Sanders Campaign Press Release - Bernie 2020 Volunteers Break Record, Organize Over 1,600 "Plan to Win" House Parties in Less Than One Minute

Over 450 volunteers in early states to host events launching next phase of the campaign's organizing strategy

WASHINGTON – On a call with volunteers from across the country, the Bernie 2020 campaign organized over 1,600 "Plan to Win" house parties in less than one minute. Over 450 volunteers in early states of Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Nevada and California have committed to hosting these events that will launch the next phase of the campaign's organizing strategy.

"I think all of you know that what we are trying to do is literally unprecedented in American history," Sen. Sanders said on the call with thousands of volunteers. "I believe now that we are the strongest campaign to defeat Donald Trump… We have over a million people at the grassroots level who are prepared to volunteer for this campaign because they know the stakes, they know the moral imperative of defeating Trump and the equally important imperative of transforming our country."

"This is a clear sign our volunteers have built the largest and most innovative organizing program of 2020," national organizing director Claire Sandberg said. "We are not only exceeding benchmarks set in 2016, we are already breaking records set by our volunteers earlier this year. It took us over a day in April to achieve what we did in less than one minute on this call by pulling together over 1,600 volunteer-led events."

The "Plan to Win" house parties -- the largest national coordinated organizing event push since the Bernie 2020 campaign kick-off house parties in April -- will provide volunteers with state-specific instructions on achieving customized organizing goals targeted at winning early state caucuses and primaries. "Plan to Win" events in early states will focus on building volunteer teams to execute targeted canvassing and phonebank goals. Outside early states, "Plan to Win" events will prioritize building national calling days of action into priority states and promoting the BERN app. All events will also include trainings on using the BERN app for friend-to-friend relational organizing.

On the organizing call, Bernie 2020 announced the campaign's organizing program has already held over 11,000 events nationwide, including over 2,000 events in California, made 2 million phone calls to voters, sent over 30 million texts to volunteers and voters and signed-up over 1,500 students in the Bernie Summer School program to train campus leaders with staff-level organizing skills and resources. "Plan to Win" parties are set to increase these numbers, with events being held across the country from September 18 to September 24.