Deep Canvassing

David Fleischer is the founder and former director of the Los Angeles LGBT Center’s Leadership LAB, and the creator of the pioneering outreach approach called “deep canvassing”. Before the Leadership Lab, David led political training programs at the LGBTQ Victory Fund and the National LGBTQ Task Force. He has politically organized all over the country, advocating for LGBTQ+ rights for decades. His work has been profiled in major publications such as The Atlantic and the New York Times days, David has an amazing Substack you should check out and writes about deep canvassing and its empirically proven ability to change hearts and minds. This week, we asked Dave 7 questions about his career path and experience.

Deep canvassing is a growing tactic for voter persuasion that uses longer, two-way conversations. Campaigns, especially electoral campaigns, are always on the lookout to find the most efficient and effective way to persuade voters to support their cause. In the past, door to door canvassing and phone campaigns were a staple of field operations to identify and persuade voters to vote for their candidate or issue.