One of the worse things that could happen next Wednesday would be for Californians to wake up and find out they’re having a “Meg Moment”—the awful realization that you should have voted, but didn’t.  

 To make sure Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman doesn’t buy the election after spending $163 million of her own money, the California Labor Federation has launched a new TV ad urging Californians to “Protect Yourself from a Meg Moment” by voting. The ad uses Whitman’s own words to expose her failure to vote for much of her adult life, while at the same time urging people to get to the polls.

The ad is part of the state federation’s largest-ever get out the vote (GOTV) mobilization effort supporting Jerry Brown for governor, Sen. Barbara Boxer and other working family candidates on the Nov. 2 ballot. 

Whitman in recent days came out with a campaign ad in which she reflects on how great California was 30 years ago. As a Brown ad then pointed out, Jerry Brown was governor 30 years ago—which is why the state worked so well.

Over the next week, more than 30,000 volunteers across the state will talk with 2 million union voters about the high stakes for working people in this year’s election. Art Pulaski, executive secretary-treasurer of the state federation, say :

Our unprecedented grassroots effort is proving wrong the pundits who said the power of our message couldn’t match Whitman’s limitless pocketbook.

The labor federation also has launched a program to engage Asian Pacific Americans in the election, making hundreds of thousands of GOTV contacts to these voters by phone and mail in four languages.