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Welcome to a special midweek message from the North Dakota Democratic-NPL Insider, a newsletter that features regular updates about upcoming Dem-NPL events, legislative happenings, and news that affects North Dakotans!
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It's District Convention Time—Right now is a great time to get engaged or re-engage! Mark your calendars:
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Do you listen to The Hot Dish? It's a podcast Heidi and Joel Heitkamp do through One Country Project. This week, they interviewed Amanda Litman from "Run for Something," which energizes and assists diverse, non-traditional leaders to run for local office! Today's Midweek Message is a brief excerpt from their interview, but please check out the full interview over on One Country's Substack!
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Run for Something!
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Joel: So Amanda, you're sitting at a kitchen table. You know you've got a good candidate. That candidate could be Taylor, could be whoever, but that's the candidate you're looking for to flip a district. And that candidate looks at you and says, "You know, I'd like to, but there's no way I'll ever win." What's your answer to that?
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Amanda: We have no idea what can happen. Anybody can win. Republicans get indicted all the time. There is always a chance, and especially in a year like 2026, where we are seeing such dramatic swings, if there is ever a moment in which you are thinking, maybe this is the moment.
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The other thing you're in mind, is that elections do not happen in a vacuum. So if you want, where you're running to eventually become really competitive. If you want a 50-50 district or a real flippable opportunity, sometimes that means you've got to lose by less. And that doesn't mean be a sacrificial lamb! That doesn't mean just throw yourself to the mountain lions, but to understand that your metric of success is going to be how much can you close the margin? How much can you move the gap over? You could take a district that's 70-30 to 65-45 to 60-40 to 55-50 to 50-50 pretty quickly, but you're not gonna go from 70-30 to 50-50 overnight.
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So when we're working with candidates, you really try and remind them, maybe winning isn't like the most obvious outcome of this, but maybe. And even if you don't win, what good can you do as part of this race? How can you bring more people in?
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How can you force conversation on the issues? How can you galvanize your neighbors who might agree with you and want to see an alternative? And I will say one of the most compelling arguments I'll make to folks is if you don't run, what dumb dumb is going to put their name on the ballot? Who is the alternative?
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Now it's your turn! Our state needs fresh ideas and new voices—it needs people like you. Whether you've done political work your whole life or you've never given a second thought to politics before, we want to hear from you!
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The Century Club supports our year-round work to build party infrastructure supporting candidate recruitment, local district and regional leadership, issue-based education, and tools for Dem-NPL success.
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Help us elect great Democrats up and down the ballot!
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The North Dakota Democratic-NPL is launching a new grassroots program called “Neighbor to Neighbor” where volunteers will connect with voters in your community to elect Democrats up and down the ballot. As a volunteer, you will be responsible for connecting with voters in 25 homes in your neighborhood or friends and family to help elect Democrats up and down the ballot about 3-4 times this year.
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Grassroots organizers are the lifeblood of the Dem-NPL! Sign up to volunteer with the Dem-NPL!
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