The uniters
CHRIS EVANS
Seeking straight talk from elected officials
A FEW YEARS AGO, ACTOR CHRIS EVANS WAS watching pundits debate, when he realized that he—someone who’s passionate and outspoken about politics, particularly on social media—didn’t actually know that much about the policy being discussed. “When I went to try and educate myself a bit,” he says, “I thought it was shockingly difficult to find a simple way in.” What he realized he wanted was straightforward and not necessarily journalism: a place to hear directly from elected officials on what they believe about different subjects—not mediated through think pieces or filtered by talking heads on cable news. He tapped a friend, actor and director Mark Kassen, to develop it with him; they brought in Joe Kiani, a tech entrepreneur who was well networked in Washington. Together, the three fleshed out their vision for a hub where politicians could speak, in brief videos, about where they stood on issues from immigration to trade. “When you have a democracy,” says Kiani, “you need an engaged, knowledgeable citizenry.” They called their site A Starting Point.
If only it were that simple. Evans is the first to admit it was an uphill battle to earn the trust of politicians in D.C., who knew him best as Captain America, not as someone trying to change the way Americans formed opinions about policy. To that end, whether users who have become increasingly siloed in echo chambers of confirmation bias will want to hear from polarized politicians at all remains to be seen. A planned unveiling at South by Southwest was derailed after the conference was canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic; now, they’re regrouping on a launch date as the world moves into an unprecedented era. But with more Americans staying home and looking for clear information about where their elected officials stand on issues like health care reform that have immediate and urgent consequences, there may be more need than ever for a site like this—though Evans resists the suggestion that the current crisis could be advantageous for his project. “I will say that when things like this happen, people just long for functional, effective