HRC spends $2 million so pro-LGBTQ+ voters will stop Trump’s “reign of terror” in November

The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) is going all in to get out the vote for the Harris-Walz campaign.

This week, the Human Rights Campaign’s Equality Votes PAC announced the launch of a seven-figure digital ad campaign aimed at mobilizing pro-LGBTQ+ voters in four key battleground states in the remaining weeks before the November 5 election. Combined with separate campaigns aimed at getting out the vote generally and supporting Democratic Senate candidates, Equality Votes PAC is spending $2 million to safeguard LGBTQ+ rights in the upcoming election.

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The campaign, according to an October 9 press release from the LGBTQ+ advocacy organization, will present a clear contrast between Democratic nominee Kamala Harris’s long-time support for LGBTQ+ rights and former president Donald Trump’s anti-LGBTQ+ agenda.

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The campaign’s streaming video, radio and display ads will run in Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, all key battleground states that will determine the election’s outcome.

The goal, according to HRC, is to reach the 1.5 million “Equality Voters” in these four states who are not habitual voters in each election cycle.

“Equality Voters,” according to the organization, include members of the LGBTQ+ community and allies who prioritize LGBTQ+ equality when voting. These voters are younger, more racially diverse, and include more women than the general voting population. Equality Voters played a key role in electing President Joe Biden in 2020 and in preventing the projected “red wave” that would have given Republicans control of the U.S. Senate and a larger majority in the House of Representatives during the 2022 midterms.

But, the organization says, one-third of these Equality Voters are “at risk of not voting in 2024 or at risk of voting for a third-party candidate for president.”

The campaign’s battleground state ads are aimed at getting them to show up to vote for Harris instead.

“This election is going to come down to the smallest of margins, but the difference between an equality champion like Kamala Harris in the White House or another reign of terror from Donald Trump couldn’t be greater,” HRC’s Equality Votes PAC chief strategist Guy Cecil said in a statement.

Equality Voters, Cecil said, “will once again make the difference in battleground states across the country.”

“With the rise in anti-LGBTQ+ attacks and the threat of the Trump-Vance Project 2025 agenda on the horizon, the stakes for this election could not be higher,” said Cecil. “We must elect Kamala Harris, Tim Walz, and equality champions across the country who will protect and advance our fundamental freedoms.”

Equality Votes PAC is also running ads supporting “pro-equality” Senate candidates like Ruben Gallego in Arizona, Elissa Slotkin in Michigan, Bob Casey in Pennsylvania, and Tammy Baldwin in Wisconsin. A separate national campaign consisting of two ads urges pro-LGBTQ+ voters to get to the polls on November 5.

HRC also kicked off its 10 Days of Action campaign Thursday, with a rally in Philadelphia featuring Gwen Walz, the wife of Harris’ running mate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz. As The Advocate reported, the 10 Days of Action campaign urges Equality Voters to participate in more than 160 planned actions across multiple states, including phone banking, canvassing, digital outreach, and community organizing to get out the vote for the Harris-Walz campaign.

“With so much at stake for LGBTQ+ Americans, we are not taking a single vote for granted. LGBTQ+ Americans deserve leaders who will champion our freedoms — like Vice President Kamala Harris and Governor Tim Walz,” the Harris campaign’s National LGBTQ engagement director Sam Alleman said in a statement. “Over the next 10 days, we will knock doors, make calls, and rally communities across this country to send the clear message that when we show up, equality wins.”

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