Generating 265,000 public comments to successfully stall a regulatory attack against immigrant families
National Immigration Law Center and NILC Immigrant Justice Fund - Fall 2018
Objective: Generate 100,000 unique public comments on regulations.gov in 60 days to delay or stop Trump's proposed "public charge" regulation, which would harm millions of families and countless communities.
Project: Provide strategic guidance for overall digital advocacy and communications campaign plan, coordinate with key national partners, and enlist the help of key celebrity endorsers and influencers to raise the campaign’s profile. The overall campaign required significant coordination with powerhouse campaign leads at NILC and CLASP and an all-star team of consultants, including BerlinRosen, Springboard Advisors, and Causer Media.
Result: The fall 2018 campaign generated more than 265,000 comments – approaching triple its initial ambitious goal and marking the most comments ever generated for any public comment campaign on a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) proposed order. Aglet Strategies successfully coordinated with each of the campaign’s identified key national partners, including ACLU, MoveOn.org, Credo, and DailyKos, each generating tens of thousands of comments for the campaign, and landed celebrity tweets from from Julianne Moore, José Andrés, Padma Lakshmi, Sia, R.E.M, Debra Messing, Mark Hamill and more.
Real World Impact: DHS is legally required to review and respond to each of the more than 265,000 comments generated by this campaign before it can finalize and implement its proposed rule. As per the writing of this case study, the comments are still being reviewed by DHS and the rule is stalled and yet to be implemented.
“Thanks to Ginny Simmons’ superb digital organizing and strategic services, the Protecting Immigrant Families campaign successfully formed lastly and effective campaign partnerships that continue to play an important role in the campaign to protect immigrant families to this day. ”