In This Issue —

Events:

• Experienced Dems Meet-Up – Summer pause
• Global Pride Fundraiser in Amsterdam
• Lady Day Theater FunRaiser
• Oktoberfest in Munich

Issues & Actions:

• We Can & Must Fight Back
• DA Austria In the News
• Innsbruck Consular Services
• Follow us on TikTok

Midterm Election News:

• The Missing 83%
• State Teams
• Dialing for Democracy Results

Reviews:

• Pride Parade
• Fourth of July Party

Our Executive Committee meetings are held on the second Wednesday of the month. Our next meeting will be held online on: Wednesday, July 13, 2021, at 7:00 p.m. Members are welcome to join us at the meetings. Please contact Richard at [email protected] to join.

DAA is making a strong effort to include in our monthly newsletter all the information you need to stay up to date. By sending you fewer emails, we hope you will read those you receive. Thanks for reading!

Message from the Chair

Leading up to our Independence Day Celebration in Vienna, I heard from a number of people who wanted to sit this July 4th out. They told me they thought there was nothing to celebrate about America. The Supreme Court decisions overturning Roe v Wade, the ruling limiting the EPA’s power to combat climate change, the seemingly weekly news of mass shootings - now even at a July 4th Parade - are tragedies that leave us little to celebrate.

However, it is my hope that we can channel our emotions - our sadness, anger, frustation - to take action. For Democrats Abroad, that means ensuring every one of our 200,000 plus members requests their ballot and votes in the mid-term elections. We have a ways to go. As of today, only 18% of our members have requested their ballot at our VFA website, and only 17% of our members in Austria.

What can you do? If you have not done so already, please request your ballot at VoteFromAbroad.org. Also, please volunteer with Democrats Abroad Austria, including perhaps joining our phone banking team. DA Global is launching important calling campaigns in August to call overseas Americans who vote in battleground states. Please consider joining us! It is both fun and rewarding work helping voters to request their ballot. The overseas vote was the margin of victory in key races in 2020 and 2021.

Let’s do it in 2022!

-Richard Miller, chair, Democrats Abroad Austria

Events:

Training Tuesdays

When: Ongoing

Time: See schedule

Where: Online

Hosted by DA Germany

State Teams Events and Planning Sessions

When: Ongoing

Time: See schedule

Where: Online

Hosted by: DA State Teams

Amsterdam Canal Pride

When: August 5–8

Time: Varies

Where: Amsterdam

RSVP to attend

Hosted by DA Global LGBTQ+ Caucus & DA Netherlands

Theater Fun-Raiser – Lady Day

When: September 20

Time: 8:00pm

Where: Drachengasse Theater

Minimum Donation: $38

RSVP to attend

Hosted by DA Austria

Oktoberfest Extravaganza

When: Oct 2, 2022

Time: 11:00 am

Where: Munich

RSVP to attend

Hosted by DA Global & DA Germany

Issues & Actions:

We Can & Must Fight Back

The Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade is an abhorrent and unprecedented assault on our fundamental human rights. Today is a dark day, a hard day in American history.

Stripped of protections and freedoms the past 50 years had granted us, we now confront a new, grim reality where our health, marriages, and basic bodily autonomy are on the chopping block. Make no mistake: the radical Republican Party has no intention of stopping with Roe.

We can and we must fight back. We must show up to the polls this November — and make sure that every single American we know has a plan to vote, too.

In this moment of despair, let us not forget that the power still resides with us – and that the overwhelming majority of Americans support the freedoms Roe upheld. A net gain of only two more U.S. Senators will allow for abortion rights to be codified at the federal level. The America we want, need, and deserve is within reach, and Democrats Abroad is committed to making it a reality.

We still have each other — and our resolve to fight for our basic rights. Let’s do this.

– Candice Kerestan, DA International Chair

DA Austria In the News

Sophie Spiegelberger, DA Austria Communications Director, was invited to appear on Puls 24 on July 1 to discuss the US Supreme Court’s decision to curtail the EPA’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from power plants.

Interested in more news regarding the decision? Be sure to join the Global Progressive Caucus and the Global Environment and Climate Crisis Council to stay informed.

Puls 24 clip

Innsbruck Consular Services – July 18-19

Attention U.S. citizens in western Austria! A Consular Team from U.S. Embassy Vienna will be visiting Innsbruck, Monday July 18 - Tuesday, July 19, 2022. We are offering LIMITED appointments for applicants who must appear in-person for services such as Consular Report of Birth Abroad (CRBA), passport renewals for children under 16, and replacement of a lost or stolen passport (DS-11 applications), and emergency notary services. The turnaround time for passports and CRBAs is about 2 weeks.

If you are interested in Innsbruck services, please send a detailed email to [email protected] and include the names and Dates of Birth of all applicants and attendees, contact information, and what service(s) you require.

Due to the high demand and limited appointment slots, we will not be able to accept all requests. If your case is selected, we will send you a follow-up email with the exact time, date and location for your Innsbruck appointment.

Innsbruck applicants must arrive fully prepared with all required application forms, supporting documentation, photocopies and self-addressed stamped envelope. We are only able to accept payment in Euros (exact change only).

See the consulate’s website for detailed instructions on all consular services: https://at.usembassy.gov

– U.S. Embassy Vienna

Follow us on TikTok

Vote from Abroad is on TikTok and it’s pretty awesome. Have your kids show you how to use it if you don’t know 😉. DA-UKs summer interns from Syracuse have outdone themselves! Take a look at the VoteFromAbroad TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@votefromabroad.org and the Democrats Abroad TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@demsabroad/video/7105060440622845189

– Linda Adeson, DA United Kingdom

Midterm Election News:

The Missing 83%

Are you one of the 83% of DA Austria members who has not yet gone to VoterFromAbroad and requested your ballot for the 2022 midterms? What are you waiting for?

The GOP is and will do everything in their power to prevent our votes from being counted. Do not let that happen! Go to votefromabroad.org today and register/request your ballot. The FVAP form on the site provides special protections for overseas voters that a regular absentee ballot does not. Plus, the up-to-date Frequently Asked Questions section and voter assistance volunteers are there to answer your questions.

Be counted — and make sure your family, friends and colleagues are too!

State Teams

Do you vote in California, Ohio, North Carolina or Florida? The State Teams group is hosting Candidate meet & greets and organizing meetings in July. Go to the State Teams event page to find out more about these events and others from many States across the Union.

Dialing for Democracy Results

The D4D 48 hour around-the-world fundraiser Call-a-thon which took place over the weekend of June 25-26 was a great success!

Thanks to the time and amazing effort spent by DA volunteers during Dialing for Democracy, together 72 callers from 21 countries on four continents and in all three regions made 5771 calls!

And 24 donors raised more than $2400 to help Democrats Abroad to get out the overseas vote.

Working together on actions like D4D shows DA volunteers are a force to be reckoned with when we set our minds to it. The surge of calls over the weekend was 4-5 times our recent daily call averages and it is truly important to get to these battleground state voters now, as our callers know from hearing members eagerness to vote and their need to be reminded!

DA Austria led the way in the number of contributions given from any one country with nine unique donations raising $670 dollars — thank you donors for your generosity!

Four DA-AT callers (the sixth from 21 CCs participating ) made 323 calls, the fourth highest – only behind Germany, United Kingdom, Canada, and Mexico – once again swinging above our weight! Thank you callers!

Please donate a little or a lot to congratulate DA Austria’s callers’ success and support the thousands of calls that we’ll be making in the fall! https://www.democratsabroad.org/d4d_donate

Are you interested in helping us call members in the fall? There are regular training sessions to learn to be a phonebanker or to help answer voter questions. Find out more here https://www.democratsabroad.org/live_training Trainings are updated regularly.

– Jen Rakow-Stepper, DA-AT Member-at-Large, RVC-EMEA

Review:

Pride Parade

Thanks to everyone who joined Democrats Abroad Austria as we again walked with pride in Vienna’s annual Regenbogenparade on June 26. While our group was small, we had lots of spirit and Faith’s soundtrack had the crowd around us dancing!

Fourth of July Party

Thanks to everyone who attended our Fourth of July event in the Prater! We had live music from the band “Rage Against the Voting Machines” and your chair and vice chair, Richard and Faith, performed the VoteFromAbroad.org Rap (stay tuned for the music video). Congratulations to our raffle winners. The event was a fundraiser for DA Global’s get-out-of-the-vote efforts, including funding upcoming calling campaigns. We raised a bit over 200 euros for the cause. If you care to contribute, here is the link.

Thank you for reading July’s newsletter and we’ll see you in September!

Our fearless Chair & Vice Chair at Vienna Pride

In This Issue —

Events:

• Young Dems Meet-Up – Tuesday!
• Experienced Dems Meet-Up 
• Pride Parade in Vienna 
• Fourth of July Party  
• Global Pride Fundraiser in Amsterdam 
• Oktoberfest in Munich 

Issues & Actions:

• Why We Can’t Stop Mass Shootings
• Meet DA Austria’s Youth Caucus Coordinator

Midterm Election News:

• Austria calling campaign concludes
• Battleground States Call Campaigns – Phonebank!
• Your Vote is Your Voice
• Voter Registration Tables

Reviews:

• DA’s Annual Global Meeting

Our Executive Committee meetings are held on the second Wednesday of the month. However, our next meeting will be held online on: Thursday, June 23, 2021, at 7:00 p.m. Members are welcome to join us at the meetings. Please contact Richard at [email protected] to join.

DAA is making a strong effort to include in our monthly newsletter all the information you need to stay up to date. By sending you fewer emails, we hope you will read those you receive. Thanks for reading!

Message from the Chair 

Everything is on the line: that’s the slogan we came up with for our June newletter. During 2020, we knew Trump was a threat to our democracy. But the threat is as real as ever.

At our DA Global Annual General meeting last month, guest speaker Senator Cory Booker of NJ spoke of a “real crisis in our country.”

“We are seeing the rolling back of rights, from voting rights to the sanctity of the dominion over your own body. We see threats to our democracy in ways we have not seen,” Sen. Booker said.

He told the story of driving out into Hurricane Sandy in 2012 when he was mayor of Newark. An elderly man in a rain slicker was standing out in the storm with a flood light alterting traffic to avoid downed powerlines. Booker rolled down his window and asked the man what he was doing out in the storm, and he replied, “I’m standing out here to make sure no one gets hurt.” 

Booker said he has spoken both to the president and governor that night, “but the greatness I saw best exhibited that night was the man on a hill, in dark of night, in a savage storm, looking out for other people.” Then, addressing members of DA, he said, “And in many way I see you all out there in that same spirit, and what you are doing here, standing on hill in a storm, standing together to defend and protect, and it means a lot and it makes a difference.”

Let us all do our part in these next months to not only retain Congress, but increase our majority. Let’s believe it is possible. You can do so by making sure you and every overseas American you know requests their ballot to vote. Indeed, everything is on the line. 

–Richard Miller, Chair, DA Austria 

Events:

Austria Youth Caucus Pizza and Drinks

When: Tuesday, June 7 

Time: 6:00pm CEST

Where: Pizza Bussi Ciao, Piaristengasse 15, Vienna 1080, Austria

RSVP to attend in person

Experienced Dems Meet-Up

When: Thursday, June 9, 2022 

Time: 6:00pm CEST

Where: Café Museum, Operngasse 7, Vienna 1010, Austria

RSVP to attend in person

Pride Parade in Vienna

When: Saturday, June 11, 2022 

Meet: 12:30pm CEST

Meeting Point: Steps of the University of Vienna, Universitätsring 1, Vienna 1010 , Austria

RSVP to attend in person

Celebrate Independence Day with Democrats Abroad

When: Saturday, July 2, 2022 

Time: 12:00 – 4:00 pm CEST

Where: Meierei im Prater Hauptallee 3, Vienna 1020 , Austria

RSVP to attend in person

Pride Parade in Amsterdam with the DA Global LGBTQ+ Caucus

When: Friday, August 05, 2022 at 06:00 PM through August 08, 2022 at 6:00pm

What: Canal Parade on a Parade Boat, Cocktail Party with Special Guests, Walking Tour, Mimosa Brunch, and more!

Where: Various locations in Amsterdam, Netherlands

RSVP to attend in person

Get in Shape for the Midterms — Get Training!

When: Multiple dates through 2022 

Where: Online RSVP for Zoom link 

Oktoberfest in Munich with Democrats Abroad Global

When: Sunday, October 2, 2022 from 11:00am – 2:15pm

What: A fun weekend with othe DA members in Munich!

Where: Festhalle Schottenhammel, Munich, Germany

RSVP to attend in person

Issues & Actions:

Why We Haven’t Stopped Mass Shootings

Frustrated that legislation to stem America’s gun epidemic is going nowhere? How could Democrats fail so miserably despite the momentum gathered after school shootings in the 2010s?

Solidarity Sundays probed this Gordian knot in the wake of January 6, 2021. Frank Smyth, award-winning investigative journalist and author of “The NRA:  The Unauthorized History,” explained a year ago that gun control advocates misunderstand their opponents and what motivates America’s gun rights movement. What’s stopping reform at this point “is neither the gun lobby’s nor the gun industry’s money. It’s the ideology, stupid” – and it’s high time for progressives to challenge it.

Frank advocates for a new approach with former NY Times opinion writer Nicholas Kristof on the NYT podcast Sway with host Kara Swisher – here’s the link to the article and podcast episode. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/26/opinion/sway-kara-swisher-nicholas-kristof-frank-smyth.html

Meet DA Austria’s Youth Caucus Coordinator

Hi Austrian Democrats Abroad,

Some of you may know me from our last annual meeting - I wanted to take a second to introduce myself! My name is Sarah and I was raised in Vienna as a dual citizen. I’m 30 years old and have been involved with Young Dems Abroad for close to ten years. This year it’s my turn to make an impact as Youth Caucus leader.

So we’re reinstating regular in-person Young Dems meetups after a two-year hiatus, and our first meetup is this Tuesday at Pizza Bussi Ciao, where the vibes are good and the pizza is better. My goal is to build a network of young Americans living in Vienna, and all are welcome to join. 

So if you’d like to connect with like-minded expats, come join us on June 7th at 6pm. A table is reserved under the name “Sarah” :)

See you on Tuesday!

— Sarah Knaus, DA Austria Youth Caucus Coordinator

Midterm Election News:

Austria Calling Campaign Concludes

A big ‘thank you’ to all our phone bankers who made our May calling campaign a success. We called nearly 1,000 of our members in Austria, speaking to 359 (34%) of you, leaving 319 (30%) messages, and sending nearly all of you a text message. Our question: did you request your ballot yet? Many did, but those who had not thanked us for the reminder to go to VoteFromAbroad.org. Thanks to everyone who picked up or called back! If any of you need further support or have a question, please call or text 0676 447 3418 or send an email to [email protected].     

Battleground States Call Campaigns

Austria has finished calling our members living is Austria, but there are still thousands of DA members who vote in critical battleground states to be called. We need your help to reach them! 

You can only vote once, but calling multiplies your vote and amplifies your voice and helps and empowers others to cast their one vote. In 2020, DA callers made over 600,000 calls! And we needed every one to win the House, the Senate and Georgia Runoffs, and the Presidency.

Be part of the team and get started with a phonebank training. Learn more about training dates in June and July at phonebank training or get in touch with us at [email protected]

Your Vote is Your Voice

One of the DA’s core activities is to help Americans to register and return their ballots. The non-partisan Vote from Abroad website has up-to-date information so voters are best informed about their state’s regulations and deadlines. There is also a voter protection team that works with local election officers and state secretarys to solve issues that disenfranchise overseas voters. 

Every election cycle we hear from overseas Americans and dual citizens who say they didn’t know they had the right to vote in federal and even state elections. Help us spread the word among your family, friends, and colleagues. And if there are Americans on your sport’s team, club, school, or place of worship, we’re happy to come by and help get them registered – regardless of their party affiliation. Contact the Vote from Abroad Coordinator at [email protected] 

Voter Registration Tables

Are you part of a group — a baseball team, church group, book club, company  — or network with American members? Many US citizens and dual citizens don’t realize they are able to vote in federal elections and many down ballot state races. Help us spread the word! VFA’s trained nonpartisan voter registration volunteers are happy to come to your event and help people register and request their ballots. Contact us at [email protected]

Reviews: 

Democrats Abroad Holds 2022 Global Annual General Meeting

DA leaders from around the world gathered virtually on the weekend of May 21–22 for our Annual General Meeting, getting inspired and sharing best practices to get out of the vote for the upcoming midterm elections.

As DNC Chairman Jaime Harrison told us, “Eighty-one million of us, domestically and abroad, stood up in the face of hate and bigotry in 2020–now let’s step it up again for the midterms.”

DA Austria has three voting representatives who participated in the meeting: Richard Miller, chair, Faith Herbold, vice-chair, and Marcy Fowler, secretary and DPCA voting representative.

Besides Harrison, we heard from DNC Deputy Executive Director Roger Lau and Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey. We also gained ideas and inspiration from DA leaders about how they are mobilizing overseas voters. We got a tour of our soon-to-be-launched new DA website (thanks to many generous donations we're just shy of our target) and learned how battleground state teams are working to rally and support Americans abroad. We also welcomed DA Caribbean Islands, as DA’s newest country committee and the first-ever transnational committee!

We passed the following six resolutions:
·         Memorial Resolution Honoring Jim Christiansen of DA France
·         Resolution to Catalogue Our “Standing Resolutions”
·         Resolution on the Climate Emergency
·         Resolution to Establish a Special Committee on Legal Compliance and Implementation

Issues
·         Resolution to Establish a Standing Voter Protection Committee
·         Resolution in Support of Statehood for Washington, D.C.

All in all, it was outstanding to see the commitment and dedication of so many people – all volunteers – making this organization function. At some points, there were about 190 people on the call, some of them waking up in the middle of the night or staying up to the early hours of morning to attend. Next year, the meeting is expected to be in person in Washington, DC.  

–Richard Miller, Chair, DA Austria 

Thank you for reading the June Newsletter!