The U.S. Midterm Elections will be on November 6, 2018. All 435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives and 34 of the 100 seats in the U.S. Senate will be up for election, as well as 39 state and territorial governorships, and thousands of state legislature seats and local elected offices.
The purpose of this chat is to take a first look at the Midterm Elections. What are the key races this year? Which disability issues are most in play? Which candidates have disability issues in their platforms? What are their voting records on disability issues? Which candidates identify as disabled or D/deaf? Our hope is that in this chat we can pool the information we have and begin to build a detailed picture of the 2018 Midterms from a distinctly disability perspective.
Information on the 2018 Midterm Elections
How to Participate
Follow @GreggBeratan @AndrewPulrang @DisVisibility. When it’s time, search #CripTheVote on Twitter for the series of live tweets under the ‘Latest’ tab for the full conversation.
If you don’t use Twitter, you can follow along in real time here: http://twubs.com/CripTheVote. If you might be overwhelmed by the volume of tweets and only want to see the chat’s questions so you can respond to them, check @AndrewPulrang’s account.
Check out this explanation of how to participate in a Twitter chat by Ruti Regan: https://storify.com/RutiRegan/examplechat
Check out this captioned ASL explanation of how to participate in a chat by @behearddc.
Introductory Tweets and Questions for the Chat:
Welcome to the #CripTheVote Midterm Elections Preview chat! Please remember to use the #CripTheVote hashtag when you tweet. If you respond to a question such as Q1, your tweet should follow this format: “A1 [your message] #CripTheVote”
Q1: What are your initial thoughts about the upcoming Midterm Elections? Are there any specific outcomes you are hoping for? #CripTheVote
Q2: Name some key disability issues you believe candidates for office should know about and take positions on. Think not only about national office, but also state and local offices. #CripTheVote
Q3: What is your approach if you like a candidate’s other positions, or really despise their opponent, but they have a poor voting record or positions on disability issues? #CripTheVote
Q4: How can we help otherwise “good” candidates develop more sound, comprehensive disability policy positions? #CripTheVote
Q5: Are there specific disability issues you consider “deal breakers” or “litmus tests” for whether or not you can support / vote for a candidate? What is your take on “single-issue” voting? #CripTheVote
Q6: Please tell us about any candidates with disabilities you know of who are running for office in 2018. If you can, include their names, party affiliations, the offices they are running for, and their Twitter handles. #CripTheVote
Q7: Tell us about candidates running in 2018, disabled or not, that you will be watching closely because of their positions or records on disability issues. #CripTheVote
Q8: What can we all do to press candidates to address disability issues, both individually and through coordinated efforts like #CripTheVote and #RevUp?
Thank you for joining the #CripTheVote chat previewing the midterm elections. Please continue the convo and join us on 4/8 for our next chat reviewing the results from our online survey.
There is still time to participate in the 2018 #CripTheVote survey on disability issues. We want to hear from you! There are 2 ways to participate. The online survey, using SurveyMonkey:
Text only version, to complete and email back to us: https://docs.google.com/document/d/14Nx903WoomOWD4h7P3E5zBjKY732ja_oVYgyWeAib3s/edit
