Georgia operatives sharpen their tactics in Alabama

Supporters of Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate Doug Jones react Tuesday during an election-night watch party in Birmingham , Ala. Jones defeated Republican Roy Moore, and a number of Georgia Democrats played significant roles in his campaign. (AP Photo/John Bazemore)

Supporters of Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate Doug Jones react Tuesday during an election-night watch party in Birmingham , Ala. Jones defeated Republican Roy Moore, and a number of Georgia Democrats played significant roles in his campaign. (AP Photo/John Bazemore)

Just after Nikema Williams won a runoff to represent an Atlanta-based state Senate district, she got a phone call from operatives for Doug Jones. They wanted her in Alabama to help with his U.S. Senate campaign. Immediately.

And thus Williams, two days removed from her victory, hit the road to head Jones’ get-out-the-vote efforts. Until shortly after she arrived and was asked instead to run the Jones campaign’s final-push political operations.

Armed with a spreadsheet full of names and her deep roots in Alabama — the Democrat grew up just across the river from Columbus — Williams spearheaded the “Vote With Me” program. The initiative involved linking voters with their legislators so they could vote together on Election Day.

“We had an unbelievable response from voters who wanted to go with their elected officials to the polls to cast a ballot,” Williams said in an interview. “We have not used that program in Georgia — but I guarantee we will now.”

Jones relied on discreet help from operatives and activists across the nation for his upset victory Tuesday over Republican Roy Moore, and several Democrats with deep ties to Georgia politics played a central role in the race.

Richard McDaniel, who was the Georgia political director for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, has been in Alabama since July, first as a strategist for Randall Woodfin’s successful bid for Birmingham mayor and then as head of Jones’ field operations.

He brought with him a team of young organizers who cut their teeth canvassing for Woodfin, trained them for about 10 days on the U.S. Senate race and sent them out to knock on doors. The first weekend, they hit 400 homes. The next weekend it was 1,200. A week later, 7,000 doors.

“I always told them this can be like morphine — give voters time and it’s going to work,” he said. “Each and every day we got better and stronger. And the kids saw what they could do when they gave it time for the morphine to work.”

McDaniel organized fish fries in neighborhoods and parks where Jones met hundreds of voters. He targeted troves of voters in rural counties and urban communities who Jones could flip. And he emphasized, win or lose, leaving behind a semblance of organization for a state party that lacked it.

“We treated this campaign like it was a Southern campaign,” he said. “Even if we didn’t win here, we were going to provide some infrastructure for the state.”

Brant Frost V, a Georgia GOP activist who volunteered for Moore’s campaign, came away with his own hard-earned lesson.

"In my experience, the winning candidate is the one who is willing to fundraise the hardest and follow good advice," said Frost, the chairman of the Coweta County Republican Party.  "If your candidate doesn't have the eye of the tiger, drop him right away."

Sometimes, the rollicking nature of the campaign forced Georgia veterans to improvise.

Michael Tyler, an adviser for Michelle Nunn’s 2014 Senate run who is now a Democratic National Committee official, decamped to Alabama shortly after ending a long-planned trip to Spain. Soon after arriving, he was asked to take the lead on a Jason Isbell concert supporting Jones.

“This was the first I’d heard of the Jason Isbell concert,” he wrote on social media. “I had never run a Jason Isbell concert before. Or any concert for that matter.”

The Huntsville concert attracted thousands of voters, and field organizers took advantage of the lengthy line to sign up hundreds of volunteers and remind others of their polling locations.

“The concert was held on the edge of downtown Huntsville, the seat of Madison County. Donald Trump carried Madison last fall 56 percent to 39 percent, a landslide,” he wrote on Wednesday. “Last night, Doug Jones won Madison county 57-40.”

Williams, who is to be formally sworn in Friday, said her time in Alabama reinforced a campaign maxim: “There’s no replacement for direct voter contact — we have to get on the ground early and start early.”

But her biggest takeaway from the race has little to do with tactical campaign maneuvering.

“I shout this until people are sick of hearing it: Black women continue to hold up the Democratic Party,” she said. “And I’m going to make sure we keep on getting elevated, lifted up and represented in my party.”