We’ve been busy.
Check out our campaigns to fight back against injustice policies and advocate for a more equitable Texas.
Get Out The Youth Vote
Our Work | Get Out The Youth Vote
While we recognize that engaging in voter registration work is important, we also place a big emphasis on turnout and ensuring young people feel empowered at the ballot box by having the right information on how & where to vote, qualifying photo ID documentation and materials needed to make an informed decision. Â
Our turnout tactics include:
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- Personalized peer-to-peer textsÂ
- Issue-based targeted digital adsÂ
- Progressive online messaging
- Engaging artists from all over Texas to create unique GOTV art
2020 Census
Our Work | 2020 Census
Through our campaign YOUth Count, we targeted and ensured that young people knew the importance of and were accurately counted in the 2020 census.Â
Our campaign included:
- hosting 14 virtual trainings attended by over 1,200 peopleÂ
- engaging 4 artists to create unique census art
- developing a census zine to share with the community
#ClearTheKits.
Our Work | #ClearTheKits.
Every day, more rape kits enter the massive backlog of untested evidenceâwhile the clock runs out on others. The statute of limitations (in Texas, 10 years) sets a timeline for justice to be served in rape cases, and that deadline is closing on many survivors whose rape kit evidence has sat untested, collecting dust on evidence room shelves for years. Justice in rape cases may have an expiration date, but human dignity doesnât, and it’s up to us to ensure that the backlog of rape kits is tested before the clock runs out on the ability to use this evidence in court.
In a joint effort between Deeds Not Words and Texas State Representative Victoria Neave, we launched #ClearTheKits to show survivors they matter by helping them get justice so they can regain their lives and heal.
Through our online portal, visitors can educate themselves on the Texas rape kit backlog, sign a petition to end the statute of limitations, and donate directly to a fund to clear the kits.
Since its launch in June 2018, weâve raised over $16,000 with a social media campaign that reached over 100,000 people.
Work Strong Austin.
Our Work | Work Strong Austin.
In February of 2018, Austin City Council voted favorably to adopt a Paid Sick Leave Ordinance, making it the first city in the South to do so.
A number of our young advocates were involved in the âWork Strong Austin Taskforceâ that met over the course of many weeks to formulate a policy that worked for businesses and workers, alike. And they were there on the night of the scheduled vote, armed with their personal stories and testifying before the City Council urging their favorable vote on the ordinance.
#Changemakers like Katie who talked about her autoimmune disorder and how her single mom had to miss work when Katie was hospitalized on numerous occasions; like Claudia, an undocumented immigrant, who has suffered from mental distress while the threat of deportation hangs over her and other Dreamers like her; and like Ashley who spoke of our moral obligation to protect individuals from threat of job loss when they need to take time off to deal with an illness.
These personal stories, joined with the stories of so many others who spoke that night, werenât just a part of why the ordinance passed last Thursday, they were THE reason that the ordinance passed. And because of the courage of the people gathered that evening and their willingness to share deeply personal stories about their own health challenges, we now have a model ordinance in Austin that will protect the 233,000 workers who currently lack those protections. And weâve set the bar for other cities to follow.
The People's Lawsuit.
Our Work | The People's Lawsuit.
Five years after the Peopleâs Filibuster, Deeds Not Words is excited to join with 18 reproductive health, rights, and justice organizations from across Texas in fighting back against anti-abortion legislation with a groundbreaking federal legal challenge to the existing web of Texas abortion restrictions.
Collectively, we held a press conference to highlight the merits of the lawsuit and created a communications campaign to help raise awareness about the existing landscape of abortion restrictions in Texas and the Peopleâs Lawsuit that seeks to overturn them.
Our young Changemakers were an important part of these efforts and will continue to provide communications support for the Peopleâs Lawsuit awareness campaign.
I Am Evidence Screening
Our Work | I Am Evidence Screening
In May of 2018, Deeds Not Words organized a screening of the groundbreaking documentary, I AM EVIDENCE, to a packed house in Austin, TX.
Produced by a partnership between Mariska Hargitayâs non-profit, Joyful Heart, and HBO, the film exposes the alarming number of untested rape kits in the United States through a characterâdriven narrative, bringing much needed attention to the disturbing pattern of how the criminal justice system has historically ignored sexual assault survivors.
After the film, our founder Wendy Davis led a panel discussion on Texasâ Rape Kit backlog, featuring Texas State Representatives Victoria Neave and Donna Howard as well as experts from the Texas Association Against Sexual Assault, SAFE Alliance, Survivor Justice Project, and Not On My Campus.
When is Equal Pay Day?
Our Work | When is Equal Pay Day?
Equal Pay Day for all women should be on December 31, but unfortunately, it isnât. The average woman must work far into the next year to earn what a man earned in the prior year. Equal Pay Day marks how far women (asian, white, black and latina) work after the close of a calendar year in order to make what men made in the previous one. For asian women that day typically occurs in February, for white women itâs April, for black women itâs August, for native american women, itâs September, and for Latinas itâs November!
To illustrate the enormous disparities in equal pay through an intersectional lens and to encourage social media sharing, we built a microsite day counter.
