MOVEON ENDORSES OBAMA
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Today Barack Obama earned the endorsement of MoveOn, one of the largest
grassroots membership organizations in the United States, after
clobbering Hillary Clinton by 40 percent in Internet balloting. Obama
led the final tally 70.4% to 29.6%, clearing the supermajority required
for the endorsement. MoveOn, which has never endorsed a presidential
candidate before, boasts that it has 1.7 million members in Super
Tuesday states. The group has over half a million members in California
alone - roughly one out of ten primary voters in Tuesday's largest state.

"We've learned that the key to achieving change in Washington without
compromising core values is having a galvanized electorate to back you
up," said Executive Director Eli Pariser, "and Barack Obama has our
members 'fired up and ready to go' on that front."

Obama welcomed the endorsement on Friday. "In just a few years, the
members of MoveOn have once again demonstrated that real change comes
not from the top-down, but from the bottom-up. From their principled
opposition to the Iraq war - a war I also opposed from the start - to
their strong support for a number of progressive causes, MoveOn shows
what Americans can achieve when we come together in a grassroots
movement for change," he said in a statement. "I thank them for their
support and look forward to working with their members in the weeks and
months ahead," he added.

Organizers said they would "immediately" begin mobilizing on behalf of
Obama, leading turnout programs and phone-banking members of MoveOn in
targeted states. The group made seven million "GOTV" calls for Democrats
in the mid-term elections, and it has an extensive voter file database.

The decisive victory shows that Obama is consolidating support from the
netroots in the wake of John Edwards' withdrawal. Obama also won the
Edwards vote in Thursday's Daily Kos reader poll. He bounced 35 points
to reach an all-time high of 71 percent, while Clinton held steady at 11
percent. If Super Tuesday is a tie and both campaigns brace for a
protracted delegate hunt, Obama could draw fundraising, volunteers and
advocacy from a united front of MoveOn, netroots activists and bloggers.

Matthew Smith, an Ohio MoveOn member who voted for Obama yesterday, said
he was excited by the Obama's "ability to draw people to him, to
energize people who generally don't vote [and] to create an atmosphere
of long-overdue possibility."


Posted by Ari Melber at 02/01/2008 @ 11:43am
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