Capitol News Connection / "Ask Your Lawmaker" interactive podcast

Capitol News Connection would like to invite you to participate in a new initiative.

CNC recently started an interactive "Ask Your Lawmaker" podcast. Each week there's a different U.S. senator or house member as a guest, and he or she is expected to answer questions from advocacy groups, activists, private citizens, or anyone else outside the Beltway who has a concern. Thus far, the focus has been on jobs and the economy, although questions about other topics are welcome. (You can find more information about the interactive podcast here: .)

In the next podcast, Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) will be the featured guest. The "Ask Your Lawmaker" team is soliciting questions for him from nonprofit advocacy groups in Oregon, and can accept them until 11:00 am pacific time (2:00 pm eastern time on Thursday, February 4th. Advocacy groups that wish to participate may submit their questions by going to .

For the "Ask Your Lawmaker" team, the value of advocacy groups is that they can offer pointed, well-researched policy questions about their signature issues, so it's highly desirable to get them into the mix.

For advocacy groups, the value of participating in the “Ask Your Lawmaker” initiative is that it gives them an opportunity to deploy experienced, credentialed congressional journalists to ask their specific questions and publicize the responses. (At no cost to the advocacy groups, of course.)

Advocacy groups that are interested in participating should feel free to go to to immediately. Groups that miss the February 4th deadline, but are still interested in having the “Ask Your Lawmaker” team pursue a response to the question and post it publicly to the web, are welcome to submit questions at . They are also encouraged to use the free “Ask Your Lawmaker” widget on their own web sites – the widget can be found at .