Activity Request: Thursday or Friday

Letter to the President, follow-up on his State of the Union Speech

[Note: As always any sample messages, letters, etc. that we provide are just that, “samples.” The samples are just what we’re sending out from this end and you are strongly encouraged to use your own judgment, voice and perspectives. Our prose, tone and approach can always be improved upon and quite frankly a good mix of perspectives is better than following our samples verbatim. We’re not the most reverent and that may or may not be good (we’re just expressing one opinion among almost a 1000 different member opinions). We don’t do messaging for the group (nor do we aspire to) or ever speak for the group, but instead merely facilitate our members’ ability to speak at once for more power and volume. If you’re a “professional communicator” or would like to help with recruiting, research, administration, etc. shoot us a note and we’ll be happy to get you involved. There is no lack of work to be done.]

No one should be surprised that HR3149 was not mentioned during the President’s State of the Union speech, but what should be surprising is that to date HR3149 is NOT being mentioned as part of the “jobs bill” being discussed in the Senate. That’s the main point we attempted to get across in our sample letter below. We’re confident that your perspectives may differ and your communication skills will be more persuasive . . .

Use White House link below (the link below was dead the first time we tried it, so if it is down, simply try again later) copy sample letter below, open link, paste in letter, edit to suit you, fill in the blanks and send. The form within the link allows for only 2500 characters MAX, we edited the sample letter below and tested it . . . it fits, so keep the length or your letter close to the sample provided.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact


[SAMPLE LETTER]

Dear Mr. President:

I watched your State of the Union address Wednesday evening with great anticipation. While your speech covered a lot of territory, I was most interested in your words surrounding the economy and jobs. While there are a myriad of pressing needs and issues facing our great nation, I’m sure you agree that none outweigh job creation and the economy.

While the current stimulus plan, as well as the new “jobs bill” you referenced, may prove over time to pay huge dividends for the American people – we need your help now. Because the vast majority of employers unfairly utilize a citizen’s personal credit report as hiring and firing criteria, millions and millions of citizens are now stuck in the job they have and if they are unemployed . . . they are locked out of the workforce all together in what constitutes a death sentence with no chance of escape. Millions of Americans are now locked into a catch 22 of bad credit = no job and no job = bad credit which equates to a financial death spiral with no means whatsoever to pull back on the stick before a crash and burn.

Nevertheless, HR3149: The Equal Employment for All Act (in the House since July) that would make this form of discrimination illegal is continuing to be stalled by corporate lobbyists and PACs. How could your State of the Union address mostly centered on job creation and discussion of a “jobs bill” not include immediate passage of HR3149? While on average 6 applicants apply for the rare job opening that does exist – those with damaged or destroyed personal credit reports never have a chance of even competing. How can that be fair?

In closing, I respectfully beseech you to follow through on delivering that “change we can believe in” by stopping the stalling games being played in Congress with passage of HR3149. Please see to it that the people are no longer made to pay for the sins of Wall Street by helping to get this critical legislation to your desk for signature.

[END SAMPLE LETTER]