
From phone banks to concerts to canvassing, Madison is buzzing with recall activities this weekend. Folks from all walks of life are pitching in to make sure Wisconsinites get out the vote for Tom Barrett and Mahlon Mitchell on June 5.
Patrick Hickey who works at a nonprofit called the Workers’ Rights Center was at the Madison Labor Temple bright and early on Friday to sign up for a shift talking to voters at the doors. His organization helps workers who do not have collective bargaining rights, so he has seen how bad it can be when workers don’t have a seat at the table to talk about their workplace conditions.
He took a few days off to go door to door because:
“It really is going to take everybody to win this and the other side has the money so we need all the people we can get… This is not just for Wisconsin, but for the whole country.”
Rob Henn, a volunteer from the Teaching Assistants’ Association at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, spent almost 10 hours going door to door in Madison on Friday. He was part of the group that first organized the occupation of the capitol and remains dedicated to the grassroots movement that started over a year ago:

“This is about the labor movement here in Wisconsin. We have to repudiate Walker. We have to show that when you fight working people, working people fight back.”
The phone bank room was operating at full capacity, and in between calls volunteers shared why they wanted to be involved with the GOTV effort.
Retired state employee Shelly Glodowski, who worked at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said she was volunteering because:
“I feel very strongly about this election. I think Walker has done a lot to hurt the middle class and hurt workers. We need all the help we can get [to recall him], every little bit helps.”
Also making calls was Harlan Johnson, a rising junior and Political Science major at the University. He got involved after Walker started going after collective bargaining rights and was part of the activities in Madison last year. He stayed involved with the recall efforts because he believes all workers should have the right to a voice in the workplace:
“If we volunteer and work with the AFL-CIO, more of these rights will be extended to workers in the private sector.”
Patsy Miller said she was just a concerned citizen from Madison and gave a simple reason for signing up to volunteer:
“I want Barrett to win, so I wanted to help.”
Volunteers and their friends and family also received some musical motivation in the form of a free concert featuring Tom Morello of Rage Against The Machine, Jackson Browne, Tim McIlrath of Rise Against, Wisconsin-bred hip hop artist Brother Ali, and Mike McColgan of the Street Dogs. Local acts Centime and the Solidarity Singers warmed up the crowd.

The concert concluded with a massive sing-a-long as all the acts returned to the stage and Tom Morello invited concertgoers to come up as well. Morello stressed the importance of volunteering for GOTV efforts by telling the crowd:
“The wheel of history is in our hands and what we do or don’t do with it is up to us!”
Whether you’re a student, an educator, a worker in the private sector, a union member, or a retiree, we are all working together for the same goal—new leadership in Wisconsin that will unite our state and move us forward toward our shared goals of more jobs, an economy that works for us all, and a government that listens to the people, not the 1%.
In the few days we have left before the election, it’s more important now than ever to get involved. You can help with GOTV activities at volunteer locations across the state. We will win this election and put Barrett and Mitchell into office if we pitch in all that we can.