3.2 Value of constituent input
Insight into the extent to which input from constituents shapes the actions of our Members of Congress and their teams.
FINDINGS
While offices generally place some value on engaging meaningfully with their constituents, this does not always translate to de facto use of constituent input in shaping policy or legislative action.
Many offices — and staff in particular — do not hold constituent input in high regard and are relatively candid about how it does not influence policy-making.
Constituents aren’t insightful or informed enough to be helpful:
“Just to be honest, a lot of times our constituents are super under-informed. They don’t engage on a national or international level, and most of their feedback isn’t informing our decisions around national policy and legislative strategy.”
“Sometimes constituents want us to do something we already did or already support. If they reach out and this is the case, then we suggest tangible action steps that won’t necessarily impact policy-making. The intent is to make constituents feel like they’re a part of the process.”
Constituent input does not weigh on policy decision making.
“My boss voted 66 times to repeal Obamacare. He’s not going to change his mind now, no matter what this constituency thinks.”
“The boss rarely changes his mind based on high input volume — that’s just not part of the picture.”
“My pain point is not, ‘I wish I knew what our constituents were thinking,’ when it comes to politics and legislation. Their views aren’t informing our big-scale decisions.”
“There’s not always an overlap with what’s going on the Senate floor and what people contact us about. That’s a little frustrating.”
“It’s a rare day that we’re able to change a Member of Congress’ mind based on high input volume.”
However, there are two common instances in which some Members turn to constituent input: 1) as an informative datapoint when shaping policy decisions, or 2) as a datapoint to help advance an existing stance on a policy issue.
“When there’s an issue the Member is unsure about, she or the LD will want to know what constituents think about the topic to help her have a more informed decision-making process.“
“We use constituent input to bolster our existing policy efforts (e.g., use intake of constituent correspondence on X issue to support X bill that has already been positioned prior to considering constituent correspondence).”
“Constituent input allows us to get a better sense of what’s getting constituent attention and what constituents are fixated on. The Member likes to know about this in times of big policy fights.”
Some feel input loses value because the current approach for collecting and making sense of constituent sentiment is unscientific and thus misleading.
“We hear so much from the same people over and over. And there’s so many people we don’t hear from. It’s hard to know what to do with that sometimes.”
“I don’t feel like constituent correspondence is the best representation of our district. Let’s say suddenly we get 500 people reaching out to us about one issue — that might feel like a lot in that moment, but that’s really a small percentage of the entire district.”
3.3 Staff perspectives on the best ways to get heard
This article is part of From Voicemails to Votes (PDF), a report conducted by The OpenGov Foundation on the mindsets, capacities, tools, and operations of Congressional offices with regard to constituent engagement. More about the project here.
