How Kerry Washington is Helping ‘Florida Rising’ Tackle Disinformation

With the rise of digital technology and new social media platforms emerging every day, we’re living in an age when information travels fast – and disinformation travels even faster to reach voters more than ever before.

Tech platforms have a huge impact on how people use their platforms and tools to combat misinformation and hate speech – but that’s another conversation for another time! Our grassroots partners here at Movement Voter Project – being the progressive organizers and change-makers that they are – can’t afford to just wait around for that to happen.

So how are grassroots groups on the ground learning how to tackle misinformation, all while reminding people the importance of voting?

Actress Kerry Washington helped launch a two-year Vision Into Power Cohort (VIP) to provide 10 grassroots organizations across the country with resources and support to accelerate and scale their impact.

But there’s one specific project in the Sunshine State that stands out when we talk about the importance of stopping disinformation in its tracks. Florida Rising Together is consistently working to help make sure their communities know why voting is so important — especially after environmental disasters in the coastal state. The group is using innovative storytelling methods to do just that. One way the organization is doing so is through their Cigars and Champagne community education event aimed at highlighting the importance of the election, shifts in local voting processes, and promoting overall educational tools. The event is both a huge accomplishment and a win for power-building and voter education in Florida.

The cohort is actively helping groups build up their communications toolboxes for stronger digital organizing and community mobilization through impactful storytelling. Cohort participants also have the opportunity to get their work promoted by Kerry on her socials– she’s also been known to visit groups in person to show support.

It’s the work of movements like Florida Rising Together that gives us motivation – and lets us know we’re on the right side of history. The group has also been doing a community education tour to reach Black and Brown communities across the state. With the help of the cohort’s experts and training, FL Rising is telling visual stories through different communications methods – this includes graphics, invites, and they’re even using analytic data to make sure they reach the right audiences. The group is using communication tools and effective storytelling methods that they’ve learned to spread the word and help educate potential voters in their communities. What better way to combat misinformation and hate speech?

While we lost in Florida during the 2022 midterm elections, we know that groups on the ground did the best they could. Florida is no longer the “swing state” that it once was. Part of MVP’s commitment is to stand with grassroots organizers in red and purple states as much as we can, given our political priorities. We know we can win, and one day we will get there — we just have to remember that building a progressive decade is bigger than any one election!