Tennessee working hard for election reform (verified voting)

[cry baby]

An email I received from Bernie Ellis, organizer for "Gathering to Save Our Democracy". He is an incredibly active activist for voting reform.

To everyone,

Here's hoping all of you are having a beautiful and restful weekend. Because this Tuesday, May 17, we hope that you and many of your friends and family will show up, stand up and be counted for free, fair and verifiable elections in Tennessee. Here are the final details on our presentation before the House State and Local Government committee.

Instead of being scheduled before the committee convenes, we have been put first on their formal committee agenda, which means our presentation to the full Committee should run from noon to 12:15 pm. (It can be extended if members have questions.) We are very fortunate to receive this time and this time assignment, as we will be followed on the agenda by a discussion of one of the ethics bills (on lobbyist disclosure), so the Tennessee media should be in the room en masse. We need to do everything we can do to pack the hearing room to the rafters.

If you have been looking for SOMETHING to do here in Tennessee NOW to repair and protect our election system, attending this legislative hearing is just the thing. And to maximize our potential impact, I would still like to ask as many people as possible to arrive early (around 11:30 am) to meet and greet legislators in the hallway outside Hearing Room 16. At the bottom of this memo are the grouped email lists for key House and Senate committees, as well as the rest of the legislature. There is also a sample invitation for the legislators to meet with us to discuss election reform next Tuesday. Please "cut and paste" these lists into an email and write the legislators yourself a quick note and an invitation to meet with us in the hallway starting at 11:30 am and to stay around to hear our presentation to the House State and Local Government committee at noon.

This week, we have had excellent meetings with the TN Secretary of State (three Gathering members, together with three legislators) and another excellent meeting with the Tennessee Disability Coalition, which will send representatives to the hearing to support free, fair and verifiable elections. We still are in a good position to influence the future of voting here in Tennessee, if we act now and in a big way. We need to reach out to every person and organization we know here in Tennessee today and over the weekend to ask them to join us, for this one hour -- high noon next Tuesday -- to demonstrate to our legislature that we stand united for free, fair and verifiable elections. We need to keep building the momentum for reform, and a big attendance at this hearing will do just that.

Spread the word. Mobilize every Orange State patriot you know to show up, stand up and be counted May 17 at high noon.
Hearing Room 16, Legislative Plaza, across from the TN Performing Arts Center. (Park at the Sheraton -- it's easiest.)

Bernie Ellis, Organizer
Gathering To Save Our Democracy

(If anyone wants to help email state reps, just ask, I'll post cut and paste addys.)