Put the 6 numbers in your phone (all under P for Politician). An example is McCaskill MO, Politician; McCaskill DC, Politician; Politiican Blunt MO, etc., which makes it really easy to click down the list each day.

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

6) They may get to know your voice/get sick of you—it doesn’t matter. The people answer the phones generally turn over every 6 weeks anyways, so eve if they’re really sick of you they are likely not a permanent staff member.

5) Be clear on what you want—“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…”. Don’t leave any ambiguity.

4). Pick 1-2 specific things per day. Don’t rattle off everything that concerns you—they’re figuring out what to put on list. So, only 1-2, & ideally something that will be voted on in next few days, but doesn’t really matter—even if no vote, call anyway. It’s important they keep getting calls.

3) If you can make it personal, make it personal. “I voted for you in the last election and I’m worried/happy/whatever” or “I’m a teacher, and I am appalled by Betsy DeVos,” or “as a single mother” or “as a white, middle class woman,” or whatever.

2). 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.

you get transferred to that person, awesome. If you don’t, ask for that staffer’s name, and just keep talking to whoever answered the phone. Don’t leave a message (unless the office doesn’t pick up at all—then you can—but it’s better to talk to the staffer who first answered

WHEN YOU CALL

1). When calling the DC office, ask for the Staff member in charge of whatever you’re calling about (“Hi, I’d like to speak with the staffer in charge of Healthcare, please”)—local offices won’t always have specific ones, but they might. If

Calls are what they pay attention to. Every day, the Senator gets a report of the 3 most-called about topics for that day, and how many, sorted by zip code & area code. She said Republican callers outnumber Democrat callers anywhere from 4-1 to 11-1. Republicans have called. Democrats haven’t.

YOU SHOULD MAKE 6 CALLS A DAY

2 each (DC office & local offices) to your 2 Senators and your 1 Representative.
The staffer was clear that any sort of online contact basically gets ignored, and letters pretty much get thrown in the trash (unless you have a particularly strong emotional story).

Do NOT bother with online petitions or emailing.

1) The best thing to be heard by your congressperson is to have face-fo-face time—if they have town halls, go. Go to their local offices. If you’re in DC, go to the “mobile offices” that their staff hold (located on each congressperson’s website).