Has your phone been ringing with unsolicited political text messages since election season started?
If you vote early, most people may be quiet, but bad actors may continue to blow up your phone until Election Day has passed.
Susan McManus, a political science professor emeritus at the University of South Florida, told WFSU she has met with Democratic and Republican voters. She said everyone is tired of political writing.
“They all hate them and don’t even look up to them because the parties are using it too much. It’s really unpleasant and annoying to people that that’s all they’re getting. And most of the time they ask for money,” she said.
Bulk political text messages have exploded in popularity across the country since a 2021 U.S. Supreme Court ruling relaxed opt-in requirements for bulk text message lists. This allows data collectors to collect phone number lists and sell them to interested political groups and PACS.
Patrick O’Keefe, an adjunct lecturer in political communication at the University of Florida, said one way to delay these messages is to go to the polls, as political parties and well-funded political campaigns track people who have already voted. he said.
“Once someone votes, it doesn’t make sense to contact them. So for political party operations that can build that into their data center, it means they can save money by not texting you. Because it doesn’t do them any good.”
But that can’t stop them all. Kevin Cate, a Democratic political consultant, said he has already voted, but that hasn’t stopped him from receiving a flood of emails.
“In a normal world? Yes, campaigns end with direct mail, direct text messages, and GOTV. But for every well-organized campaign there are so many sloppy ones. I can tell you from personal experience But I’m still inundated with texts and mailers from 99% of the campaigns targeting me,” he said.
tristan wood
/
WFSU Public Media
Anecdotally, after the author of this article voted on the first day of early voting, the number of political text messages decreased, but the messages did not stop. This was one of the messages he received the day this article was published, a request for early voting from people who support abortion ballot initiatives.
Another part of the problem is that some people form political committees without actually intending to support a cause or candidate. Instead, they send text messages pretending to support Republican or Democratic issues and send most of the money they earn directly to the consultants. Kate says these groups are some of the worst offenders.
“With the proliferation of shady fly-by-night super PACs and other organizations trying to extort money from people, they have an incentive to remove you from their texting list because you already voted. Or, if you donate in another way, all they want is your attention and money, and the quickest, most insidious, and stupidest way to do that is if you reply. texting you constantly until you do,” he said.
The university’s O’Keefe said the presence of these PACs and other misbehavior will likely undermine the effectiveness of text message outreach in the long term unless changes occur.
“The industry will either have to self-regulate or the government will have to step in and regulate it, because that’s not good for campaigns and it’s not good for the public,” he said.
For now, please send a text message to the number where you received the spam message. This will stop you from receiving messages from that number, but you may have to send the stop several times as other groups may send spam messages from your other numbers.
Copyright 2024 WFSU
