Some advocacy groups try to influence lawmakers, others focus on making change through the courts. And then there are those working to engage the "regular" people by encouraging them to take action.
Now that voting has begun in much of the country, many democracy reform groups are stepping up their efforts to support voters by offering a trove of online tools designed to educate and engage the electorate in the final days of one of the most consequential presidential elections ever — and one facing a unique range of challenges because of the pandemic.
Below is a sampling. Find the one that's right for you. And if we missed something, let us know at newsroom@thefulcrum.us.
Cleveland Clinic and Bipartisan Policy Center: Voting Amid Covid-19
"We've created this book to provide guidance on precautions you can take to protect yourself, your loved ones and your community from further spread while exercising your right to vote. Voting in the middle of a pandemic will be unlike anything we've experienced in the past century. By understanding your rights and being prepared ahead of time, you can ensure your voice is heard."
Ballotpedia: Election Help Desk
"The 2020 election is taking place against a backdrop of uncertainty. We understand you may have questions about what to expect in elections at all levels of government, from the casting of ballots to the certification of final results. We are dedicated to providing you with accurate, objective, and measured answers to those questions."
Democracy Docket: Voter Dashboards
"Our Voter Dashboards aim to help you—and voters everywhere— make a plan to vote by providing accurate information about the voting laws in your state."
Democracy for President: A Guide to How Americans Can Strengthen Democracy During a Divisive Election
"This report aims to describe how Americans are experiencing this election season. It examines Americans' attitudes, beliefs, and feelings toward the state of democracy, and covers core concerns related to the integrity of the election. ... This report also seeks to provide nonpartisan guidance for what Americans can do to strengthen our democracy in the coming weeks and months."
Headcount: Early and Mail-in Voting in Your State
"Warning: Mail-in voting is a convenient and safe way to vote, but if your ballot is submitted late or with errors, it might not count. So follow the directions below to make your vote count."
League of Women Voters: Guidance and Considerations for the 2020 General Election
"While the novel coronavirus outbreak is an ever-changing situation, we know that the risk of COVID-19 spread increases based on the number of people an individual interacts with and the length of time of the interaction. The following guidance and key considerations for the 2020 General Election come from the League's election preparation expertise, lessons learned from the 2020 Primaries, and recommendations from the CDC. No voter should have to choose between their safety and casting a ballot."
National Vote at Home Institute: Elections Officials Communications Toolkit
"This Election Official Communications Toolkit is for all election officials, but particularly those of you who are looking to add more tools to your box. Whether you have no communications capacity or a large budget, you can find something useful to include in your elections communications plan."
Nonprofit Vote: Voter Registration Toolkit and Get Out the Vote Toolkit
"Nonprofits have more than 10 million employees and engage more than 60 million volunteers each year. Let's make our voices heard."
PEN America: What to Expect This Election Season
"The 2020 general election will be unlike any previous election, happening against the backdrop of a pandemic, and with disinformation running rampant. It's vital that voters know what to expect. Here are five things to keep in mind."
RepresentUs: 6 Steps to Save the Vote
"We are a fiercely non-partisan movement with one mission: Protect democracy. President Trump's public statements have made it clear he's laying the groundwork for an electoral coup. This is beyond partisanship. We must act now. The more steps you take, the bigger difference you make."
Eric Trump, the newly appointed ALT5 board director of World Liberty Financial, walks outside of the NASDAQ in Times Square as they mark the $1.5- billion partnership between World Liberty Financial and ALT5 Sigma with the ringing of the NASDAQ opening bell, on Aug. 13, 2025, in New York City.
Why does the Trump family always get a pass?
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche joined ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday to defend or explain a lot of controversies for the Trump administration: the Epstein files release, the events in Minneapolis, etc. He was also asked about possible conflicts of interest between President Trump’s family business and his job. Specifically, Blanche was asked about a very sketchy deal Trump’s son Eric signed with the UAE’s national security adviser, Sheikh Tahnoon.
Shortly before Trump was inaugurated in early 2025, Tahnoon invested $500 million in the Trump-owned World Liberty, a then newly launched cryptocurrency outfit. A few months later, UAE was granted permission to purchase sensitive American AI chips. According to the Wall Street Journal, which broke the story, “the deal marks something unprecedented in American politics: a foreign government official taking a major ownership stake in an incoming U.S. president’s company.”
“How do you respond to those who say this is a serious conflict of interest?” ABC host George Stephanopoulos asked.
“I love it when these papers talk about something being unprecedented or never happening before,” Blanche replied, “as if the Biden family and the Biden administration didn’t do exactly the same thing, and they were just in office.”
Blanche went on to boast about how the president is utterly transparent regarding his questionable business practices: “I don’t have a comment on it beyond Trump has been completely transparent when his family travels for business reasons. They don’t do so in secret. We don’t learn about it when we find a laptop a few years later. We learn about it when it’s happening.”
Sadly, Stephanopoulos didn’t offer the obvious response, which may have gone something like this: “OK, but the president and countless leading Republicans insisted that President Biden was the head of what they dubbed ‘the Biden Crime family’ and insisted his business dealings were corrupt, and indeed that his corruption merited impeachment. So how is being ‘transparent’ about similar corruption a defense?”
Now, I should be clear that I do think the Biden family’s business dealings were corrupt, whether or not laws were broken. Others disagree. I also think Trump’s business dealings appear to be worse in many ways than even what Biden was alleged to have done. But none of that is relevant. The standard set by Trump and Republicans is the relevant political standard, and by the deputy attorney general’s own account, the Trump administration is doing “exactly the same thing,” just more openly.
Since when is being more transparent about wrongdoing a defense? Try telling a cop or judge, “Yes, I robbed that bank. I’ve been completely transparent about that. So, what’s the big deal?”
This is just a small example of the broader dysfunction in the way we talk about politics.
Americans have a special hatred for hypocrisy. I think it goes back to the founding era. As Alexis de Tocqueville observed in “Democracy In America,” the old world had a different way of dealing with the moral shortcomings of leaders. Rank had its privileges. Nobles, never mind kings, were entitled to behave in ways that were forbidden to the little people.
In America, titles of nobility were banned in the Constitution and in our democratic culture. In a society built on notions of equality (the obvious exceptions of Black people, women, Native Americans notwithstanding) no one has access to special carve-outs or exemptions as to what is right and wrong. Claiming them, particularly in secret, feels like a betrayal against the whole idea of equality.
The problem in the modern era is that elites — of all ideological stripes — have violated that bargain. The result isn’t that we’ve abandoned any notion of right and wrong. Instead, by elevating hypocrisy to the greatest of sins, we end up weaponizing the principles, using them as a cudgel against the other side but not against our own.
Pick an issue: violent rhetoric by politicians, sexual misconduct, corruption and so on. With every revelation, almost immediately the debate becomes a riot of whataboutism. Team A says that Team B has no right to criticize because they did the same thing. Team B points out that Team A has switched positions. Everyone has a point. And everyone is missing the point.
Sure, hypocrisy is a moral failing, and partisan inconsistency is an intellectual one. But neither changes the objective facts. This is something you’re supposed to learn as a child: It doesn’t matter what everyone else is doing or saying, wrong is wrong. It’s also something lawyers like Mr. Blanche are supposed to know. Telling a judge that the hypocrisy of the prosecutor — or your client’s transparency — means your client did nothing wrong would earn you nothing but a laugh.
Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.