Seven hundred twenty-two AVV members as of 1 Jan 2025! To do What? How, Why, Where, and When? Our after-action review (AAR) on 4 January examined this last 2024 election cycle. At staff and regional team level, we addressed these questions, measured our progress, adjusted our “business model” or TTP, and created our plan and ops for 2025 at the Strategic, Operational, and Tactical level!
American Veterans Vote has now operated in Virginia for four (!) years and gained solid experience in National, Statewide, and State legislative races. Our brand is strong in Virginia and gaining recognition nationally. But our record of election victories in support of winning candidates can always improve. Our messages can be refined, our allies better supported, and our objectives better accomplished. This AAR was our fifth and the progress in all these areas is very clear but we’re not content. The terrific team of Veterans in our five regional teams in Virginia will get the work planned and accomplished. We have learned key lessons already, even as we mine this last years’ experience for more. Some of these lessons learned include:
1. Our deliberate choice to remain a standing organization rather than a periodic presence only busy during active elections was a good choice. Our learning, networking, member growth, and messaging have all been greatly strengthened. And an unexpected but significant benefit has been the solid fellowship and friendships we have all gained within AVV.
2. An all-volunteer organization benefits from consistency in mission and goals, regular contact and practices, and reasonable expectations and responsibilities. AVV constantly imports and employs remarkable talents as it accepts changes in the team. We work and succeed because of Veterans as we work for Veterans. AVV is lucky.
3. AVV is a unique presence in the political space – regionally, statewide, and nationally. We are member based and seek political change locally to benefit Veterans in Virginia. Our growth and activities build organically from the bottom up. Other groups, in particular progressive entities, funnel money to their endorsed candidates “in the name of Veterans.” They cloak these candidates as “Veteran supported.” We reject this marketing ploy. We speak as Veterans and not for Veterans.
4. We make membership contingent on agreement with our Code of Conduct. We are not a “rent a mob” organization in either word or deed. We have our goals – support for Vets and their families, the defense of our Constitution as written and amended, and our security at home and abroad. We work for change through the ballot box. Support for these goals is the one metric we use to weigh our support for a candidate or cause.
5. Predictably, we are team first in all we do. We are branded by our Veteran experience. Prima Donnas need not apply. In fact, I’m certain the outcome of this next AAR will focus on strengthening teams and teamwork.
I am very excited as we head into this next election cycle. There’s great opportunity for growth of AVV in Virginia and victories at the ballot box. We’ve got the experience, the networks, the members, and the teams to add necessary weight to our priority efforts. There is one growing challenge we face as we seek to build necessary scale in our operations and reach. That is the real costs of growth. My sincere thanks go to those who reliably donate to AVV. Please understand we remain lean and mean as an organization. Support costs, professional fees, materials, etc. are boring but vital. More to follow! Again, thank you to those adding their donations to the cause.
Finally, can we CELEBRATE our political victories this year, nationally and in Virginia?!! And the integrity of elections was beyond debate due to planning, overwatch, and execution. Veterans knew full well that there was to be peace in the streets. We have great faith in the American people. Those who needed to have an “attitude adjustment” in the media and political world got it! The pendulum is swinging back to normal. That makes the elections ahead, in this year and beyond, so very important. AVV remains committed to work our hardest to promote change through the ballot box allied with the greatest constituency, American Veterans who Vote!! Every Veteran, Every Vote.
VETERANS FORWARD
Bob Wood
LTG (R), USA
CEO, American Veterans Vote
by
Michael B. “Yama” Hoyes
COL (R), USAF
WOW! Our earth has completed another lap around our sun! A new Federal administration is about to commence, but We the People must continue our “fight” for a “more perfect Union.” As Veterans we fully realize, “freedom isn’t free,” a truth that runs counter to those who falsely believe that “the battle has been won.” Perhaps as the new year dawns our AVV team can make a resolution to enhance our teamwork with Veterans across the Commonwealth of Virginia, seeking maximum participation at the ballot box for the good of our nation. I offer the following three points regarding teamwork.
1. There must be unity in purpose and spirit. Said another way, there should be no confusion regarding the “why” of our effort. The Bible stresses unity while moving towards a common purpose. Paul, in Corinthians 1:10 writes, “all of you agree with one another in what you say and that there be no divisions among you.”
2. While heading together towards a common purpose, we must realize that each of us comes to the “team” with different gifts, so we each have a unique role to play. Later on in 1 Corinthians, Paul uses the metaphor of the body to illustrate this concept: “just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body” (1 Cor12:12). Paul continues by pointing out that the whole body is not made up of a hand, or a foot, or an eye…no, each part has a role to play for the body to function properly. So it is with teamwork.
3. Lastly, each team member should support and encourage the other. In his letter to the Galatians, Paul writes, “Carry each other’s burdens” (Gal 6:2). What veteran has not been exposed to the concept of “mutual support?” This is what this third point is all about. By supporting each other, the team becomes stronger, more agile, able to meet whatever challenge is on the horizon. The battle may be tough, but there is great solace in knowing that teammates “have your back” (and side…and front).
So, let us resolve that 2025 will be a year where we seek to vastly expand our AVV team and its impact, in unity, capitalizing on our unique capabilities while supporting and protecting each other.
by
Michael Schoelwer, USMC (RET)
Nothing is more important to us than our families. That is especially true for the families of active-duty service members and Veterans due to the unique stresses – frequent family moves, extended overseas deployments, wartime uncertainty, routine extended separation and single-parenting – that military and post-service life place on both the members and their dependents.
For its part, the U.S. military itself is uniquely important to Virginia. Virginia has the second highest active-duty population of any state in the Union and a huge Veteran population. Direct Federal military spending accounts for 40% of the GDP of Hampton Roads, DoD spends billions of dollars every day on payrolls, R&R, and equipment purchasing in northern Virginia, and is one of the single largest employers in Charlottsville. Too, Veterans are a well-spring of skilled workers for Virginia’s burgeoning business sector.
The equation is simple: families are a cornerstone of military and Veteran life, and service members and Veterans are essential to Virginia, ergo their families are essential to the growth and prosperity of Virginia. For that reason, the health and welfare of military and Veteran families deserve special attention.
Whatever helps military and Veterans’ families helps the entire community, as a whole. However, the other side of that coin is that whatever hurts the community hurts military families. And, due to the unique demands of military and post-military life, it hurts them worse. The ills of the past 4 years – the highest inflation rates in 40 years, 85% rise in gas prices, high consumer and mortgage interest rates, low housing stocks, problematic K-12 public schools, high childcare costs – are magnified into body blows by the demands of military service and shaky finances of new Veteran families. The good news is that, by helping military and Veteran families, Virginia can achieve outsized benefits for them, the greater community, and for Virginia’s future all at the same time.
A quintessential lesson from our military service is that individuals compete, but teams win. A corollary to that is that individual actions can succeed, but long-term impact is achieved with a well-thought-out campaign plan with multiple reinforcing lines of operation. Those axioms apply equally to any program to support military and Veterans’ families.
The issues that afflict our families cross social, economic, and political boundaries. Although these issues share the trait of hampering our families, each also has separate and distinct causes, which demand separate and distinct – yet coordinated – responses. And, since the issues cross political, social, and economic sectors, different leaders will need to act in concert.
AVV is proposing that our elected leaders adopt a coordinated, integrated campaign for military and Veteran families in 2025 to address each of these issue areas. The issue calls for actions on inflation, improving access to food, childcare, and work force housing, quality K-12 education for dependents, lower energy costs, and public safety. Individual efforts against problems are welcomed. However, we seek the synergistic effects of coordinated solutions. The value of our families and the outsized impact of addressing their issues on the larger community and on Virginia as a whole are too great to settle for anything less.
The philosopher Diogenes was famous in ancient Greece for wandering the streets of Athens, in search of an honest man. Today, AVV seeks those elected officials willing to take charge of this operation. Who among those who seek our votes is willing to take on this worthy fight?
American Veterans Vote, Inc. (AVV) is a volunteer team of Veterans and Veteran supporters. We are a 527 Political Action Committee with a nationally-focused mission to promote the political power of Veterans and Veteran supporters in support of our three strategic goals:
AVV’s goal is to help Veterans maximize their political voice by supporting Veterans’ ability to Vote, Volunteer and Lead.
“Every Veteran, Every Vote.”
We don’t speak FOR Veterans… we speak AS Veterans.
PAID FOR BY AMERICAN VETERANS VOTE
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