Our Mission
F&F will renew this belief that people of faith have an important and active role to play at the ballot box. Our organization will engage and educate faith-based communities on their rights and responsibilities to participate in elections by voting. We will inform faith-based communities on the choices that they have at the polls. We will provide positive portrayals of all candidates with footnotes on their positions and photos of their choosing. We will encourage broader positive participation in democracy by urging people of faith to evaluate candidates’ positions.
It is our mission to educate and inform people of faith about voting and participation. Our goal is to inform voters about the candidates of faith who are on the ballot. Our metric of success will be to increase voter participation by people of faith. Some estimates place that only 52% of Evangelical Christians voted in 2020, compared to 67% of elections. Elected officials by nature focus on those who vote.
Wisconsin is the largest state in a 5-state region in which the majority of the faith-based community is made up of Mass-attending Catholics and Evangelical Lutherans, in addition to smaller vibrant communities of non-denominational Christians, Pentecostals, other Evangelicals,.and other Christian denominations as well as a strong Orthodox Jewish community and other faiths. The first goal as covered in our Newsweek piece the day Wisconsin Faith and Freedom was formed is to assure faith-based voters they have a right to take their faith to the policy arena.
Our second goal is to communicate with other Wisconsinites who do not view their faith as central to their policy and voting, but nonetheless do agree with some basic tenets. In a time of political vitriol, we want to communicate with all who agree on certain issues. For example, our national counterpart issued this letter (link) to leaders of both parties in defense of Israel after the savage Hamas attacks, and when the Democratic Senate leader gave a speech on the Senate floor sounding the same themes the national group leader Ralph Reed praised the speech in this Fox News appearance (link), happy to find a point of unity despite many other policy disagreement.
As noted in our Newsweek pieces roughly 75 percent of Americans agree with our position on many issues such as only allowing women in women’s sports, opposing abortion on demand, allowing Christian Christmas displays in public places, and other issues such as a strong border to not only protect those already in the country from deadly drugs being brought across the border but also to stop the exploitation of those being brought to the country for purposes such as human trafficking. To this end, we laid out the following legal definition to operate consistently as a non-profit under section 501(c)3 of the IRS code.
Successful organizations require leadership and teamwork. F&F is no exception. Pudner, a successful and experienced Executive Director of 501c3 public affairs organizations, will take the lead in launching Wisconsin Faith and Freedom. His winning track record in public affairs and elections, his Wisconsin roots, his national network, and his faith will guide these efforts. Pudner has launched other winning c3 organizations and knows the ropes. He brings a wealth of experience working with new organizations in the public affairs arena. His ability to work with newly formed Boards to accomplish their goals is exemplary.
Activating and engaging people of faith in public affairs and electoral politics has been John Pudner’s professional life’s work. His experience in educating and mobilizing faith-based voters will be invaluable following the launch. He has worked on local, state, and national campaigns with faith-based voters for decades, including running the national faith-based outreach efforts for the successful 2000 Presidential campaign.
MAILING ADDRESS
1100 W Wells Street Suite 1406
Milwaukee, WI 53233
(404) 606-3163
jpudner@wisconsinffc.com