NGP VAN provides tools used by Democrats, from the White House to local school boards, to raise money and mobilize voters. But with new management in recent years, it has been stripping its operations to the bare bones.
The potential decline of these tools — which have given Democrats a significant technology edge over Republicans over the past few cycles — would be so threatening to operations that a handful of top Democratic digital firms recently called a roughly hourlong Zoom meeting with leadership of the company to seek answers. Among their demands: reassurance that NGP VAN wouldn’t dismantle one of its top products, an online organizing and fundraising tool called ActionKit. Without it, Democrats worried about their prospects during the 2024 cycle and beyond.
“I’m hoping that I’m wrong, that we’re all wrong, that everyone’s fine,” said a former NGP VAN employee, granted anonymity to speak candidly about their former employer. “But this could mean something really bad for 2024.”
The alarm relayed on the call reflected a larger concern: that the Democratic Party has grown too dependent on a small handful of companies to carry the bulk of its campaign operations.
Democrats up and down the ballot have long relied on NGP VAN to run their campaigns. Now, consultants and former employees are concerned that repeated layoffs will lead to problems with the party’s most vaunted tech tools. Some consultants are on the precipice of turning their back on NGP VAN altogether, according to six NGP VAN clients who spoke with POLITICO.
But the company’s monopoly-like grip on Democratic campaigns means there’s no clear alternative that can immediately replace it.
Four former employees said the staff cuts could delay response time to client questions, reduce the ability to update the software and slow the ability to address glitches.
“There’s a pattern in Democratic software of creating a tool and then you stop updating it, you stop working on it, you stop developing and creating new releases for it.”
Use. Open. Source. Software.
JFC, people.
If you’re using products that are FOSS, it doesn’t matter if a single company goes under. You can just take the code to somebody else.
A big component of the VAN is having access to the names and addresses of likely democratic voters, which I understand this company to basically be selling access to and building tools around.
So it’s not so much the data tools so much as the access.
That all being said, 20-16 till now, and the constant physical irritant that was the Trump years have left people pretty damn jaded. I’m a bit dubious about the value of these lists, but without them, a campaign is starting from scratch.
It’s a tough thing, but if you need to reach 100k voters to win an election, you need both data and people.
Which open source software do you recommend to replace ActionKit?
Also, the software only one part of it. the other aspect is the likely voter data for a given race or district.
And, you know, the payment platform, the hosted APIs, the collaboration tools, the regulatory compliance…
yeah idk about the value of any of that, hence the lay offs.
I’ve worked with the VAN 3 times in a couple different campaigns.
None used the payment platform, the apis, or tools, and I’m not sure what if any regulatory compliance had to do with anything. It’s a list of likely voters, not their medical records. I’m not sure there any required compliance whatsoever.
We worked with the lists directly or the campaigns had teams that built infra or reworked the lists for other tools like auto dialers and what not. There are many other options when it comes to tooling around lists, but there really very few places to buy lists.
When you’re out in the field and your FOSS product suddenly has a glitch, who runs tech support for you?
FOSS is great for some things but this isn’t necessarily one of them.
You realise there’s a whole industry built around consulting services and support for FOSS software like Linux?
Alternatively, fork the software and hire your own in-house staff to support the fork. So long as that’s allowed in license.
Who runs tech support? The people you hired to run tech support.
A company you hire to do tech support for said software, or someone inside your own organisation. You think people don’t do tech support for FOSS? Governments run on FOSS.
What’s to stop some Republican billionaire from buying the company and shutting it down entirely before 2024? Maybe you get sued for damages but that doesn’t undo an election. They have to be a lot more prepared for situations like this.
It would trigger 5-10 news article in the first week, uproar for the days after in the comment sections and social media, 2 years later an AG would pick up the case, in the 4th year after a report would be released detailing how it was found that a company financed by a billionaire of an opposing party had interfered in the election campaign of the Democratic Party. In the 6th year 2-3 people have to stand trial for these findings. In the 7th year all of them are found not guilty, but the (already shut down) company with the billionaires ties would have to pay a hefty 30.000 $ fine as that was not correct to do. Rinse and repeat.
Why doesn’t the company simply raise prices? It sounds like they have a strong market position, which isn’t something normally associated with financial problems and layoffs.
I know of at least one similar company that has intentionally avoided political campaigns because of the inherent instability and problems collecting fees even when someone wins an election, much less loses.
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It would be nice to know which FOSS alternatives exist or alternative routes. There needs to be as many options possible to make sure Republicans stay underwater as they’re not a legitimate political party.
The Republicans want to end democracy and convert the US to an oppressive fascist oligarchy like Russia, but make no mistake. They are not underwater and they are a legitimate political party with all of the power, funding and infrastructure that comes with it.
They have near absolute control of the judiciary and strangleholds on most of the federal and state legislatures.
The Democrats need to equip themselves to compete with that but I fear they’ve squandered whatever technology edge they had. One vendor having the ability to screw their entire operation is proof of that.
You assume FOSS even exists for this use case, which I sincerely doubt.
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