Six Degrees to Victory

Is Twitter the way ahead for embattled conservatives?

If you needed proof that Twitter has infected Republican thinking, it arrived January in the form of Grover Norquist’s grilling of the six candidates for RNC chair on how many Twitter followers they’d amassed.

“Three, four hundred,” said Michael Steele.

“Same thing,” Katon Dawson quickly added.

Twitter—a never-ending conversation comprised of 140-characteror-fewer bursts—is the online obsession of the moment for both Millenials and Silicon Valley venture capitalists. But can Twitter help dig the GOP out from under what conservative new media consultant Justin Hart calls “the disaster in November”?

Hart thinks so. Conservatives have long eyed the left’s online networks—Daily Kos, Talking Points Memo—with envy.

“If I’m on the left,” says conservative operative Patrick Ruffini, “I have to be pretty happy with the online networks I already have.”

Perhaps that’s why Democrats have stood aside as Republicans conquer Twitter. Sure, Barack Obama amassed 175,000 followers, but his tweets were bland press-releases. His postelection updates can be counted on one hand (with fingers to spare).

So when Orange County Republican legislator Chuck Devore set out to topple California Sen. Barbara Boxer, Hart knew his client had an uphill climb—but saw a strategic advantage: the 46-year-old Devore is a blogger.

“We knew we could tap into our new media advantage to get us some buzz,” he says.

So Hart set up a “Tweet for Chuck” campaign. Devore put out a call for contributions, and importantly, echoed out the responses: “@justin_hart gave $25 to my campaign to help defeat Boxer. @DavidAll referred!”

That tactic helped to ripple excitement around Devore’s candidacy out through his, Hart’s and All’s combined networks of 6,000 followers. More useful than the money raised—Devore attracted contributions from 160 Twitterers—was the attention his quixotic campaign received, including a profile in the Wall Street Journal. Hart is now executing a similar strategy for the Heritage Foundation.

Republicans have pounced on the opening. Top Conservatives on Twitter is a popular leaderboard of the right’s Twittegensia, and Rep. John Culberson (R-Texas)—perhaps best known for being the first member of Congress to tweet from the House floor—enjoys 5,700 followers. That’s more than three times Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Mat Morrison, a digital communications planner for Porter Novelli, created a great map of congressional Twitter users for his blog, www.mediaczar.com. Legions of Republicans use the service, but a scant handful of Democrats. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid isn’t on Twitter at all, while Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell has about 700 followers. (Morrison points out that the two groups are pretty clique-y—there’s little information flow between the two groups. In other words, Dems tweet only to Dems, Republicans tweet only to Republicans.)

What’s so appealing to embattled conservatives is the chance Twitter provides to exploit what sociologists call “the strength of weak ties”—or as Ruffini puts it, “connecting [you to] people you should know.” And perhaps more importantly for a party struggling to reclaim its purpose, Twitter excels at spreading ideas. Thanks to Twitter traffic, in less than a single day last summer “#dontgo” became a battle cry for Republicans who refused to leave the House floor to protest Pelosi’s refusal to debate domestic oil drilling.

But Republicans need to keep things in perspective. “Blogs didn’t replace e-mail as the main driver of political action online, and Twitter isn’t likely to replace blogs or e-mail,” Ruffini says. “Time will tell whether this becomes a competitive advantage—but we need to experiment.”


Nancy Scola (www.nancyscola.com) is the associate editor at techPresident, an online publication focused on the intersection of technology and politics.