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(Reuters) – Iowa resident LeAnne Putman-Thomas has watched her country pursue wars, endure recessions and elect its first Black president. Yet the 53-year-old never felt compelled to vote.

When Barack Obama turned North Carolina blue in 2008, Democrats hoped the Obama coalition would usher in a new era of competitiveness in the state. Instead, the next decade-plus was marked largely by disappointing election results — and no more presidential wins for the party.

GOTV looks very different this year, but one thing campaigns on both sides of the aisle are relying on even more amid pandemic campaigning: social pressure.

“President Trump’s fly-in campaign rally in Ocala on Friday is targeting rural and exurban voters, a bloc that in 2016 helped put him over the top in Florida.”

“Sen. Todd Young (R-IN) introduced U.S. Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett as the Senate confirmation hearing kicked off earlier this week.”

“The novelty of the coronavirus is gone but concern lingers, according to research from the Ehrhardt Group – a public relations firm – and Causeway Solutions, a research and data analysis company. Together, the two companies produce the Gulf South Index, a snapshot of ‘where consumers in the Gulf South stand with their concerns about the COVID-19 pandemic.'”

“In the lead-up to the 2020 presidential election, several major social media platforms threw their hands up and said they wouldn’t take political advertising.”

“Typically in the last few weeks of the campaign, digital advertising will be the preferred medium for pushing out response ads,” Reid Vineis of the GOP firm Majorities Strategies wrote to Zach. “Digital advertising is used to moving very quickly. Think about recent events. After Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s passing, groups had ads up within hours trying to raise money.”

“Lara Trump was the headliner at a Monday evening event at a farm in southwestern Wake County to rally support for President Donald Trump.

“Wake County Republicans and other activists from around the triangle gathered at Finnigan’s Run Farm in New Hill to hear from president’s daughter-in-law and Susan Tillis, the wife of U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis.”

“The latest report from the Gulf South Index show boomers and millennials in the region are changing course on their outlooks as the summer months wind down and we approach the end of the year. Optimism reigns with both groups as the number of people in our region who think “things are getting a lot worse” has decreased from 43% to 29% for millennials and 52% to 31% for boomers. However, the needle has not moved much in terms of how long they think the effects of the pandemic with last. Roughly two-thirds of both boomers and millennials still think the effects of COVID-19 will last a year or longer.”

“Consumers in the Gulf South are more ready for things to open than they have been just weeks prior. Extreme concern over the coronavirus pandemic in the U.S. has dropped 5 points since July to just 37.5%, according to updated Gulf South Index research, conducted September 6-9.”

“The State Board of Elections has spent months preparing for the 2020 general election, and even up until Sept. 4 rules were still being finalized for absentee ballots, early voting locations, and verification of counting those ballots.”