidates to an endorsement meeting it's not adequate to just email the candidate's campaign, and leave it at that. Email is a notoriously unreliable means of communication (mis-typed address, Junk and SPAM detection, email overload). No response to an email notice should be followed up with a phone call to confirm the candidate's campaign received the email notification.
Endorsements are one of the most satisfying, and challenging, activities for a Club.
Many of the clubs in San Diego County established committees to help draft their endorsement guidelines, some of the clubs publish these on their websites. Here are a few that we’re aware of, let us know if your club has guidelines to share.
Democratic Woman’s Club of San Diego
Point Loma Democratic Club
San Diego County Democrats for Environmental Action
San Diego County Democrats for Equality
In this presentation Fred Rogers, VP Political Action for the San Diego County Democrats for Environmental Action, guides us through how to plan endorsement meetings, and how to run an exemplary endorsement meeting.
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