BigTent was thrilled to host Lucille Wenegieme Executive Director of HeadCount. Lucille discussed HeadCount’s impactful work in fostering voter engagement and civic involvement with young voters, through music and culture. She dove into their strategies and innovative approaches to promote voter registration and democratic participation.
HeadCount gets people registered to vote and interested in democracy. They are at concerts, festivals, community events – anywhere they can translate the power of music and culture into real action. Their mission is to use the power of music and popular culture to register voters and promote participation in democracy. They reach young people where they already are to inform and empower.
HeadCount stages nonpartisan voter registration drives at more than 1,000 live events each year and collaborate with cultural leaders to promote civic engagement on a national scale. Since 2004, they’ve signed up over 1,000,000 voters through their work with touring musicians like Ariana Grande, Dead & Company, and Beyoncé and events like Lollapalooza, Bonnaroo, Pride Festivals and RuPaul’s DragCon. Meanwhile, their digital campaigns have won Clio and SHORTY awards, and their public service announcements have starred the likes of Jay-Z, Dave Matthews and members of the Grateful Dead.
ABOUT OUR SPEAKER
Lucille Wenegieme is an executive in the civic engagement and democracy spaces with an eclectic background in political advocacy, communications, fashion, and biomedical science. Her central change philosophy is that democracy has to meet people where they are, and she focuses on culture as the vehicle to get there.
Prior to joining HeadCounT, Lucille served on the executive team at the Denver Clerk & Recorder’s Office where her team leveraged a $13 million budget to administer elections and provide other essential services. During her tenure, the Office launched a citizen-led campaign finance initiative to match local small-dollar donations with public funding and implemented a first-of-its-kind marijuana-themed get-out-the-vote campaign.
Her career has also included a stint as vice president of communications at the National Vote at Home Institute, which helped states and municipalities rapidly scale up their capacity to handle mail-in votes during the 2020 election. She also led her own communications firm, Kleos Creative, and was an executive at the Washington, D.C.-based public affairs firm Fireside Campaigns. Prior to entering the democracy space, she worked in communications at the global luxury retail giant Tapestry (formerly Coach, Inc.).