WE’RE shiftING the window of political possibility — one campaign and election cycle at a time.
Run On Power (ROP) equips next-gen candidates for state and local office with the policy, platform, and messaging tools to expose and challenge unchecked corporate power in their communities — before a single ballot is cast.
WE’RE shiftING the window of political possibility — one campaign and election cycle at a time.
Run On Power (ROP) equips next-gen candidates for state and local office with the policy, platform, and messaging tools to expose and challenge unchecked corporate power in their communities — before a single ballot is cast.
WHY CORPORATE POWER?
Because not waging this fight makes it nearly impossible to effectively wage any other.
We are the wealthiest nation to have ever existed, and one of the most unequal. We have too little housing, and what supply we do have costs far too much. Everything costs far too much — especially, somehow, the things we need most to survive, like food and water and insulin. Guns are plentiful; health care is scarce. Once-in-a-century-storms occur with aching frequency. Our democracy appears to be cannibalizing itself. Our attention is sold to a new highest bidder every micro-second.
These are all fights very much worth having. But each interacts with — and is sustained by — a broadly unaccountable system of concentrated corporate power (and the private wealth that power generates and hoards). This power benefits wildly from the system as it is, and it will do whatever it can — and with so much outsized influence, it can do a lot — to keep the status quo… well, static.
Corporate power is the first thing we fix, because it’s the thing that keeps us from fixing everything else.
WHY NEXT-GEN?
Because we’re here and we’re ready. For our purposes, “next-gen” loosely means individuals between 25 and 40. The bulk of millennials and a good chunk of older Gen Z-ers. There’s a role for all age groups in this endeavor, but we’re most focused on leaders-in-waiting. The brilliant individuals at the top of the middle of their fields, who’ve decided to stop waiting for an invitation and start building a different world.
We’re the get-caught-trying generation. What we do may not always work, may not scale, and may not immediately alter the rules of the game — but it will be new. And let’s face it: We need new.
This focus is built into ROP’s DNA. Our leadership is intentionally next-gen. And while we do everything we can to play nice with others, we’re not asking for permission. Just like the candidates we empower. And not unlike the most powerful actors who currently run the table.
WHY CANDIDATES?
Candidates — especially next-gen, first-time candidates — are less likely to be captured and more likely to be intimately engaged in the specific ways their future constituents are affected by issues, including unchecked corporate power.
Our mission is to shift what’s possible, and that starts with what’s talked about. If you’re running for office, a campaign is likely to be your first and bravest conversation with the public. It’s your chance — win or lose — to start a conversation that will inform everything that comes after.
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Because not waging this fight makes it nearly impossible to effectively wage any other.
We are the wealthiest nation to have ever existed, and one of the most unequal. We have too little housing, and what supply we do have costs far too much. Everything costs far too much — especially, somehow, the things we need most to survive, like food and water and insulin. Guns are plentiful; health care is scarce. Once-in-a-century-storms occur with aching frequency. Our democracy appears to be cannibalizing itself. Our attention is sold to a new highest bidder every micro-second.
These are all fights very much worth having. But each interacts with — and is sustained by — a broadly unaccountable system of concentrated corporate power (and the private wealth that power generates and hoards). This power benefits wildly from the system as it is, and it will do whatever it can — and with so much outsized influence, it can do a lot — to keep the status quo… well, static.
Corporate power is the first thing we fix, because it’s the thing that keeps us from fixing everything else.
-
Candidates — especially next-gen, first-time candidates — are less likely to be captured and more likely to be intimately engaged in the specific ways their future constituents are affected by issues, including unchecked corporate power.
Our mission is to shift what’s possible, and that starts with what’s talked about. If you’re running for office, a campaign is likely to be your first and bravest conversation with the public. It’s your chance — win or lose — to start a conversation that will inform everything that comes after.
WHY LOCAL?
Newcomer candidates struggle at the national level, and newcomer organizations — like this one — do too. Federal advocacy is expensive, deeply coalitional, and largely saturated by established institutions that sometimes, although certainly not always, receive funding from the very power players we’re seeking to upset. Change at the federal level is urgently needed, but it’s a space where urgency and necessity rarely meet.
That’s why we’re focused on state and local races. The further down the ballot, and closer to the material reality of ordinary people, the better.
-
Because we’re here and we’re ready. For our purposes, “next-gen” loosely means individuals between 25 and 40. The bulk of millennials and a good chunk of older Gen Z-ers. There’s a role for all age groups in this endeavor, but we’re most focused on leaders-in-waiting. The brilliant individuals at the top of the middle of their fields, who’ve decided to stop waiting for an invitation and start building a different world.
We’re the get-caught-trying generation. What we do may not always work, may not scale, and may not immediately alter the rules of the game — but it will be new. And let’s face it: We need new.
This focus is built into ROP’s DNA. Our leadership is intentionally next-gen. And while we do everything we can to play nice with others, we’re not asking for permission. Just like the candidates we empower. And not unlike the most powerful actors who currently run the table.
-
Newcomer candidates struggle at the national level, and newcomer organizations — like this one — do too. Federal advocacy is expensive, deeply coalitional, and largely saturated by established institutions that sometimes, although certainly not always, receive funding from the very power players we’re seeking to upset. Change at the federal level is urgently needed, but it’s a space where urgency and necessity rarely meet.
That’s why we’re focused on state and local races. The further down the ballot, and closer to the material reality of ordinary people, the better.