The day after the US midterm elections on November 3, 2026, the AFL-CIO, the largest federation of US unions, published a summary of what it calls its largest-ever midterm program. The figures are the federation's own, from a press release, and they describe a campaign built on members talking to other members.
According to the AFL-CIO, the program ran in 35 states. Tens of thousands of volunteers "reached more than 16 million union voters," including several million it describes as disengaged. "Since Labor Day, union volunteers have reached 14.9 million voters at the door, on the phone and in the worksite." Its training program "trained more than 30,000 union volunteers." In June, at its convention, the federation had set a goal of turning out at least 2 million more union voters than in 2022.
The release also reports that "83% of union members reported being 'very motivated' to vote, a 10-point increase from 2022," that exit polls showed union households voting 21 points more for Democrats than for Republicans, and that "639 union members and counting have been elected" to office. AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler put it this way: "This blue wave was union-made. The billionaires had the money in this election, but working people had the power."
SEIU, one of the largest US unions, described its own work the same day in plainer terms: "We knocked doors, called our neighbors and organized around a simple belief: working people demand money, power and respect."
Why this matters for your team
Every organization claims credit after a good night, and a press release is not an audit. Exit polls show how union households voted, not why, and no one can prove how many of those votes the conversations changed. Read the figures as a description of what the unions did, not as proof of what it caused.
What the release does show is where a large member organization chose to put its effort, and how it chose to count it. Next to 14.9 million contacts at the door, by phone, and at work, the AFL-CIO also reports a digital ad campaign with "more than 221 million unique impressions." The two numbers measure different things. Impressions count how often a screen showed an ad. Contacts count a person from your organization reaching another person.
That matters outside the US too. In the EU, Meta and Google both stopped selling political ads in October 2025, citing new EU rules on political advertising. For many parties, unions, and NGOs, the paid route is narrower than it was. Members who reach their own colleagues, neighbors, and friends are the route that's left, and it's the one your opponents can't buy.
Four habits worth copying
- Set a goal against your own last result. The AFL-CIO didn't aim for a round number. It aimed for 2 million more union voters than in 2022, and it said so months in advance. A goal measured against your own baseline tells your team whether this year's work added anything.
- Train the people who will have the conversations. More than 30,000 volunteers went through training before they knocked or called. A member who knows what to say, and what not to say, is more useful than three who were sent a link.
- Count contacts, not only views. Keep a record of who reached whom, through which channel, and when. Impressions are easy to collect and hard to act on. A list of which members acted, group by group, tells you where to send the next ask and where to follow up.
- Start long before the deadline, and widen the circle. The federation began with a bus tour across 26 states and door-to-door blitzes in the spring, then pushed from Labor Day to Election Day. It also aimed at members who don't usually vote. The people already on your side are the easiest to reach and the least likely to change the result.
Where Ostracon fits
Ostracon helps a team turn a moment into a clear ask for its own supporters. A coordinator writes a mission, such as "talk to three coworkers about the vote this week," and a person on the team approves it before it goes out. Ostracon sends it to supporters who chose to receive missions, who act in their own words and tap Done, so the team sees who acted in each group. Every mission stays in a permanent archive. Ostracon doesn't count reach it can't read, and it doesn't send mass-reporting missions.
Sources
- Labor Movement Organizing Powers Pro-Worker Majorities in Congress, AFL-CIO press release as republished by Portside, November 4, 2026 (original on aflcio.org)
- SEIU President Verrett: This Win Belongs to the People - No More Politics As Usual, SEIU, November 4, 2026
- Meta to stop selling political ads in the EU from October, TechCrunch, July 25, 2025
- 'Blue Wave Was Union-Made': Record 639 Union Members Won Elections, AFL-CIO Says, Common Dreams, November 5, 2026