Cambridge, MA – October 22, 2020.
Cultural Survival, an international nonprofit, which advocates for Indigenous Peoples' rights, is participating in a nationwide, nonpartisan effort to increase voter engagement for the upcoming 2020 election in the United States.
The initiative was launched by Darren Walker of the Ford Foundation and Ellen Dorsey of the Wallace Global Fund after they published a call to action to their peers in philanthropy. The effort proposes that all nonprofits provide paid time off for employees to vote and volunteer in voter engagement efforts related to the election. According to Walker and Dorsey, “the nonprofit sector – which includes both grant-making and grant-seeking organizations – makes up 14% of our nation’s workforce.”
The massive effort draws upon not only organizations in the nonprofit sector, but for-profits companies, as well. Just Vote is a nonpartisan, get-out-the-vote campaign by Global Citizen and HeadCount, mobilizing support from artists, influencers, media and corporations to give young Americans the tools to use their voice in the 2020 US elections. Global Citizen is recruiting voters across all sectors, while NonprofitVOTE and Time to Vote are working to organize across the nonprofit and for-profit sectors respectively.
Galina Angarova (Buryat), Executive Director of Cultural Survival, stated, “Cultural Survival is committed to promoting civic engagement by providing our staff, both in the U.S. and abroad, with paid time off to vote in national and local elections, to volunteer on and before elections, and to attend important local meetings and assemblies. We are announcing Election Day as a paid staff holiday across the organization. Civic engagement and participation is essential and important if we want to see change happen.”
Cultural Survival employs 26 staff, 10 of whom are based in the United States.
