About Us

 

 

The co-Founders and co-Executive Directors of JewsVote.org/JCER are Mik Moore and Ari Wallach. 

Mik Moore has fourteen years of experience working in the often overlapping worlds of communications, politics, and the Jewish community. He is currently on leave from Jewish Funds for Justice, where he serves as Chief Communications Officer. Before joining JFSJ in 2005, Mik did electoral and policy work for a variety of elected officials and non-profit organizations in New York City. Mik serves on the board of The Jewish Week and is board chair of the Jewish Student Press Service. He studied at Hebrew University of Jerusalem, spent a year in Israel with the Zionist youth movement Young Judaea, and holds a B.A. from Vassar College and a J.D. from Georgetown Law.

Ari Wallach has been working at the intersection of business, politics and communications for over 12 years. He is currently on leave from the consulting firm of studioBenZion (sBZ) and was formerly VP of Corporate Development at Seed Media Group, where he was responsible for strategic alliances and business development. He serves on the board of the American Jewish Committee’s ACCESS program and has been a past participant of the Hillel Spitzer Forum, The Bronfman Reboot initiative and The Jewish Week’s “The Conversation.” He was born in Guadalajara, Mexico and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area by the artist Susan Wallach and the late Raul Wallach. Ari's father, a Polish-born partisan with the Jewish underground in W.W. II, was hailed by Sen. Harry Reid as “a national treasure” upon his passing. He holds a B.A. from the University Of California, Berkeley.

 

All media inquiries should be directed to Jessica Rosenblum. 

 

Everyone knows that Jews vote. By some estimates, 80% of Jews are registered to vote. Among registered voters, Jews tend to vote at twice the rate of the typical voter. In certain swing states, Jewish votes can make a significant difference between victory and defeat. 

In presidential elections, when choosing between a more progressive candidate and a more conservative candidate, Jews overwhelmingly choose the more progressive candidate. Between 1924 and 2004, Jews have given their vote to the more progressive candidates at an average rate of 76 percent. In fact, none of the more conservative candidates has ever mustered more than 40 percent of the Jewish vote, while more than half received less than 20 percent.

Given this history, why is Barack Obama hovering at 60 percent of the Jewish vote, according to three separate polls? Is this all the product of a highly effective rumor campaign, spread through Jewish networks often by well-meaning individuals concerned that they information they received was true? Or is there something more?

The goal of JewsVote.org is to find out what is unsettling so many people in our community, those friends and family who have typically supported the more progressive candidate for president, and to convey to them why we are so excited about the possibility of an Obama presidency. JewsVote.org will take on the rumors using the same networks used to propagate them. To realize this ambitious goal, we created a sophisticated suite of tools. You can use any and all of them, for free.

Want to make phone calls? User-generated call lists and logic trees of talking points will help you talk to your undecided friends and relatives. Hoping to start your own email campaign? JewsVote.org will let you choose among dozens of emails and with one click send them to your networks. Hoping to reach voters you can’t email or call? You can select and then place advertisements in the newspapers of your choosing. Are you a skilled facilitator or organizer? Organize a salon with undecided voters in a swing state, or get trained by JewsVote.org as a salon facilitator. 

JewsVote.org is a project of the Jewish Council for Education & Research, a federal political action committee created to develop and disseminate information to voters in the United States around issues of concern to the Jewish community. JCER is motivated by a deep love for the Jewish community and by a desire to ensure that Jews have access to all the information they need as they engage in the electoral process.                                                                                                       

In 2008, JCER is supporting Sen. Barack Obama for president and six other Congressional candidates who share the American Jewish community’s core public values: a robust First Amendment, equal rights for all, broad-based economic and educational opportunity, cultural liberalism, vigilance in the face of oppression, respect for the natural world, a strong but not belligerent foreign policy, and support for Israel.