CONTACT CONGRESS ON BEHALF OF SGT. ANDREW TAHMOORESSI

We have asked you to circulate a petition to President Obama and gather at least 100,000 signatures.  You’ve done that.  While we are awaiting his (hopeful) response we feel we must help Andrew on many fronts.  With that in mind, we are once again asking for your assistance.  It is time for all citizens to contact their elected representatives.  Some of you are familiar with doing this and others may not be.  Fear not, we will walk you through the process.

1)      Find your representatives.  Every citizen has one U.S. Congressperson and two Senators.  We ask that you write, call and possibly tweet all of them.

For starters, enter your zip code on this site, hit enter and it will bring up both your Congressperson and two Senators http://www.contactingthecongress.org/

You now have your three representatives.  Click on the name of the first representative and it will take you to all of his/her contact information.  Included you will see their DC Address, phone number, Fax number, email contact form, their website information (which generally includes their Facebook page) and, their twitter user name.  You will also see choices for their local office contact information.  It is up to you whether you choose to contact their D.C. office or their local office, or both.

Next, return to the homepage (above).  Click on your next representative and repeat the above steps.  Finally, return to the homepage, click on your third representative and repeat.

Now, draft your correspondence or phone your representative.  It is unlikely you will reach your representative directly but, you can try.  If not, please leave a message for them.

Finally, you may choose to tweet or Facebook them.  Most of Congress is on twitter and/or Facebook.

The most effective channels of communicating with Congress, in order, is as follows:

1)      A “Snail Mail” letter.  These letters are logged and recorded and must be responded to.

2)      An Email letter.  These letters are also supposed to be logged but it is not as traceable as a “snail mail” letter.  Also, tech is not perfect.

3)      A phone call.  We suggest calling both the D.C. office and the local office of all three of your representatives.

4)      A tweet.  It HAS happened that a tweet to a representative has been responded to but, there is no requirement or guarantee that they will respond.

5)      A Facebook post.  The problem with this is that most members of Congress have their FB set so that you can only comment on a post that they have put up.  It is the least effective method of communication and one that will likely not be seen or responded to.

All of that said, if you can, we suggest doing ALL of the above.

What to say?  That is entirely up to you.  We can only offer suggestions.  When writing, the subject line should be “Sgt. Andrew Tahmooressi, imprisoned in Mexico.”   We suggest you stay on point.  Do not bring other factors (ie illegal immigration to the U.S. and or Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl) into the discussion.  Ask for their help.  You want them to intercede and help free Sgt. Tahmooressi.  Ask them to please contact Secretary of State John Kerry.  Be concise, stick to facts. Do NOT make threats.  Be professional and courteous.  Keep it brief.  This is an effort to elicit help from Congress and the State Department on behalf of Sgt. Tahmooressi, not a letter to air all of your grievances.  You may wish to do that in a separate letter and, we encourage that if you so choose.  Our elected officials represent us and this is a proper and appropriate request.

A sample could be “Sgt. Tahmooressi has been in a Mexican Prison for over two months for a wrong turn into Mexico”… etc.

You may wish to include your contact information and request a return phone call or email etc.  Let’s slam the phone lines, crash the servers and jam the Fax lines.

This is a major “CONTACT CONGRESS” push.  If you’ve no idea what to say, please message the Facebook page for Sgt. Tahmooressi here and someone will assist you.

https://www.facebook.com/freeusmctahmooressifrommexicanjail

Finally, post this link on your Facebook page, tweet it, email it.  Let’s get everyone involved in this.  Send it to any person or entity that you may know that can be of assistance.

On behalf of the Tahmooressi family and our entire effort to free Andrew, thank you.

I am on twitter at @hipEchik