Wednesday night, they posted the culmination of their efforts: a nearly four-minute exhortation for the Obama faithful to mobilize in the final days of this campaign. It features plenty of higher-profile Obama alumni — including former presidential body man Reggie Love, 2012 national field director Jeremy Bird, 2012 national director of Operation Vote Buffy Wicks and former Organizing for Action director Jon Carson — talking about why electing Clinton is critical to cementing the president's legacy.

Anne Filipic, who met her husband Carlos Monje Jr. while canvassing caucusgoers on Obama's behalf in Davenport, Iowa, in June 2007, holds her son and declares: “I know Hillary will not only continue on the legacy for all the things we fought for, all the things we have fought so hard for, but also the legacy she has built in her own right.”

AD

AD

“Do it for Obama. Do it for Hillary,” says Betsy Hoover, who served as director of digital organizing for Obama's 2012 campaign, as she holds her infant son with Bird, her husband, sitting beside her.

The president himself is trying to urge many of his most devoted supporters — including African Americans, who are voting early in lower numbers than they did four years ago — to head to the polls. On Thursday, Obama held rallies in Miami and Jacksonville, Fla., telling crowds they should be just as enthusiastic about the prospect of Clinton in the White House as they were about his own candidacy.

In many ways the video — snippets of political operatives in their living rooms or offices, interspersed with campaign footage from 2008 and 2012, as well as Obama's speech from this summer's Democratic national convention — capture the passage of time. Multiple staffers offer their testimonials beside campaign co-workers they've married; one shot shows Alex Okrent, who died suddenly at the age of 29 in July 2012 when he was working on Obama's reelection. New York state Assemblyman Michael Blake, who worked on both of the president's campaigns and in the White House before winning office, also appears in the video.

Liz Jaff, who ran regional field operations in several states during Obama's first White House bid and led get-out-the-vote efforts on Election Day in Ohio in 2012, said in an interview that when she and other campaign veterans became “teary-eyed” discussing the election in late September, they decided, “Oh, my God, we need to get really emotional so anyone who’s not doing everything possible for Hillary will go out and do something.”

AD

AD

Josh Burstein, a digital staffer on the 2012 campaign who now works at the site Tribute, offered to host the video submissions. Tara McGowan, another Obama alumna who is digital director for the Democratic super PAC Priorities USA, drafted three questions to which individuals could reply on tape. Jaff spent “a couple bucks on a soundtrack,” and Frank Chi, who worked on Obama's 2008 ads as well as on Sen. Elizabeth Warren's (D-Mass.) race, edited the video along with McGowan and made the website.

“We will just spread it as far as it can,” Jaff said.

Whether the video translates into extra votes for Clinton is unclear. Jaff left for Ohio a week ago, where she is knocking on doors and making the case for Obama's aspiring successor.