“It doesn’t matter if Democratic senators or members of Congress put out TikTok videos or bring influencers for special hearings. Ultimately, if it’s not in their bones that they want to fight with everything they have, the people will see right through it.”
Murshed Zaheed has more than 30 years of experience as a leader, organizer, and advocate in a career stretching from D.C. to San Francisco. He’s the founder of Pacifica Strategies, a boutique public affairs firm working with prominent organizations engaged in policy and politics.
He served as the Political Director of CREDO Mobile, empowering its over five million members to fight for progressive change in Washington, D.C., and in state capitols across the country.
He also served as Director of New Media for then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid in a senior leadership role and was a member of Gov. Howard Dean’s groundbreaking digital team during Dean’s presidential campaign.
He has watched the Democratic Party cycle through the same conversations about tactics — from blogs in 2006 to TikTok in 2026 — and he’s tired of it.
Not because tactics don’t matter. But because tactics without strategy are just noise.
We covered a lot of ground — from what Harry Reid’s war room actually looked like from the inside, to why Congressional staffers quitting Bluesky is exactly the wrong response to getting yelled at online, to how the Dean campaign’s approach to email was the soul of what we’ve since lost.
Some top takeaways:
- Strategy first, always. You cannot layer better tactics on top of a weak political position and expect people not to notice.
- Democratic leaders need to stop treating their email lists as ATMs and start treating them as communities worth actually communicating with.
- Getting yelled at online is not a reason to log off. It’s a reason to show up more and listen harder.
- The Dean campaign raised $55 million with a blend of communications, organizing, and fundraising anchored in a real political position. That model exists. We abandoned it.
- Indivisible is one of the only progressive organizations whose emails Murshed actually reads. Pretty sure he’s not the only one.
Listen to the full episode right here, or wherever you stream podcasts.
Find all episodes at HelloMergeTag.com or wherever you stream podcasts.
Links
Murshed’s Bluesky and LinkedIn
Murshed’s Writings
Democrats Need A Battle Plan—And A War Room
About some Congressional Democrats’ frustrations with Bluesky
About diminishing digital reach of progressive powerhouse groups
Referenced Episodes
How Did Democratic Fundraising Get So Problematic, And Where Do We Go From Here? With Josh Nelson | Ep. 15
Running a Bluesky-First Campaign with Kat Abughazaleh | Ep. 32
Checking Back In With Kat Abughazaleh | Ep. 42
Additional Resources
X-Last Strategy from Indivisible
Big thanks to our sponsors:
Civic Shout. Learn more about the great work they’re doing to help Democratic campaigns and progressive nonprofits build their lists ethically at civicshout.com/partners.
Episode Transcript
This transcript was automatically generated and has not been copy-edited. While it can serve as a helpful guide to our conversation, it may contain errors or omissions. For the most accurate representation, we recommend listening to (or watching) the full episode.
Josh Klemons: Murshed Zaheed has more than 30 years of experience as a leader, organizer, and advocate in a career stretching from DC to San Francisco. He’s the founder of Pacifica Strategies, a boutique public affairs firm working with prominent organizations engaged in policy and politics. He served as the political director of Credo Mobile, empowering its over 5 million members to fight for progressive change in Washington DC and in state capitals across the country. He also served as director of new media for then Senate majority leader Harry Reid in a senior and leadership role and was a member of Governor Howard Dean’s groundbreaking digital team during Dean’s very famous presidential campaign.
Josh Klemons: So Murshed, thank you so much for coming on the pod. One month into Trump’s second term, you wrote a piece called Democrats need a battle plan and a war room. And in it, you argued that Democrats don’t just have a tactic problem tactics. Uh, we also have a strategy problem and that no amount of better spokespeople or snappier Tik Tok videos was going to matter if party leaders hadn’t committed to actually being an opposition party. Um, how are we doing? It’s been a year since you wrote that piece, a year in change. Are we any closer to your vision? Or are we further away? Uh, I’d love to hear your take.
Murshed Zaheed: You know, I I will come in with a glass half full kind of take today. I I I do think since I wrote uh when I wrote that piece about a year ago, things looked really dire. I I felt things were very dire. I I thought the party looked um uh extremely rudderless, right? It looked like it was going uh uh it was sort of floating around without any kind of direction.
Murshed Zaheed: I and and the reason I wrote that post uh or wrote wrote down those reflections and huge thanks to uh uh Brian Pitler who hosted that uh who posted that as a guest post on his well- read u blog called off message.
Josh Klemons: Off message for
Murshed Zaheed: I recommend I I recommend everyone reading it uh every morning for for their for
Josh Klemons: sure.
Murshed Zaheed: their sanity is uh is because what I felt like the Democratic party leadership were have been suffering from an issue and not just Democratic party leadership but I think progressive establishment at large has been suffering for a long time is where they get too infused and enamored with tactics without really thinking about strategy. Right. This is this is a simple dichotomy that uh the distinction between strategy and tactics. It’s uh it but it is fundamental to everything that we have seen transpire in our world and when after the and what happens after every elections when especially when uh the winning side gets to tell all the stories right and after the 2024 election uh uh elections or debacle or whatever you want to call it right the uh the the
Josh Klemons: Nightmare. Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: nightmare We kept hearing one theories after another. How the Republicans dominated the manosphere. Obviously, Democrats were divided over foreign policy issues. Joe uh the consternation with uh consternation with Joe Biden and also how Republicans have been running labs around Democrats uh when it comes to digital comms uh uh the world of digital comms and and and and in reaction you you start reading sort of content in um in in the world of I want to call practitioners media like the the the the uh the media uh the lobby outlets in DC where reporters get you know reporters are I I you know sadly I will I will say it often times are are the ones who really get enamored with tactics right they they will they then they will uh reach out to Democratic operatives you know wouldn’t it more sense if you know how how come Democrats are not been gone on podcast as I’m here on a podcast or how uh uh uh you know if only they did more like videos or something along those lines lives.
Josh Klemons: That’s
Murshed Zaheed: You know, it’s it’s a conversation that we heard like 15 20 years ago. Uh and I know I I will say uh uh I’m going to go on a I’m going to go into the weeds a little bit, Josh,
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: and I promise I’m going to bring it back.
Josh Klemons: We like the weeds here. For
Murshed Zaheed: I’m going to bring it back.
Josh Klemons: sure.
Murshed Zaheed: Uh so about 20 uh uh I think it was 20 2024. Yeah. So 21 uh 20 so 22 years ago about 22 years ago actually almost 22 years ago I um the dean campaign ended and I moved back to
Josh Klemons: Kev
Murshed Zaheed: DC and then I took a job at an organization called Common Cause. I think a lot of probably your listeners know that. And my first job title there was director of online strategy. And this was 2004. Right? And I’m like, I look at my business card. I’m like, hey,
Josh Klemons: Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: what am I doing with my life?
Murshed Zaheed: You know, what what does this mean? But but the one of the reasons I I got that job because my then boss uh Shelley Pingri, who was now an awesome congresswoman from Maine,
Josh Klemons: Mhm.
Murshed Zaheed: was like, yeah. Uh uh she had said like Michelle, you know, I uh love the work you all did at the Dean campaign. We also want to think about the same approaches in terms of building online communities of activists and and and and and sort of refurbish common causes
Josh Klemons: That’s
Murshed Zaheed: uh uh online communication, strategic communication sounds good. But I remember going into various DC places at that time, you know, you would have things like I would hear from people, oh, we just have to block it out. Block the content out. Oh, we need animations. because animation was like a big big thing at that time, you know. So those those those cry is not any different than what we hear now, right? What the the common thread there is everyone is enamored with tactics.
Murshed Zaheed: The actual part of how to uh what to push out. But when it comes down to it, it it really is about strategy. What is the position you want to take? And so when I wrote that piece and I told you I would bring it back in uh about a year ago, there was really no direction that I was sensing from the Democratic party as the opposition. They they they they uh uh um there was good number of pe senators were still going along and voting yes on a lot of Trump nominations, right? And then we saw the whole debacle around government shutdown fight that happened last year and it was unclear if uh then the Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer was really tr truly committed to a unified opposition. Right? When you have when you’re not committed, when your when your fundamental core is not strong in terms of how you want to
Josh Klemons: Mhm.
Murshed Zaheed: set yourself as an opposition party or how relentless and fierce you want to be that impacts whether you are going to be able to go out in various digital platform and communicate, right?
Murshed Zaheed: So what so what I was trying to say is it doesn’t matter uh if Democratic senators or members of Congress put out Tik Tok videos or bring influencers for special hearings or something along the line. Ultimately, if it’s not in their bones that they want to fight with everything they have, the people will see right through it. and that’s why they’re going to get push backs or eye rolls when they come to those platforms and get ratioed or whatn not accordingly. But if you go back differently and you really fight the Republicans and really fight with the tenacity and be fearless about it and actually be on opposition voting, people will respond to it. And I think we have seen that. We have seen some elements of it the last two, three months. I think I would say the congressional Democrats have done a really good job in recent months in pushing back uh specifically following uh the tragedy in Minnesota and in holding firm in terms uh of letting telling Republicans that they are not going to appropriate one another another dollar for um the ICE or CPP given that those agencies have already gotten tens of billion dollars from previous appropriation bills.
Murshed Zaheed: I think we see uh the Democratic Party completely unified in terms of how they’re pushing back against uh the current administration’s needless uh um and arguably lawless war that they’re waging in the Middle East. Just about an hour ago, less than an hour ago, there was a vote on the House floor where Iran war power uh resolution filled by one vote. And I have to say the good the democratic leadership there and um did a really great job
Josh Klemons: Mhm.
Murshed Zaheed: in terms of organizing the party and communicating accordingly. So I have seen some improvements there you know now is it but they still have a long way to
Josh Klemons: So,
Murshed Zaheed: go.
Josh Klemons: and that’s a helpful context I think. So, you think the strategy has improved? Do you think the tactics have
Murshed Zaheed: Uh it’s there’s tactics.
Josh Klemons: improved?
Murshed Zaheed: It’s unclear to me. I think uh uh I think there they they’re still behind. They they can still do more. Right. Um uh I think the now let’s let’s and it it all depends on what tactics you are talking about right it
Josh Klemons: Are are Democrats doing a good job of taking their newfound core strategy
Murshed Zaheed: Hey.
Josh Klemons: and helping people in like obvious so every time I see um polls Donald Trump is so underwater but Democrats are way worse you know it’s like are we like as we’ve sort of grown in
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: a I mean it sounds like you do think we’ve grown into an opposition party to a degree uh maybe there’s still room to go and I definitely want to talk about how Harry Reid What would Harry Reid be doing today that we’re not? But yeah, I am just curious like if you think like and maybe there’s no one answer like I certainly think you know Chris Van Holland like you talked about him in one of your pieces, you know, going to El Salvador that was like both strategy and tactic like he was able to get news that directly connected back to the story that we desperately needed to be talking about. Um I know there’s also been talk of having a daily press briefing that came up in one of your uh articles where it’s, you know, Pete Buddhajes or somebody like it.
Josh Klemons: uh the party does not seem to ha I mean it’s always the problem when you’re in the wilderness right when you don’t have a president you don’t have a party leader and I think we are struggling with that right now there is no one person who speaks for the party uh which makes it very hard to respond to like the daily horror that we’re seeing out of the Trump administration so let let’s pull it to Harry Reid so you argued in one of your pieces that like the model exists Harry Reid’s war room from 2005 really like changed the tone like the Bush administration was just you know running ramshot over the dems Harry Reid came in, he was a relatively soft-spoken, seemingly moderate, you know, guy. Nobody thought he was going to be this like progressive champion, but he understood that that’s not how you win. Like you you you know, you’ve got to have a stance. You can’t just be in the middle. Um, so talk to us about sort of like I was around at that time, but you know, like I wasn’t following that.
Josh Klemons: So like give us the context and how do you think Harry Reid would be responding to the to what’s going on today? Or is that like a fair question to ask in the context of the a world that’s so different than the one that he served
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah, I think it’s a really good question to ask. Um, you know, one of the first things that Senator Reid did,
Josh Klemons: in?
Murshed Zaheed: uh, was, again, again, this is going beyond tactics. And I’m going to, uh, invoke another, um, favorite senator of mine, Senator Elizabeth uh, Warren. You know,
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: one of her famous uh, saying is personnel is policy, right? I think you probably have heard that in some ways.
Josh Klemons: Mhm.
Murshed Zaheed: uh Senator Reid uh when he was building out this apparat uh apparatus uh leaned into that lean into that concept in a different way. Uh he uh when he was uh building out uh this war he brought in people that essentially reflected the actual Democratic party spectrum, right? He was not afraid to bring in I want to mention my my colleague Ari Rabenhaft uh who you pro I don’t know if you have heard his name but Ari
Josh Klemons: Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: is uh former deputy chief of staff uh for Senator Bernie Sanders and deputy campaign director.
Josh Klemons: Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: uh are uh Ari is a legend in terms of uh Olgard internet organizers or whatnot um you know who they are and Ari actually has been working um I I’ll give him some credit he has been working in the Hungarian elections uh for
Josh Klemons: Ah, interesting.
Murshed Zaheed: the good guys right you know so so he’s he’s he’s fighting he’s always been fighting the good fight
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: and uh Reed brought in uh uh uh Reed’s chief of staff at that time was uh this woman named Susan McHugh who is incredible, brilliant, sharp. Uh she she was a former comm director. She knew to set up a war room and she had to make sure that it was touching all part of Democratic constituencies and at that part a key part of Democratic constituencies was net roots or the online blogger the blogersphere that was that was coming through. So she brought in people like Ari. She she she uh uh uh uh uh she uh she brought in folks who were doing the traditional media work.
Murshed Zaheed: She brought in f folks who were doing the traditional work of booking senators uh on on cable networks. But the thing that they did was they whenever the White House Bush White House went on a policy offensive, they responded with a fullcourt press everywhere every day. Right.
Josh Klemons: Thanks.
Murshed Zaheed: that that that and that meant not just shooting out press releases that meant like pushing out at that time uh you know post on Daily Coast I don’t know if you remember
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: Daily Coast they would have recommended diaries Senator Reed Ari his team Senator Reed would
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: post recommended post on Daily Coast diaries and you know what he would do not just post content they would engage in the comments even when they were getting push back on something or if somebody was not agreeing with them. And I think that’s something that uh what um the current if if I was running a war room in in the uh on on um in in Congress either on the House side or on the Senate side, we’d make sure that it was touching all parts of the Democratic constituents in including even the ones sometimes who may be skeptical about the strategy and tactics of of the Democra ocratic leadership.
Murshed Zaheed: It’s the only way you can sort of I feel like you can build an authentic and strong unified opposition when you engage all parts of it, you know. So that that just means not just pushing out press releases. You want to make sure that you want to have more most aggressive members on cable. You want to make obviously you want to make sure you do the video content but I also it also means you you use your email platforms email communities in a way so that it’s more than just a marketing uh marketing tool. Uh I think you’ll pro you probably have uh uh if one of the reasons I think when it comes to digital organizing digital comps uh you will see there uh there is skepticism that’s built in into the online world is when they see a Democrat do something or leadership do some things like oh here comes the email solicitations and text solicitations. s unwanted unasked without without any prompt but you never see you don’t see uh um I think it would be it would be ideal if we had this um democratic leaders were also using their email uh communities as uh as an effective tools to communicate at a massive level in terms of pushing out uh uh uh uh pu pushing out their key messages or key strategies or how they’re taking on taking on the administration.
Murshed Zaheed: We don’t see we don’t see much of that because that platform is essentially used as a mark they’re using it as a marketing tool. Um and also uh we don’t see the leadership engage with a progressive community that’s very online progressive community. That’s that’s fundament I think that’s one of the fundamental elements that was missing right you know we we have Netroots Nation coming up in about seven weeks right who
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: showed up in the first Netroots Nation even before it was Netroots Nation called Yearly Coast Senator Harry Reid he showed up in that
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: community embraced them and got them fired up even even though he there was a he knew knew there was a good there was a good chance people would ask him tough questions, put him put him he still came and figured out how to how to how to engage the community. Um would we uh are we going to um now fast forward 20 24 years later I can see there might be hesitation on the part of Hakee Jeff or or Chuck Schumer to come to a progressive conference because they they think they may get a hostile reception, right?
Murshed Zaheed: Or they may get a confrontational reception or they may get hard questions. I think they should invert that, you know. I think they should embrace the community and go into the lion’s den and tell them, “Okay, this is what we’re doing. You have ideas, let me hear you.” And sort of build that relationship. And I think it’s really important that they do that. But and they they still have a long way to go in in making that happen.
Josh Klemons: Do you think the Netroots community is um more less or the same amount of receptive to welcoming in somebody who they might be frustrated with on the national level to have those hard conversations today?
Murshed Zaheed: I think uh obviously there has been a lot of history and at this point I I think people are smarter in terms of the kind of questions they want to ask their leaders or whatn not but I think at the end of the day uh folks are most engaged uh in terms of consumer or political information and organ whether they’re communicating, organizing, donating or whatn not they understand the threat uh this country faces the threat that our democracy faces the stakes uh in the elections the vamper so at the end of the day I think if they have I think for every family it’s healthy to have tough conversations and talk it out and make the family stronger.
Murshed Zaheed: So I I I would advocate and encourage democratic leaders to think that think about that and think about that as one of their core strategies when they build their opposition and position themselves at the opposition party. the the best way to get buy in is to really engage the community in an authentic way laying out what the strategy is and and this is I that that leads to further complex questions about the strategy itself like who are they really answering to but but but it’s it’s good to have those tough conversations otherwise it’s going to be it’s going to be like
Josh Klemons: Uh what do you think the role is for activists um when the party or the movement like let’s go bigger than the Democratic party here?
Murshed Zaheed: This
Josh Klemons: Obviously like we the progressive movement are being failed and failing ourselves in whatever you want to call it. Uh, and I do agree like things are better today than they were a year ago, but like obviously we are still very much in the wilderness. What do you think the role is like talking about Harry Reid’s war room is very much a top down approach, which I understand was not his like his whole thing was building relationships.
Josh Klemons: So to say top down is maybe like a little bit too dismissive, but what do you think the role is of those activists of the influencers who have big audiences who are frustrated with the party? Should they be going after the party every day? Should they be keeping those conversations behind closed doors and trying to move them in the right direction or should they be openly, you know, like right now I think we have a lot of progressive activists who are very critical of the party which I’m not in favor of or against. I think it’s a case by case basis. But as a whole, do you think that that is helpful to move us forward or is it like making it harder for us to be able to build those kind of bridges where I’m not saying that Netroots needs to welcome Schumer or Jeff? But my guess is Schumer or Jeffre would not be interested in attending. maybe not net roots but certainly some spaces where they would not necessarily get a friendly um welcome. Is that your
Murshed Zaheed: I I think first of all I think it’s a really good good question Josh.
Josh Klemons: take?
Murshed Zaheed: Um it’s a great question and I think that that requires reflection. I think I I think a role of unhealthy and informed activism is to always push your leadership to uh towards the north star.
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: And I uh and I don’t know who’s who actually said it said it. It could be MLK Jr. but please fact check. I I get but I I felt like I heard this somewhere.
Josh Klemons: That’s
Murshed Zaheed: I it’s like it’s like when somebody is uh advocating very effectively it
Josh Klemons: okay.
Murshed Zaheed: he or she makes the people uncomfortable around around it. I think I’ve heard that effective ad advocacy means that people being uncomfortable. Now I’m going to if you want to look on the other side of the spectrum the right-wing the right-wing have never had any qualms about pushing their leadership right they are ruthless they go at it they are absolutely ruthless and they make no apologies in terms of what their demands
Josh Klemons: Ruthless.
Murshed Zaheed: are over the years NRA Heritage Foundation uh foundation have been absolutely ruthless in terms of coming down and going after moderate Republican leaderships or whatnot and they have and and you have seen the results the last last 30 40 years. No, I I think um u there there should there should be a a strong and hope robust left flank where organizations and activists push u their natural allies on the hill uh this will be the Democrats in a healthy way towards policy points they want them to get to and and I think sometimes they they should be ruthless about it. they should be strong about it and they should be a call out at it is but there’s also balance right I think there’s also need for uh u to be strategic there will be times where where you will have to have backroom discussions uh with the leadership and figure out what’s achievable and what’s
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: not and and this is where you need to have the honest conversation and I say this as somebody who’s been on the both ends of it you So when I worked at Reed’s office, I I would take incoming from a lot of my friends uh my dear friends in including um you know one time I took petition delivery who from Becky
Josh Klemons: I
Murshed Zaheed: Bond at Credo who later became my boss like four six five six years down the line but it was with you.
Josh Klemons: Just
Murshed Zaheed: I think you it’s important to have those back back-end conversations and then I think it is also important for uh progressives to understand like how at certain point they have gone front enough uh uh as far as they could take it but then throttle back and then focus your uh fire on on the bigger picture
Josh Klemons: heat.
Murshed Zaheed: and uh and and and and the more important opposition and then come back at it again. So there’s always a little bit of back and forth, but uh but I also think constant negative negativity is not
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: helpful either. Um I think if people follow my feed on blue sky, they will see I’m I’m pretty hard on Democrats uh a lot. You know, I I call it like it is some more than others,
Josh Klemons: Some more than others. And yes.
Murshed Zaheed: but at the same time, I’m I’m also sometimes the first ones to give them credit uh when they when they make the right move.
Murshed Zaheed: you know what when they hold firm and when when they listen when they listen to the activists. So I think it is also on the advocates from the outsides to be sharp and strategic and and understand what’s going on
Josh Klemons: Yeah. No.
Murshed Zaheed: inside.
Josh Klemons: Um, I really appreciate that and again it was a big question and it was based on what you were saying obviously like
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: um I think this is a running theme on this podcast is that like Republicans fund these movements and give them the um wiggle room to like really do whatever they want within a lot of you know some of them like Tucker Carlson seems to be like have his own audience but like certainly
Murshed Zaheed: No.
Josh Klemons: talking points USA is like you know there’s nothing grassroots about the beginning of talking points USA they could get away with saying things that like our activists cannot get away with. They’re journalists. Quote, I’m putting that in quotes. Um,
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: can get away with asking hard questions in a way that like, you know, you go on to a progressive media show, you expect a friendly interview.
Josh Klemons: And that makes it challenging because we do need to hold each other to account. And I think that we as a party are very our our donors want to see unonymity. That unonymity does not win elections. It does not move the needle. It does not win battles. Like we need a broad coalition of people. And obviously, we’re seeing this right now. Like I don’t know if you like have thoughts on this like third way saying that Dem shouldn’t talk to Assan per it’s like such an interesting we’re literally relitigating 2024 and it’s only 2026 you know it’s like it’s been literally 18 months since we had the fight about whether or not Dem should be going on the manosphere and like how we need our own Joe Rogan and I am in no way advocating that you know Hasan Piker is the voice of the party that I adhere to but he has a huge audience of people that look to him what is more in line with the next Joe Rogan and here we are debating debating whether or not it’s okay to go on his show.
Josh Klemons: So, part of me wonders if we’re just destined to fight the same fights over and over again until everything crumbles because like the fact that we are having this fight so soon after having the fight about how we need our own Joe Rogan and how we need to go on more podcasts, like it does make me worried that we have not learned enough lessons in the last 18 months. Uh, but I don’t know, maybe that’s overly pessimistic. You have any thoughts?
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah. Uh and and and is is it okay if I go a little bit deep on on on on this question?
Josh Klemons: Of course. Of
Murshed Zaheed: And you know,
Josh Klemons: course.
Murshed Zaheed: I will tell you I have not weighed in on on that issue anywhere.
Josh Klemons: You’re the first one who’s had an opportunity to talk about it on this spot.
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: So,
Murshed Zaheed: I I I have not I have not I don’t think I have even done a single post on it
Josh Klemons: okay.
Murshed Zaheed: uh anywhere.
Josh Klemons: I didn’t see anything from you, but Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: Uh yeah the but I will tell you may maybe I’ll uh this is an opportunity to tell you a little bit of my journey of how I have ended up where I am.
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: The first internship so I I’m one of those people I love politics. I love policy. Uh I I always wanted to be in the world of public affairs and public service. You know I when I moved to America uh you know one of my identities I’m an immigrant right? I moved to US when I was 15. Uh I was so happy to move here with my parents and so I’m like wow I’m moving to somewhere with democracy where I can speak my mind I I can I can work on issues and I’m going to work on making world a better place right so I did the classic political work college democrat and all that so and then when I was a kid in college I went to do internship in DC my first internship in DC summer of 199 And again, I’m going to bring it back.
Murshed Zaheed: I promise. Summer of 1994 was an organization called the Democratic Leadership Council and their think tank called the Progressive Policy Institute,
Josh Klemons: Okay. Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: which is where third way came from.
Josh Klemons: Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: Uh uh uh working on issues on why MAFTA is helpful for the country.
Josh Klemons: Gotcha.
Murshed Zaheed: My second internship, I love DC so much I came back for a second internship. My second internship was then late Senator Joel Lieberman’s
Josh Klemons: No.
Murshed Zaheed: office who is you know I had
Josh Klemons: You were just surrounded by centrists.
Murshed Zaheed: yeah centrist that that was sort of my beginning of my journey and and then and
Josh Klemons: Yeah. Interesting.
Murshed Zaheed: then and then from there on I became I went to law school became a labor lawyer and one and uh worked worked working with the dean campaign dean campaign was
Josh Klemons: Oh.
Murshed Zaheed: sort of like I want to, you know, I I don’t want to say you you go through radicalization, but you you you you go through enlightenment, right?
Josh Klemons: Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: Bush vore in 2000 was my first enlightenment because I was one of the I was one of the attorneys working in West Palm Beach taking depositions from old grandmas and I was
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: furious when the Democrats conceded that fight. I I felt like Senator Al Gore, Vice President Al Gore and and Joe Joe Lieberman conceded prematurely. And then Iraq was like my second moment. Iraq war in 200 uh 2003 when I saw in disbelief Democratic leadership in Congress just lay down and give B uh uh President Bush at that time Carter Blanch to to to launch his war. Um I uh so I you know like a lot of this lot of a lot of this conversations I I feel like maybe this I show my age. I feel like I’ve I’ve seen this so many times. It is what it is. Um I uh it is it is it is what it is.
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: I I I feel like I what I will say is this. I have kept my focus on work and issues that I can control on.
Murshed Zaheed: you know, I work on issues that every day that I feel are very important,
Josh Klemons: Good.
Murshed Zaheed: whether that’s on climate justice issues, on immigrant rights issues or whatnot. And I think a lot of times the discussions that happen in DC in organizations like Third Way or whatnot is is they they they set up conversation that’s really interesting for the DC elite media who love a good Democrat on Democrat Democrats and disarray stories and and
Josh Klemons: Mhm.
Murshed Zaheed: I feel like it’s strategic on my part in my little part in my little part if I don’t see into it and rather f yeah and and and and
Josh Klemons: Yeah. You moved as far away from DC as you could, right? San Francisco.
Murshed Zaheed: and rather focus on on things that is actually happening in front of us, right? I mean I I think what do people want to talk about?
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: People want to talk about where I am that gas is approaching seven bucks an hour. People people uh uh my fellow parents, you know, we see our grocery bills every every um every weekend when we go, you know, and I’m where it was a couple of years ago.
Murshed Zaheed: And you have these people, they came into power saying that they’re going to lower our egg prices. And here we are and we see what’s happening and we and and now and and average people right now are in disbelief that this guy is going after the pope. You know, it is that it it is going after Catholic Charities. You know, I think I think those are the conversations those are the conversations to have.
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: So my recommendation is is this and this is maybe this is a zen approach that I’m taking. I have not weighed into any primary fights at all. Like to me at this point it doesn’t matter this year. I will support whoever becomes the nominee. I will uh if it I don’t care who becomes the nominee in Maine.
Josh Klemons: Sheriff.
Murshed Zaheed: I will support that person even though I may have personal reservations about it.
Josh Klemons: Sheriff,
Murshed Zaheed: I don’t care who becomes a Yeah.
Josh Klemons: does that hold true for next cycle in Pennsylvania?
Murshed Zaheed: No.
Josh Klemons: John Federman,
Murshed Zaheed: Uh no no Fedman is the Federman is the exception.
Josh Klemons: I’ve seen you speak many times about Betterman.
Murshed Zaheed: I think Yeah.
Josh Klemons: That’s why I’m asking.
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah. Yeah. Fed Federman is an exception at this point.
Josh Klemons: sure.
Murshed Zaheed: uh I don’t think that you know he he has shown his cards in terms of who in terms of
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: who he is and that that that is that that’s that’s an complete
Josh Klemons: Right.
Murshed Zaheed: exception and um but but overall I I I think I I I I don’t think anybody’s going to remember the Hasan Piker debate in October
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: or September.
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: Uh it Yeah.
Josh Klemons: It just sometimes feels like we’re running in circles. So, I’m just Yeah,
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: I was just curious like if you had like a gut reaction as someone who lived it so many times like going back to the early as it’s
Murshed Zaheed: I think I I I I think No. Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: I think Yeah.
Josh Klemons: like we just keep doing this over and over again,
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: you know?
Murshed Zaheed: I think people who want to live run the circles I have at it. It’s like it have at it in the common threads.
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: Have at it in group chats.
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: you I think you really have to keep the focus on what’s important and and and not uh take it, you know, day uh day by
Josh Klemons: Yeah. So, in one of your pieces,
Murshed Zaheed: day.
Josh Klemons: you talked about how Harry Reid um y’all did polling of like the Daily Coast community and he was at 10%. He’s like,
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: “Great, let’s talk to him more.” So, you wrote a piece about how congressional staffers were giving up on blue sky because their bosses kept getting yelled at, which does tie directly in line with like it’s not a tactics problem,
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: it’s a strategy problem, right? It doesn’t matter how brilliant your blue sky post is. If people are mad at you voting for like election deniers for cabinet positions,
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: you’re going to get yelled at. So, your response essentially was, yeah, like let’s lean in. Let’s have those debates. Um, who do you think is doing a good job of like leaning in and like actually listening to the activists and the criticisms from the left, the right, wherever? Uh, and instead of like shying away from that
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah, I think the obvious one is Representative Alexander uh Okasia
Josh Klemons: fight.
Murshed Zaheed: Cortez. I think she she she she’s always been really brilliant about it in terms of um paying um very close attention to the discussion that’s happening online. I think she is the classic online uh she’s a very online person, right? And I think it reflects reflects through that and sometimes she will have exchanges. Uh I do wish she was engaged more on uh uh more more on blue sky than than X or she she uh I do wish she deemphasized X more in favor of other platforms. Overall, I think um I think I think she has done uh she she has done a really really good job on that front. But sadly,
Josh Klemons: Mhm.
Murshed Zaheed: I think she’s the only exception I can think of.
Josh Klemons: Oh, interesting.
Murshed Zaheed: I I don’t I haven’t really Oh, you know,
Josh Klemons: Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: I haven’t um I I I I will say Mandani has also been really smart in terms of how he uses um his media. But thing about Mandani is he’s he’s got a strategy.
Murshed Zaheed: He’s got a core, right? He’s got a vision in terms of how he wanted to how he wants to govern and what he wants
Josh Klemons: Right.
Murshed Zaheed: to emphasize. And that’s why he always has a plan in place. And that enables him to communicate the way he does in a way that actually is authentic because that’s him, right? Uh and that that’s what it comes down to. And that’s what it comes down to
Josh Klemons: I read a thing um when Al Franken first got elected to the Senate.
Murshed Zaheed: it.
Josh Klemons: Uh he made a joke in a committee and it got a lot of news which he did. It was an accident. Like he was uncomfortable with the fact that he was like getting news for making a joke. He was trying to be a very serious person. But his team and him realized that they could use humor to get stories about issues that they cared about. So they were they became very strategic. They used comedy as a way to get press.
Josh Klemons: Um, not just by accident because he had something funny to say, but on purpose because he wanted people to focus on an issue. And I mean, it kind of goes back to like the whole like mom didn’t win his election because of his videos. He won because his videos were talking about policies people were excited about.
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: He could have had equally good videos advocating for a terrible policy and nobody was going to get excited about them. Like the videos mattered, of course. like and he’s like, you know, once in a generation ability to like pull it, his team just a genius all the way down. But none of that mattered if the policy wasn’t good. And again, like Al Franken using the joke to accidentally raise awareness about something he didn’t want to talk about would be a cell phone. But recognizing, oh, I can use humor specifically to talk about important issues like you know, use every tool in your toolkit. And like um Donnie certainly done that.
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: AOC obviously before him was, you know, doing it and is still phenomenal at digital. Um, do you so you you brought up that you wish you would depp prioritize Twitter. I I still call it Twitter. You you feel free to call it whatever you want. Do you think that Dem should completely be off Twitter despite the fact that there’s an audience there or like just like depp prioritize it without disappearing completely? Like what’s your take on Twitter at this
Murshed Zaheed: really good question.
Josh Klemons: point?
Murshed Zaheed: uh you know I think uh there there is a really good recommendation and strategy on this uh and our friends at Indivisible who who by the way I love indivisible I think they are they they they do such good work.
Josh Klemons: They’re amazing for sure.
Murshed Zaheed: One of the few organizations emails I still read because I feel like I learn I learned something from
Josh Klemons: Yeah, they’re
Murshed Zaheed: them.
Josh Klemons: great.
Murshed Zaheed: But Indivisible had uh put out a paper I think it was more than a year and a half ago.
Murshed Zaheed: was called an exost strategy and I think uh it’s called the ex last
Josh Klemons: Okay,
Murshed Zaheed: strategy. If you Google indivisible exast strategy it will it will show up.
Josh Klemons: now I have to check it out.
Murshed Zaheed: Basically their argument is this and I’m going to bring it back to the raid war room like how
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: we all uh how how we how we thought about this is no I don’t recommend anybody deleting their their account on axe. I haven’t uh uh I have locked it up but I still uh I still have uh and I have deleted all my old posts but but I still have it. Uh but as an individual now if I was an organization let’s say if I if I ran an organization that that had a really strong presence on a in the past and now it’s building a presence on other platforms. I wouldn’t recommend that organization to to delete their profile and account on Axe. What I would recommend them recommend to them is to essentially diminish and phase diminish or phase it out.
Murshed Zaheed: And this is think about a comm strategy. Let’s say your organization and let’s say and and and okay, let’s say I’m going to go back. I’m going to pull back in. Let’s say I was working for Senator Reid right now and I was his communications director and we have a big press release that we’re going to drop, a big statement that’s going to uh drop. You know how I would how I would push it out? Uh that press release. I would might just first post it on Instagram, post it on uh Blue Sky,
Josh Klemons: Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: then post it on threads, and then post it on Facebook. I would post it on Axe at the very end, just broadcast it. But then if somebody asked questions, I would maybe engage on Blue Sky or Instagram or Facebook on other threads. I would essentially diminish it. I would never give post original like newsy content on on on X. I would post it somewhere else. I would cross post it on X so that other people can see it.
Josh Klemons: Check.
Murshed Zaheed: I think that’s really uh that’s really that’s that I would that’s it’s a really simple approach that that is that is what’s called X last and I kind of wish Democratic cate this is where I think Democratic candidates uh Democratic leaderships they’re all failing miserably. they they they they they simply don’t seem to grasp it that they can
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: actually um take control here. I will Okay. Do you know what Drudge Report is? Right.
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: Now,
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: Drudge Report was a dominant entity in circa 2002, 2003,
Josh Klemons: They broke the they broke some big
Murshed Zaheed: 2004. Anytime something got on,
Josh Klemons: stories.
Murshed Zaheed: Democrats would cower in fear. So back in two uh when I got there, one of the things that we did um you know we started having outlets like Huffington Post that was coming up, outlets like Mother Jones and Think Progress. So I uh uh so when we had something good that we wanted to share uh we and I was having it we were having discussion like who we should share with we give it to uh Carl Holes of New York uh New York Times or whatnot.
Murshed Zaheed: like no why don’t we make news why don’t we give it to our friends in Huffington Post and give it to Nico Pittney
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: or back then Samstein and they will do it and they will do justice to it and splash it you know put it on their page and there were those were the ways that they we built up progressive start building up progressive media infrastructure back then I would suggest that’s how Democrats should should be thinking about X visa v what progressive media infrastructure means do you really have to go out and put uh post uh original new content, fresh content on axe? No. No, you don’t.
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: Would you lose anything if you don’t post it somewhere else?
Josh Klemons: All
Murshed Zaheed: You absolutely won’t. In fact, you will actually build those communities up, right? I’d rather have them uh give them an exclusive on my on my touch and and
Josh Klemons: right.
Murshed Zaheed: post it on blue sky. I rather have them, you know, in in a radical world come to your site if they have something the DPCC have something really
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: easy to share. Come to I in my in my old job,
Josh Klemons: Invite’s always open.
Murshed Zaheed: I would find somebody like you and I I had I had done stuff like that and and
Josh Klemons: Yeah. Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: post it on a platform like this and then blast it to other reporters and that’s
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: how they should be thinking about it. But I don’t I don’t think they need to delete people need to delete their axe accounts or or go away from it.
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: But it’s a matter of strategizing and understanding what is it really important. What is it that you’re trying to build
Josh Klemons: I work a lot of campaigns and folks ask if they should be on Twitter and my take at this point is if you’re not already there,
Murshed Zaheed: up?
Josh Klemons: there’s no reason to be there. If you’ve got a following, obviously it’s a different story.
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: Uh I had this one candidate that I was working with and she had a very large engaged following on Twitter and we were trying to
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: like move folks off, but she had an engaged following. And I kept saying like she would live tweet events like sports things. And I’d be like instead of doing that on Twitter, do it on Blue Sky.
Murshed Zaheed: You
Josh Klemons: Let’s let’s try to like train people that this is where you’re hanging out. But it’s hard, you know, for a lot of folks that’s where they are. I know Cat Abu Guzle, she came on the pod, like she’s been on twice. the first time she came on specifically to talk about running a blue sky first campaign and she was depprioritizing Twitter. Exactly what you’re talking about. Like it’s not that she wasn’t posting to Twitter,
Murshed Zaheed: brilliant. She’s brilliant.
Josh Klemons: but she was started everywhere else and Twitter would be last.
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: And then at some point they released they announced they were stopping on X altogether on Twitter altogether.
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah. Yeah.
Josh Klemons: Um and uh so it was interesting watching her transition and obviously she didn’t win her election but damn if
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: she didn’t build an audience. I mean, she already had an audience, but her her Blue Sky audience is bigger than almost anybody any elected official on Blue
Murshed Zaheed: Bestrun digital campaign in in this past cycle.
Josh Klemons: Sky. Yeah. And best field program. It’s It was pretty wild.
Murshed Zaheed: Uh best program.
Josh Klemons: like phenomenal digital phenomenal
Murshed Zaheed: Brilliant. I I don’t know, Cat, but if you’re listening to this, you are brilliant.
Josh Klemons: field.
Murshed Zaheed: Uh I I hope you know you were you were inspiring. You are brilliant. uh you you are I you know I I I really hope you stay engaged because textbook that’s I mean absolute textbook in terms of how
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: how she ran how uh how she ran her campaign and I really believe that’s going that that’s that’s the model and that’s the way to
Josh Klemons: Well, she actually just uh is conver my my understanding is she’s converting her campaign now into an organization that helps other campaigns do better field and field not from a traditional field like knocking on doors but actually turning it into like mutual aid hubs.
Josh Klemons: So like her office was famously like a mutual aid hub and she is continuing that now that she’s no longer running but also helping other campaigns convert their models from like these you know sort of dated models that we’ve been running uh into something a little bit more modern and fitting at the time.
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: So I’m very excited to see where she goes. So I want to ask you you worked on the Dean campaign. Uh they were very cutting edge on the in the digital world like they were one of they were the first or certainly one of the first people to use email as an organizing tool. So talk to us about like how did that come about and how did we go from that to today?
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah.
Josh Klemons: Like um you don’t need to tell the full story like Josh Nelson was actually on the podcast a while back and he did kind of tell the full story but I am curious in your view like how did we how did we start so right and end so wrong and like how do we u***** where we are today?
Josh Klemons: Is that possible in your view?
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah. I I I did listen to that podcast with Josh who is doing an amazing who’s doing
Josh Klemons: Yeah, he’s great.
Murshed Zaheed: who’s doing Lord’s work in terms of trying you know uh in terms
Josh Klemons: Very good friend of the
Murshed Zaheed: of trying to make this space a better place in terms of how how folks
Josh Klemons: pod.
Murshed Zaheed: engage in this practice. Um uh in terms of the Dean campaign, uh I worked um I got there in summer of 200 three right
Josh Klemons: Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: when everything was heating up and uh you know it was it it was it was interesting. The first email um I I got from the Dean campaign somebody forwarded to me. Uh it was a good friend of mine forward to me. was following them through blogs at that time because I was one of those people going to Dean blog every day because I needed I needed to read something that was anti-war and not like stuff that we were
Josh Klemons: Awesome.
Murshed Zaheed: getting in in the traditional media. But I believe vaguely that Senator Dick Cheney was in Texas like in Houston or some somewhere like for extremely pricey fundraiser. uh and and uh it you know it was it was it was so it was something ridiculous. I don’t have the exact amount but people were paying at that time like 2500 bucks so that they could have a sandwich and there was a photo of Dick Cheney eating a sandwich at this fundraiser.
Josh Klemons: Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: And then I got an email from Dean Camping that after after was like, you know, we’re not going to charge you $2500 for a sandwich, but for 25 if you you know, something like if you put in if you put in 25 bucks, it is going to help us get uh you know, get to this point where we are in the campaign and send a message to the establishment that uh uh um the uh the Democrats, the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party very sick and tired of this uh this war and and I remember reading that email at that time.
Murshed Zaheed: It just felt very visceral because no, we did not get anything like that and sure enough that that email like raised like tens of hundreds of thousands of dollars at that time. Uh so uh so when I uh so it it I and at that time I knew that’s that’s kind of if I was going to work on a presidential campaign that’s where I was going to be. I had a really good friend who was working there and it was and it was not something I expected to to end up at. You know, I started out as a labor lawyer right out of law school. So, I thought I was going to work, you know,
Josh Klemons: Right.
Murshed Zaheed: work in other in Senator Joe Lieberman’s campaign or Dick Ghart’s campaign who was a big labor person. But their their position on the Iraq war essentially made it untenable for me.
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: But remember going to the Dean campaign that was very interesting is when I showed up showed up there uh my uh and uh and my boss at the time Larry Biddle.
Murshed Zaheed: So when I showed up there, it was the finance team that hired me, right? Uh the finance teams that hired me. Uh um and and it’s like I think that there’s something there here for you.
Josh Klemons: Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: It’s like okay why they knew and I’m again getting into the weeds. Uh I’m a big sports fan right like I am just absolutely like one of those very online sports fan that’s in all the online communities.
Josh Klemons: Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: So back in those days and I sometimes I still do. I spent a lot of times on UCLA football’s uh and basketball’s message boards following recruiting and comedy. It’s like so mad you are good with message boards. You understand how message boards work like yeah it’s like okay I think if you know if you know how to
Josh Klemons: Oh, cool.
Murshed Zaheed: moderate these forums I think there’s a job for you the dean campaign. So they h they brought me over um uh to to to essentially build
Josh Klemons: Interesting.
Murshed Zaheed: online communities for the dean campaign on message boards so that they could organize canvasers in Iowa, New Hampshire or whatnot.
Murshed Zaheed: But also then they found another job for me was to help organize house parties online. And so the the first campaign I mean real life house parties.
Josh Klemons: like real life house parties that you were organizing online. Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: Oh yeah.
Josh Klemons: Or as opposed to like online meetings.
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah. Yeah.
Josh Klemons: Got
Murshed Zaheed: No. So, so there were uh I know in the the conversation you had with Josh was Josh was mentioning
Josh Klemons: it.
Murshed Zaheed: that um you know I think you first got Dean emails because of meetups right because of the meetup tools. So that was one element of it. Meetup tools were where you just use the tools and you would get emails and show up.
Josh Klemons: Mhm.
Murshed Zaheed: And then there were actual house parties. A version of beatups became house where you would show up, watch like a video of a and we would like email out CDs and then everybody would like donate like $15, $20 and sometimes the parties would raise like 500 bucks,000 bucks, you know, 1,500 bucks.
Murshed Zaheed: And um so so when uh so my job was to uh work with my colleagues to organize uh h house parties who were leading their efforts and also communicate that content out via online emails or whatnot. That’s when we first started using the email. You know, obviously the email calendar had a cadence where you would have national fundraisers, but then we would do a lot of this organizing, showing up at meetups, showing up at house parties. It was the the the campaign become a blend of commun uh uh uh blend of communications that focused on organizing and fun and fundraising, right? And and it was coming with people’s authentic authentic voices.
Josh Klemons: Okay.
Murshed Zaheed: So I I believe Dean campaign uh at that time raised like like something like 50 $50 million of uh $55 million,
Josh Klemons: The grass.
Murshed Zaheed: right? Yeah. and and and and uh like and 25 of it like 30 of it like came on came out through like online donations to another and I remember the the house parties element of it like we raised like two million bucks like at at our peak in November we were organizing like 1,500 house parties around the country that you know it was it was like the first time we were using online organizing tools emails message boards, blogs, all in unison to get people out in and you know we didn’t use the term at that at the
Murshed Zaheed: time but that’s what became s the genesis of distributive organizing that you later later
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: saw like move on did fight for 15 campaign did um 10 uh 10 15 years later but I think the thing about email we we uh and you probably have this term before we used email as a as a community tool tool, right? Obviously,
Josh Klemons: Mhm.
Murshed Zaheed: it was a fundraising tool, but it was a community. We were talking to people, uh, writing to people in a way that we knew that our friends, our family members, our supporters were opening it and we were sending it to them not just so that they would give us money, but actually letting know what the status of the campaign is, what we’re doing, and how they can help. But I think somewhere it changed and it started with the Obama campaign in 2008,
Josh Klemons: Mhm.
Murshed Zaheed: right? Which was sort of a very polished version of Dean campaign. Uh Obama’s chief uh uh uh chief online person Joe Rosers came from the Dean campaign and you know but I feel like it was that when it we started losing its soul.
Murshed Zaheed: Uh, a lot of people point to uh I think when you talk to Josh, he talked about how it was Dc who really fresh sending out
Josh Klemons: Yeah, he’s he sort of pointed to like post08 like 2010 the Detroit realized that they could start
Murshed Zaheed: those
Josh Klemons: sharing emails across members and like they just had this big distributed network.
Murshed Zaheed: yeah,
Josh Klemons: Um but I mean I’m sure he would not push back too hard on what you’re saying either.
Murshed Zaheed: but no. Yeah. No, no, no, no. I think we we are what we are all we No,
Josh Klemons: I won’t speak for him but
Murshed Zaheed: no, no. I think I think we’re I’m not disagreeing with Joshu at all.
Josh Klemons: right.
Murshed Zaheed: Uh what what I’m saying is like in in my opinion if you the the changes started happening in the Obama campaign like when I would get emails from like Barack Obama that would
Josh Klemons: Mhm.
Murshed Zaheed: say hey you know literally in the subject line hey like that’s not Barack Obama that you clearly did not send me this email this is just a marketing gimmick you know
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: beat me for dinner in Miami.
Josh Klemons: Yeah,
Murshed Zaheed: know that you did not send me that email, Michelle Obama. That’s when email
Josh Klemons: the Dean campaign didn’t they weren’t doing things like that.
Murshed Zaheed: I
Josh Klemons: Again, I I don’t remember being on the Dean list. I certainly was on the Obama list.
Murshed Zaheed: no we we did not we we it it
Josh Klemons: It was you weren’t trying to like make it seem like Dean was sending an email or it was more like just
Murshed Zaheed: was no.
Josh Klemons: updates from the from the world and whatnot.
Murshed Zaheed: It w it was like it was the actual staffers people who were sending the
Josh Klemons: Got
Murshed Zaheed: email who were actually writing it writing it out the sometimes we had sent
Josh Klemons: it.
Murshed Zaheed: emails guest emails from house party hosts and things like that and but I think it would I mean first of all give let’s give Obama campaign their flowers they they they were amazing right they but they they were beyond amazing but but
Josh Klemons: Amazing for sure.
Murshed Zaheed: but that’s when emails sort of took the leap from being to become a marketing
Josh Klemons: It went from like organizing and fundraising to
Murshed Zaheed: tool and just just really fundraising
Josh Klemons: fundraising.
Murshed Zaheed: marketing and and after the Obama campaign that’s where the practitioners took it right and and I think there was a rush to think about and they and it made sense that you know the all the ideas of AB testing subject lines what what come what people respond to graphics or tax or whatnot, but I think it became sort of a technocrat. It became like a tool more than anything to sort of market a candidate or an organization and and in the process that’s where I think the whole industry lost its soul that it’s now trying to trying to trying to recover, right? I I I mean um I mentioned indivisible. I think indivisible is probably one of the only organizations maybe four or five organizations whose email I actually
Josh Klemons: I I was going to ask you if you think there’s anybody using email for more than just a marketing fundraising
Murshed Zaheed: read
Josh Klemons: tool. Indivisible you brought up before. So,
Murshed Zaheed: no I I I I for me that’s really it at this
Josh Klemons: but that’s it.
Murshed Zaheed: point from the progressive orgs I I maybe maybe there are but but but that’s that’s that’s the only org right now that I that I wait maybe more than
Josh Klemons: That’s the one. Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: 25 I give it more than uh 10 seconds uh in terms of reading beyond the first
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: two paragraphs because sometimes they actually provide uh provide useful information. You know there are organizations like uh we make progress which is um congressional progressive caucuses outside organization that send really good emails for practitioners like we like in terms of what’s happening what’s happening legislatively in DC. They’re the emails that will go through the pains of under uh explain to people how reconciliation process
Josh Klemons: Mhm.
Murshed Zaheed: works and all that. So people like me really appreciate those emails. But but overall like um I I every other email that I that I see, they’re all about fundraising.
Murshed Zaheed: This candidate or that candidate, that’s like the direct mail trash that we would get. And I mean it email is what direct mail is.
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: Like you you see it, you don’t even open the envelope, right? You rip it. You rip the envelope, you put it in the trash.
Josh Klemons: Yep.
Murshed Zaheed: That’s what I do with that’s essentially what I do with a lot of these marketing
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: emails.
Josh Klemons: If you could snap your fingers and change one thing about our party, what would it be?
Murshed Zaheed: New leaders, new leaders with with with vision and who are fearless uh and who who are inspiring and who are not afraid.
Josh Klemons: anyone in mind or just new like is there somebody you would like uh elevate to that position
Murshed Zaheed: Um
Josh Klemons: or just
Murshed Zaheed: the the only guy that’s giving me life right now is the pope.
Josh Klemons: new?
Murshed Zaheed: You know,
Josh Klemons: He is American born.
Murshed Zaheed: it’s look look how fearless he is.
Josh Klemons: He could be president I guess.
Josh Klemons: He is careless.
Murshed Zaheed: And I’m not a Catholic who is fear but you know all his communication
Josh Klemons: Yeah.
Murshed Zaheed: actually this is really interesting Josh I I’m fascinated by the way he he is communicating right now. He clearly has a core core convict set of convictions and he’s
Josh Klemons: Mhm.
Murshed Zaheed: comm he has this trip in Africa and the way he’s communicating he’s running circles around the Trump
Josh Klemons: Oh yeah,
Murshed Zaheed: regime brilliantly eloquently with class and grace.
Josh Klemons: for sure.
Murshed Zaheed: Um and there’s something to be said there and he’s meeting and you know what he’s meeting his core objectives because the uh people of the conversion rate to Catholicism is through the roof right now.
Josh Klemons: Yeah, I would imagine Catholicism is popular at the
Murshed Zaheed: It is it’s it’s it’s it’s very
Josh Klemons: moment.
Murshed Zaheed: popular and I think I think people can learn from that is you know and Pope is popular on in my in probably because I like a couple of things from Pope but my Instagram reel is like
Josh Klemons: It’s just blowing up.
Murshed Zaheed: is feed is it is blowing up with Pope stuff with funny memes and but but but it’s
Josh Klemons: That’s awesome.
Murshed Zaheed: be it it goes back to the core conviction strategy uh people who have it. People who have them generally tend to be tend to do well.
Josh Klemons: Sure.
Murshed Zaheed: And I think that’s I think it would be good to have really good to have strong leaders uh that that embody
Josh Klemons: Okay. No, I love it.
Murshed Zaheed: that.
Josh Klemons: Uh, how can folks keep in touch with you moving forward? I know you’re on Blue Sky and where else you hanging out that uh folks can find you,
Murshed Zaheed: I think that’s probably I mean I’m on LinkedIn I suppose uh LinkedIn I I I am there
Josh Klemons: Blue Sky. Okay,
Murshed Zaheed: prof in terms of all the professional folks I mean I’m there I’m pretty pretty pretty engaged there but before we
Josh Klemons: cool.
Murshed Zaheed: even um do that I don’t think I I mentioned this Josh uh I I I forgot to note my gratitude to you for having me on the show uh
Josh Klemons: Out. Of course. Happy to have you, man.
Murshed Zaheed: it’s at the yeah needed to
Josh Klemons: A long time
Murshed Zaheed: uh make sure if if there’s a way I hope you can notice that and note this at the end or at
Josh Klemons: coming.
Murshed Zaheed: the beginning because really grateful for you to you uh for having me on the show. I’m really grateful to you uh for how you’re going about this stuff in terms of having this conversations. so important, so thoughtful. Uh there there needs to be really more of this uh in in our spaces, our our uh I think it it does a lot of good. It does a lot of good for our spaces um and the world of advocacy, which in turn does a lot of good for our communities and the country. So so so so grateful to you for that and honored for be
Josh Klemons: I’m humbled uh to have such praise.
Murshed Zaheed: here.
Josh Klemons: I started this podcast because I desperately wanted to uh learn from smarter people than me. Uh and a podcast is a great way to get them to come talk to you. Um but yeah, I know like I have, you know, I hear from folks regularly that they also are learning so much from the folks that come on. So, uh I’m very, um I love this podcast. I love getting to do it and I really appreciate you making the time to come
Murshed Zaheed: Yeah,
Josh Klemons: on.
Murshed Zaheed: thank you so much.
