Amidst great political division and active voter suppression efforts, the 2022 midterm elections brought confusion, misinformation, and fear to many voters across the country; 165 members of the Davis Polk community, including clients, lawyers, business services professionals, summer associates and alumni, were there to help.

For many years, Davis Polk has supported the national, nonpartisan Election Protection Hotline (866-OUR-VOTE) organized by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law (Lawyers’ Committee), by both volunteering at its regional call centers that operate year-round and hosting an Election Day call center.

Last year, with all 435 seats in the House and 35 seats in the Senate up for re-election, we again partnered with the Lawyers’ Committee and hosted a two-day Election Protection Call Center. Between November 7 and November 8 alone, Davis Polk’s call center fielded approximately 1,300 calls, texts and chat messages from voters across the country – accounting for more than 10% of the Election Protection Hotline’s total volume for the period. This was also the culmination of a months-long volunteer effort, during which members of our community staffed regional call centers leading up to the election.

“It was a huge undertaking to coordinate shift coverage and ensure that every volunteer was trained to respond to a range of questions in a shifting legislative landscape,” explained Pro Bono Attorney for Corporate & Transactional Matters Jillian Berman, who served as Davis Polk’s call center lead.

Although our team was initially slated to field inquiries only from the New York area, a few weeks before Election Day the Lawyers’ Committee asked for our help in taking on more states. Given that voting laws vary by state, Davis Polk lawyers quickly worked to create reference materials to cover our expanded territory encompassing five additional states.

Volunteers worked in four-hour shifts beginning as early as 5:00 a.m. ET and ending as late as 9:30 p.m. ET. They responded to inquiries from voters in New York, Tennessee, Delaware, Rhode Island, Connecticut and Washington DC.

The questions from voters spanned topics such as registration status, poll locations, and ID requirements, and volunteers worked with on-the-ground command centers to escalate reports of intimidating or suppressive obstacles to voting.

“Having grown up in a state with relatively straightforward voting requirements, I did not fully appreciate how difficult it was to vote in other parts of the country before I started volunteering with Election Protection. Answering people’s calls and hearing the challenges and the hurdles placed in front of them is horrifying, but there is some comfort in knowing we are able to help,” Jillian said.

As part of Davis Polk’s commitment to free and fair elections, the firm also partners with other nonpartisan organizations on voting-related legal research projects including on the materiality clause of the Civil Rights Act and its application to voter registration and ballots, election fraud allegations related to the 2020 election, and preventing political violence often directed at elected leaders and election officials.

Learn more about Davis Polk’s Pro Bono program.

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