--- title: Sheryl Crow: Shorter Election Cycle Needed After 2016 Race description: Singer Sheryl Crow is calling for a shorter presidential election cycle, after what she described as an "extremely damaging" 2016 campaign. canonical: https://time.com/4544117/sheryl-crow-petition-election-cycle/ author: Katie Reilly article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-10-25T12:30:24.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-19T07:42:07.651Z article:section: Politics og:title: Sheryl Crow Petitions for Shorter Election Cycle After 2016 Race og:description: Every day is a winding road in 2016, singer says og:url: https://time.com/4544117/sheryl-crow-petition-election-cycle/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2b4c700c86015a3e/6988ab64428a9e242acd4c1c/sheryl-crow-election-petition.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3500 og:image:height: 1969 og:image:alt: #BlogHer16 Experts Among Us Conference og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Sheryl Crow Petitions for Shorter Election Cycle After 2016 Race twitter:description: Every day is a winding road in 2016, singer says twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2b4c700c86015a3e/6988ab64428a9e242acd4c1c/sheryl-crow-election-petition.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Sheryl Crow Wants You to Sign Her Petition for a Shorter Election Cycle > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. ## Video: Watch Highlights From the Last Presidential Debate [Watch (HLS stream): Watch Highlights From the Last Presidential Debate](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/b05xxzoe.m3u8) (3:13)  _Published 2016-10-20. Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump debated for the final time_  by [Katie Reilly](https://time.com/author/katie-reilly/)  ## Katie Reilly Oct 25, 2016 12:30 PM UTC  Sheryl Crow attends the #BlogHer16 Experts Among Us Conference on Aug. 5, 2016 in Los Angeles, Calif. Sheryl Crow attends the #BlogHer16 Experts Among Us Conference on Aug. 5, 2016 in Los Angeles, Calif. JB Lacroix/WireImage  by [Katie Reilly](https://time.com/author/katie-reilly/)  ## Katie Reilly Oct 25, 2016 12:30 PM UTC Singer Sheryl Crow is calling for a shorter presidential election cycle, after what she described as an “extremely damaging” [2016 campaign](http://time.com/4543481/donald-trump-polling-democrats-rigged/). The 2016 election will have lasted nearly 600 days by the time polls close on Nov. 8\. By comparison, Canada had its [longest campaign season](https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/canadas-election-cycle-has-taken-less-than-three-months-and-canadians-are-tired-of-it/2015/10/18/b57ce852-7419-11e5-8d93-0af317ed58c9%5Fstory.html) in recent history last year, and it lasted just 11 weeks. “Countries across the globe have limited campaign seasons to as short as 6 weeks. With an organized system, a successful, informative, professional campaign could be run,” Crow wrote in the [Change.com petition](https://www.change.org/p/democratic-national-committee-shorten-the-us-presidential-election-cycle), which had about 33,000 signatures as of Tuesday morning. Crow, a [longtime Democrat](https://www.bustle.com/articles/116642-is-sheryl-crow-a-democrat-her-debate-performance-is-just-the-tip-of-the-iceberg) who [sang the national anthem ](http://edition.cnn.com/2015/10/07/entertainment/sheryl-crow-cnn-debate-feat/index.html)ahead of a Democratic Party debate last year, called on both parties to do what they can to create a shorter election season. “We cannot sustain another lengthy slugfest like what we have witnessed for the past two years and ask both the DNC and RNC to reform the process and shorten our election season.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4544117/sheryl-crow-petition-election-cycle/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4544117/sheryl-crow-petition-election-cycle/"},"headline":"Sheryl Crow Wants You to Sign Her Petition for a Shorter Election Cycle","datePublished":"2016-10-25T12:30:24.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-19T07:42:07.651Z","description":"Every day is a winding road in 2016, singer says","url":"https://time.com/4544117/sheryl-crow-petition-election-cycle/","keywords":["2016 Election","2016 Election","celebrities"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2b4c700c86015a3e/6988ab64428a9e242acd4c1c/sheryl-crow-election-petition.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Katie Reilly","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/katie-reilly/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2b4c700c86015a3e/6988ab64428a9e242acd4c1c/sheryl-crow-election-petition.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"#BlogHer16 Experts Among Us Conference","caption":"#BlogHer16 Experts Among Us Conference","creditText":"JB Lacroix/WireImage","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/2016-election/","name":"2016 Election"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4544117/sheryl-crow-petition-election-cycle/","name":"Sheryl Crow Wants You to Sign Her Petition for a Shorter Election Cycle"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Watch Highlights From the Last Presidential Debate","description":"Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump debated for the final time","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/b05xxzoe/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2016-10-20T03:57:44.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/b05xxzoe.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/4544117/sheryl-crow-petition-election-cycle/","duration":"PT3M13S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/4544117/sheryl-crow-petition-election-cycle/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```