After six months and tens of thousands of messages to your elected officials, MOAA’s new Legislative Action Center has exceeded expectations, allowing members to send letters, make phone calls, report on your meetings with lawmakers, and much more.

The Legislative Action Center offers a host of tools and information for MOAA members to engage with elected officials on issues impacting the uniformed services and veteran communities. Some of these tools include:

• Campaigns to contact federal legislators: MOAA’s action center enables virtual advocates to send letters, make phone calls, and share the association’s advocacy priorities on social media as well.
  
  
• MOAA’s key advocacy issues: Want to know what MOAA is doing for the population groups of interest to you? Check out MOAA’s Key Advocacy Issues to learn more about what MOAA is lobbying for on behalf of these key groups.
  
  
• MOAA-supported legislation: On average, Congress introduces over 10,000 individual bills during every session (or over the course of two years). Use this dedicated page to find out each bill MOAA has supported during the current session of Congress.
  
  
• Log your interactions with lawmakers: The new log an interaction feature enables virtual advocates to provide MOAA National with information about their meetings with lawmakers.
  
  
• Look up your elected officials’ contact information: Unsure how to contact your lawmakers, or even who your elected officials are? The center’s directory feature not only finds their names, but provides detailed contact information for multiple offices, as well as links to their social media profiles.

You’ll need to register online at this link to access these features. You may need to register more than once if logging in via different devices (your mobile phone, for example) or different web browsers; once you have signed up on your separate devices/browsers, you should not need to re-input your information.

Legislative Action, by the Numbers

Since the launch of the new Legislative Action Center in January, MOAA’s virtual advocates have sent over 58,000 messages to Congress, to include pre-written letters, phone calls, and other types of outreach.

The platform played a critical role in this year’s Advocacy in Action campaign, helping mobilize our virtual advocates to contact their elected officials on this year’s campaign topics, and to collect information on meetings with lawmakers. Some key highlights from this year’s event include:

• All 535 congressional offices were contacted.
• Campaign participants reported more than 250 meetings with lawmakers.
• MOAA’s virtual advocates sent over 8,800 pre-written letters to Congress.

The overwhelming turnout from MOAA’s members and other advocacy partners in the first six months of the new action center has made an impression on Capitol Hill.

Virtual Advocates Make a Difference

MOAA’s success in the halls of Congress is not possible without continued and steadfast member support. The thousands of letters and hundreds of phone calls you’ve made through our Legislative Action Center this year did not go unnoticed by lawmakers.

One example: The progress made by the Sergeant First Class Heath Robinson Honoring Our Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics (PACT) Act of 2022, which has been driven, at least in part, by the sheer volume of constituent engagement lawmakers received on this critical issue.

“This was a total team effort, from the legislative staffs in both chambers to the dozens of advocacy groups on board to the grassroots work put in by thousands of MOAA members,” said Lt. Gen. Dana T. Atkins, USAF (Ret), MOAA president and CEO, after the legislation cleared the Senate on June 16.

Member advocacy also has helped increase the number of co-sponsors for the Major Richard Star Act (H.R. 1282/S. 344), which would support 48,000 combat-injured servicemembers (many seriously disabled) with concurrent receipt of their medical retirement pay and VA disability. It’s also pushed forward the introduction of legislation in both chambers of Congress that would seek to protect the burial benefits of qualifying servicemembers and veterans.

While MOAA’s Legislative Action Center is a powerful tool, its power stems from the dedication of MOAA’s virtual advocates, and their continued engagement with lawmakers on the issues impacting the uniformed services and veteran communities. As much as MOAA fights for you, MOAA needs you to fight alongside us as well; check out the Legislative Action Center now.