Advice from a high-level Senatorial staffer:

The most important things that you can do right now with regard to contacting your Members of Congress:

Don't focus exclusively on online petitions or emailing.

 — PUSH HARD FOR FACE-TO-FACE TIME —

• • If they have town halls, go to them. 

  • Go to their local offices. 

  • If you can travel to DC, try to find a way to go to an event of theirs. 

  • Go to the "mobile offices" that their staff hold periodically (all these times are located on each congressperson's website). 

  • When you go, ask questions. A LOT OF THEM. And push for answers. The louder and more vocal and present you can be at those the better.

In-person events don't happen every day. So, the absolute most important thing that people should be doing every day is CALLING. 

 — MAKE 6 CALLS A DAY —

• • 2 calls to each office (DC and your local office)

  • 2 Senators

  • 1 Representative

  • Put the 6 numbers in your phone (all under P – Politician).

    • Example:

      • Politician Luna, FL

      • Politician Luna, DC

      • Politician Scott, FL

      • Politician Scott, DC

      • Politician Moody, FL

      • Politician Moody, DC

This staffer's advice was very clear: any sort of online contact basically gets immediately ignored, and letters pretty much get thrown in the trash (unless you have a particularly strong emotional story — but even then it's not worth the time it took you to craft that letter).

Calls are what all the congresspeople pay attention to. Every single day, the Senior Staff and the Senator get a report of the 3 most-called-about topics for that day at each of their offices (in DC and local offices), and exactly how many people said what about each of those topics. They're also sorted by zip code and area code. She said that Republican callers generally outnumber Democrat callers 4-1, and when it's a particular issue that single-issue-voters pay attention to (like gun control, or planned parenthood funding, etc...), it's often closer to 11-1, and that's recently pushed Republican congressmen on the fence to vote with the Republicans. In the last 8 years, Republicans have called, and Democrats haven't.

 — WHEN YOU CALL —

• Ask for the Staff member in charge of whatever you're calling about. Local offices won't always have specific ones, but they might. If you get transferred to that person, awesome. If you don't, that's ok — ask for that person's name, and then just keep talking to whoever answered the phone. It's better to talk to the staffer who first answered than leave a message for the specific staffer in charge of your topic.

• Sample script: "Hi, I'd like to speak with the staffer in charge of Healthcare, please"— 

• Don't leave a message unless the office doesn't pick up or you get sent directly to voicemail.

• Give them your zip code. They won't always ask for it, but make sure you give it to them, so they can mark it down. Extra points if you live in a zip code that traditionally votes for them, since they'll want to make sure they get/keep your vote.

• Make it personal if you can. "I voted for you in the last election and I'm worried/happy/whatever" or "I'm a teacher, and I am appalled by what's being done to the Department of Education," or "as a single mother" or "as a white, middle class woman," or whatever.

• FOCUS! Pick 1-2 specific things per day — ideally something that will be voted on/taken up in the next few days. But even if there's not a vote coming up in the next week, call anyway. It's important that they just keep getting calls. If you rattle off a laundry list of concerns they won't know what 1-2 topics to mark down on their lists.

• BE CLEAR. Don't leave any ambiguity. "I'm disappointed that the Senator..." or "I want to thank the Senator for their vote on... " or "I want the Senator to know that voting in _____ way is the wrong decision for our state because... " 

• They may get to know your voice/get sick of you — it doesn't matter. The people answering the phones generally turn over every 6 weeks anyway, so even if they're really sick of you, they'll be gone in 6 weeks.

• From experience since the election: If you hate being on the phone & feel awkward (which is a lot of people) don't worry about it — there are a bunch of scripts (Indivisible has some, there are lots of others floating around these day). After a few days of calling, it starts to feel a lot more natural. 

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