Press Coverage

Rev. Bryan Berghoef, candidate for U.S. representative for the 2nd District of Michigan, speaks at the Vote Common Good rally to defeat President Donald Trump on Sept. 19, 2020. “What we’re talking to voters about, especially faith voters, especially Christian faith...

MORNING BREW / UNSPLASH “To hear Donald Trump say '150,000 people are dead, it is what it is’ doesn’t fit with any of these people’s own sense of morality, or for many of them, Jesus’s teachings that blessed are those who mourn.” —Doug Pagitt, Executive Director of...

A new survey of evangelical and Catholic voters in key five battleground states - including Florida - shows President Donald Trump’s perceived lack of kindness is driving faith voters away in large enough numbers to potentially affect the outcome of the election. The...

Voting stickers spiral against an American flag. (photo: Shutterstock / Shutterstock) “Catholics should heed the advice of Bishop Robert McElroy of San Diego, that ‘a person’s character is what’s as important as any of these issues when considering who to vote for.’”...

Joel Perez prays during the 'Evangelicals for Trump' campaign event held at the King Jesus International Ministry as they await the arrival of President Donald Trump on January 03, 2020 in Miami, Florida. | Joe Raedle/Getty Images “Trump’s lack of kindness will likely...

A Joe Biden supporter and a Donald Trump supporter face off before President Donald Trump arrives for a campaign rally in Florida, Tuesday 8 September TNS/SIPA USA/PA Images A poll released Thursday 10 September by the Biden-supporting ecumenical group “Vote Common...

Donald J. Trump delivers remarks at the Liberty University commencement ceremony in 2017. “People of faith who didn’t vote for Hillary Clinton saw her as more corrupt and less kind than Donald Trump, and now some of those same voters see Donald Trump as more corrupt...

Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., speaks last week during a news conference after becoming the vice presidential running mate of Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden. AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster “Trump’s lack of kindness will likely cost him the election. Four years...

President Donald Trump holds up a Bible outside of St. John's Episcopal church across Lafayette Park in Washington, D.C., on June 1, 2020. (Brendan Smialowski/Getty Images) “While it was baked in back in 2016 that Donald Trump was bombastic and crude, he always hinted...

Donald Trump announces a new list of potential Supreme Court nominees at the White House on Wednesday.DOUG MILLS-POOL/GETTY IMAGES “While it was baked in back in 2016 that Donald Trump was bombastic and crude, he always hinted that he would be presidential when he...

Church and steeple (Associated Press file image) “Trump’s lack of kindness will likely cost him the election. Four years ago, many religious voters decided to look the other way and give Trump a chance, but after witnessing his cruelty and corruption, some of them are...

Lynne Sladky/AP Photo “People of faith who didn’t vote for Hillary Clinton saw her as more corrupt and less kind than Donald Trump, and now some of those same voters see Donald Trump as more corrupt and less kind than Biden.” —Doug Pagitt, Executive Director of Vote...

Democratic presidential nominee Joseph R. Biden makes frequent references to his Catholic faith, but the Trump campaign says his stance on abortion conflicts with Christian beliefs. (Associated Press/File) “We’re not going to move 100% of them; we’re not going to move...

“My feeling is that white people of faith will not only join you in this push but will join you in the march on the ballot box on election day. We are committed to bringing faith, hope and love, to bring about a change on election day, to remove the most radical...

Doug Pagitt, executive director with Vote Common, Good - Walk the Walk - Faith Pilgrimage, speaks at the March on Washington, Friday Aug. 28, 2020, at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, on the 57th anniversary of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have A Dream"...

Melody Olson (R) joined other faith leaders from around the country in walking from Charlottesville to the March on Washington. “God is inviting us into this. He sees his children, the people of color that are literally dying, and wants us to not ignore that suffering...

“I started this 130-mile journey 10 days ago. I hadn't walked more than a mile at a time, and I just figured it was just going to be one step after another. I'm not an athlete. I didn't train for this, but I think if we put one foot in front of the other and we follow...

Walk the Walk 2020 event at Alexandria’s African American Heritage Park, August 27, 2020 “The walk is about racial reckoning, resolve and love. We’re here embodying our faith. I think that the political parties are all broken, and that what we are doing is appealing...

People demonstrate for racial justice on Aug. 28, 1963, in the historic March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in Washington, D.C. Photo by Warren K. Leffler/LOC/Creative Commons “Supporters of Vote Common Good, an organization led by liberal-leaning evangelicals,...

Demonstrators march north on the Warrenton Eastern Bypass, part of the “Walk the Walk” faith leaders’ march for racial justice set to conclude Friday in Washington, D.C. Times Staff Photo/Coy Ferrell “The reason we are walking on the street is because we are trying to...

The first day of the pilgrimage in Charlottesville, VA “Racism in this country is a white person problem. If every time there's an incident where a voice needs to rise up to call for racial reckoning — if white people are being quiet, white leaders are being quiet,...

Erin Edgerton/The Daily Progress “It helps us to understand the truths about white supremacy. The evil of white supremacy is that it wants to divide us any way it can. [White supremacy] tells us that every race must remain separate to protect ourselves. It shows...

The first day of the pilgrimage from Charlottesville, VA to Ruckersville, VA “We heard loud and clear from, particularly Black clergy, that as white faith leaders and clergy we need to step up and take more responsibility for the scourge of white supremacy and...

Pope Francis, right, flanked by Vice President Joe Biden, waves to the crowd on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Sept. 24, 2015, as they stand on the Speaker's Balcony on Capitol Hill, after the pope addressed a joint meeting of Congress inside. (AP Photo/Susan...

“He is the story, where, in previous elections, the candidate kind of represented or sat atop a pyramid of belief. People are like—he’s an incompetent, immoral, cruel, unkind, actor in our society. It’s really hard for religious people to defend family values—to...

Photo courtesy: ©Getty Images/Hermosa Wave “For some people this will be a two-step process. The first part is letting go of the reflexive impulse they have to vote Republican, which is a hard thing to let go of. And then for some of those people, stepping all the way...

“Some pro-Biden forces have launched an effort to win over conscientious evangelical voters. A group called Vote Common Good has forged a partnership with the Lincoln Project, a group of anti-Trump Republicans backing Biden and Democratic senate candidates, to...

President Donald Trump bows his head in prayer before speaking at the United States Military Academy in June. | Alex Brandon/AP Photo “For some people this will be a two-step process. The first part is letting go of the reflexive impulse they have to vote Republican,...

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“On Wednesday, Vote Common Good will launch a new partnership with the Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump GOP group founded by veteran Republican strategists, to mobilize faith voters to reject Trump on Election Day. The initiative will focus on courting white...

Photo: Politico “The fundamental fear that some Democrats have is, ‘Are you trying to take the party back for Jesus?’” —Robb Ryerse, Political Director of Vote Common Good, in “Could These Evangelical Democrats Change the Party?” in Politico Read Full...

“As a pastor and Christian, I follow Jesus’ teaching that everyone is a light of the Earth and a child of God, but not every light of the world should be president.” —Doug Pagitt, Executive Director of Vote Common Good, in “Religious progressives get loud and proud”...

“Trying to memorize John 3:16 in the car on your way to the event and then quote that is probably not the best way to connect with faith-based voters”

“When I put our current president’s name in the place of love, the absurdity knocks me in the face. I am horrified that the tradition I came out of seems to be turning its back on Jesus and Scripture. I feel like we’re trading the power of love and the power of the...

“We would like for people of Christian religious faith telling a faith, hope and love narrative to speak up louder and not have people who have perverted that message to something hateful to be the ones that have a loud voice.” —Doug Pagitt, Executive Director of Vote...

“We know there are many people who felt like they gave a try to Donald Trump in 2016, but who are now having a crisis of faith. We think they’re not going to fall in line to the same degree this time. And if he doesn’t get 80 percent of them in states like...

“It’s easy as a choir member to lose your song. It’s easy to lose your voice. It’s easy to feel dispirited. We have a whole choir of faith in this country that has lost its song sheet … and we want them to rise up and start singing a new song.” —Doug Pagitt, Executive...

Our goal is not to reach the most hardened evangelicals or Catholics but to reach the 5 to 15 percent who are uncomfortable with the Trump administration and are looking for an exit ramp.

“I think the election of Donald Trump via the support of evangelicals in America is a leading indicator of the lack of effectiveness of the work I’ve been doing for the last 25 years. It’s like we build a retaining wall to hold the soil up, and the wall collapses, and...

We’re trying to help religious-motivated voters who want to change their habit actually change that habit. You need to create an alternative community people can be part of [and you need to] give them a very clear next action step to take.

“We’re kind of saying ‘treat to the Democratic Party like a hotel on a trip. You don’t have to live there but you just stay there overnight. It’s trying to change the frame a little bit and basically say ‘look, if you don’t feel at home in this Republican Party...

We’re trying to encourage what we think is a moveable percentage of 2016 Trump supporters. We think 5 percent, maybe 15 percent of those voters around the country, are really rethinking their commitment to voting for Donald Trump.

“We’re essentially traveling the country, trying to engage and energize religiously motivated voters to oppose the Trump administration by using the common good as their voting criteria for a vote.” —Robb Ryerse, Political Director for Vote Common Good, in “Advocacy...

Meah Pace sings for a gathering of faith leaders and community members outside the ICE Otero County Processing Center in protest of prisoner treatment in Chaparral on Thursday, Jan. 23, 2020. —From “Faith leaders gather at the ICE Otero County Processing Center in...

The Vote Common Good summit in Des Moines, Iowa, kicked off a 50-state bus tour, as the organization tries to bring progressive Catholics and evangelicals together to stop the reelection of Donald Trump. (NCR photo/Heidi Schlumpf) “Our goal is to reach moderate,...

It seems as if the moral spine of Congress has deteriorated to the point where they can no longer stand up straight

Samir Selmanovic, with Vote Common Good, waves an American flag as he and others rally at the Wallace F. Bennett Federal Building in Salt Lake City on Thursday, Jan. 16, 2020, for a full and fair impeachment trial of President Donald Trump. (Steve Griffin, Deseret...

In the tradition of democracy in the United States, truth and justice is bedrock. So whether you call for truth from your faith tradition or call for truth from your commitment to this country, the truth needs to be pursued. We believe that the truth can only be pursued in a full and fair trial.

This feels like a day where the senate is going to need to get it right and I am not sure they are going to.

Care for the poor, the hungry. Welcome the stranger. We’re asking people to look at that when they vote and look at those issues when they vote.

Oftentimes, when we go into a state or a city, we will tie into that (Faith in Action) network. It’s a great gift.

Trump’s misguided approach to ‘America First’ has caused many voters of faith to rethink their support for him. If just 5% of faith voters move away from Trump, he doesn’t stand a chance in 2020.

Signs suggest the God-talk is unlikely to let up as candidates enter the final stretch before the Iowa caucus on Feb. 3. At least five presidential hopefuls — New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, former congressman John Delaney, spiritual author Marianne Williamson, independent Candidate Mark Charles and Republican candidate Bill Weld — are slated to speak at the Vote Common Good forum hosted in Des Moines Jan. 9-11, which is facilitated by a group of religious progressives.

We have recognized that voters all across the country and especially in Florida are really shaken by the fact that they have a commitment to certain issues. For many of them, they are issues that have aligned with the Republican Party, but they also recognize the behavior and the policies of the Trump administration no longer allow them to maintain their affiliation with their faith, and with this administration.

It is Trump’s desperate response to the realization that he’s losing his primary voting bloc, faith voters. He realizes he needs every last vote if he wants a shot at re-election [and] losing even five per cent ends his chances.

Friday’s rally is Trump’s desperate response to the realization that he is losing his primary voting bloc — faith voters.

“You know you’re in trouble when your argument now is, ‘I don’t have all the evangelicals. We just have some and some are breaking off.”

The courage Christianity Today’s editors demonstrated now invites an even more powerful expression of courage: courage among faithful Evangelical church members all around the country to speak out.

Some Christian communities in America practice prejudice like dogma. It’s an ugly and reprehensible reality, but also one that is uniquely frustrating for progressive Christians like myself.

“Conservative Christians—they want to stand with Jesus—and so do progressive Christians, and this is the good news of all this. It means we have to stand with each other as well. So the question then becomes, not only how we talk to ourselves about the Jesus, but how do we talk to each other.”

“Voters don’t need you to be like them for them to vote for you, but voters do want you to like them if you’re going to ask them to vote for you.”

“What we want is for religious voters to know that Democratic candidates take them seriously and that they want to ask for their vote, and they want to listen to their ideas, and they want religious voters to be included in the Democratic party.”

“But Vote Common Good will be represented at the Values Voter Summit to show there’s an alternative path for religious believers, including evangelical Christians—they don’t have to be part of the Christian right.”