“I’m supposed to be in my bed today because I’ve been working hard the whole week, but instead I’m here because I need to let my neighbors, coworkers, families know that they have to vote. Every door I knock and every phone call I make, I ask people to do the same,” said Margarette Neverette, a volunteer canvasser with SEIU. “My vote will determine how much I pay for water, how much I pay for taxes and what my kids will be eating at school.”

Neverette was one of numerous canvassers and organizers across Florida who knocked on doors and phone-banked for candidates and ballot measures on the first Saturday after early voting for primaries began in the state, coined Super Saturday.

Community-based organizations such as SEIU, FLIC Votes and New Florida Majority mobilized canvassers across the state, focusing their outreach on young voters, Latino voters, Black voters and the growing community of Puerto Rican displaced voters who fled the island after Hurricane Maria.

Braving 90 degree heat and with voter registration applications in hand, volunteers and organizers canvassed throughout the day searching for potential eligible voters for what will be one of the state’s most critical elections.

The 2018 midterm elections are poised to be one of the state’s most critical elections with not only seats for the governorship and the Senate, but also with an important ballot that would restore voting rights to more than 1.8 million Floridians who lost their voting rights after they were convicted of felonies, but who served their time and are now reintegrating into their communities.

Let’s join together with people from all walks of life to fight for our future. Some politicians are making careers out of dividing Americans and pointing fingers at us because of the color of our skin, where we were born or our economic status. But there is a better way. By uniting the vote, we can elect new leaders who work for all of us, not just the wealthy few. Florida primaries will take place on August 28th and the general elections on November 6, 2018.