Protection for Congolese refugees, postcarding for fall elections, young voters defending democracy, and more!
Contact all members of Congress:
- By phone: (202) 224-3121
- By email: democracy.io
- By US mail: Representatives / Senators
- By fax: Representatives / Senators
- By Resistbot: Resist.bot
Contact White House or other federal agencies:
- TEMPORARY PROTECTED STATUS (TPS) FOR CONGOLESE REFUGEESRepresentative Yvette Clarke (D-NY) and Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ) are leading an effort signed by 33 House members and 5 Senators to ask Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and President Joe Biden to grant Temporary Protected Status to refugees from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). As Chair of the Congressional Black Caucus on Immigration, Representative Clarke has alleged that the DRC is facing a grave humanitarian crisis, and that the number of refugees from this country is among the top 5 in the U.S, yet the only one of the five without TPS. Let’s tell the White House and DHS that we support this request to extend TPS for the people of the Congo.
- COMMENT ON INSURANCE FOR OVER-THE-COUNTER PREVENTIONSubmitted by a Rogan’s List reader: The Biden Administration wants our input on how to ensure equitable access to over-the-counter (OTC) preventive services, including the newly approved OTC birth control pill. Thanks to Obamacare, many preventive services are covered by insurance. That doesn’t yet apply to services we can get OTC without a prescription including contraception, treatments to quit tobacco, and breastfeeding supplies. We can submit comments on requiring insurers to cover OTC preventive services by following the instructions here by 5 pm Eastern, December 4, 2023. Refer to file code 1210–ZA31. Let’s provide evidence or personal experiences about how insurance affects access to products, how to effectively make insurance-covered OTC services available at retailers, or the impact on health equity and economics.
- POSTCARDING FOR FALL 2023 ELECTIONSState and local elections will dominate this fall election season. Ballotpedia gives us more detail depending on where we live. There are also three remaining special elections to the 118th Congress this year: 1) November 5, 2023, to fill the last two years of the six-year term in the Senate vacated by Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), 2) November 7, 2023, to fill the House vacancy left by David Cicilline (D), and 3) November 21, 2023, to fill the House vacancy of Chris Stewart (R). There are many campaigns seeking our help with getting the vote out. We can use these two resources to find a good fit for our time and energy for writing postcards: 1) GOTV Postcard Campaigns for Democratic Candidates and 2) Active Postcarding/Letter Writing Campaigns 2023.
- YOUNG VOTERSThe Southern Poverty Law Center has an invitation for us. “On Wednesday, Oct. 11, from 6 p.m. -7 p.m., join the winners of our College Activation Challenge: Defenders of Democracy on Zoom to participate in a texting training designed to increase voter turnout.” We can register in advance here.
- LET’S UP OUR CLIMATE GAMEThe environmental organizations Project Drawdown and Ecochallenge have teamed up to create Drawdown Ecochallenge, a free event happening throughout October, in which we can take climate actions and learn with others how our individual choices can boost climate solutions. Let’s read about how our individual climate actions make a difference. Then, let’s check out the website to learn more and join up to participate.
CORRECTIONS AND UPDATES
Some links in this entry in yesterday’s List are no longer working. Here is the corrected entry. Thanks to our readers for keeping us honest!
- HEATHER COX RICHARDSON’S NEW BOOK TOURRogan’s List has long recommended its readers follow and read Heather Cox Richardson’s Substack, Letters from an American, “a newsletter about the history behind today’s politics”, and follow her Facebook page where she does a weekly live session on the intersection of history and current politics, called Politics Chat (archived in YouTube). Richardson’s new book, Democracy Awakening, published last week, is on the New York Times Best Seller List. She is currently on a book tour across the country and tickets are selling out quickly. If we are not able to secure tickets to see Richardson, we can watch her conversation with Meghna Chakrabarti of WBUR here and her conversation with Rebecca Solnit here.
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