Effective Communication With Political Staffers: A Framework For Animal Advocates
Background
While numerous animal advocacy organizations and grassroots advocates engage in legislative efforts at the state and federal levels, there are relatively few resources focused specifically on legislative advocacy tactics for animal advocates. Existing materials provide general guidance on advocacy and government processes but often lack in-depth strategies tailored to advancing animal protection legislation. Given the challenges of influencing policy, Faunalytics and its partners identified a need for insights into effective legislative advocacy approaches that can help animal advocates navigate the complexities of policymaking while more successfully influencing policy.
Several past and recent resources provide a foundation for understanding the basics of legislative advocacy in the animal protection space. A 2004 study by the Humane Research Council (now Faunalytics) examined how state legislative offices engage with animal advocates and their communication preferences, offering an initial framework for best practices. More recently, the Coller Animal Law Forum’s Advocating for Animals: A Guide to Legislative Advocacy overviewed key advocacy activities and government structures but offers limited details specific to advocating on behalf of animal-related legislation. These resources, along with booklets, blog posts, and webinars provided by other prominent animal advocacy organizations, offer helpful guidance and tips for animal advocates interested in engaging with policymakers, but a gap remains in understanding the communication strategies, policy messages, and leverage points that animal advocates can utilize to more effectively advance animal protection legislation.
Recognizing the need for a deeper understanding of legislative advocacy from an insider perspective, this qualitative study explores effective communication strategies for engaging legislators and their staff. This study aims to identify best practices for engaging with staffers to strengthen legislative advocacy efforts to advance animal protection policies by building on existing resources and incorporating insights from those working within the legislative process.
Key Findings
- Understanding legislative processes and the specific context of a given legislative body is crucial to advocacy success. Advocates don’t necessarily need to be experts, but having a clear understanding of the legislative process, the role of legislators and their staff, and the unique aspects of a given legislature can go a long way in strengthening legislative advocacy efforts. It is particularly beneficial to understand how staff support legislators, as they often serve as gatekeepers and policy advisors.
- Personalized communications are best. While form emails and calls may, in the aggregate, have some level of impact, personalized communications have a far greater chance of capturing the attention of policymakers. Politicians may be most impacted by personal stories, one-on-one meetings, or otherwise individualized communications, not fill-in-the-blank formulaic emails.
- Having a clear legislative “ask” is fundamental to effective communication. Participants emphasized that communications to legislators lacking a clearly articulated request are far less likely to lead to legislative action, especially given the limited time and capacity of legislators and their staff. While personalized messages can capture legislators’ interest, clearly specifying a desired legislative action is essential to motivate a meaningful response.
- Building relationships with legislators and their staff is an important step toward building the political capital of the animal protection movement more broadly. Participants consistently highlighted the value of building rapport with legislators and their staff toward achieving legislative goals, suggesting that animal advocates should not underestimate the benefit of taking the time to build relationships and trust within the legislature.
- Building a diverse coalition of advocates is essential. Aligning animal protection policies with other issue areas can create opportunities for collaboration across advocacy groups, amplifying efforts and increasing the likelihood of success. Examples of prospective collaborators include climate groups, alternative protein companies, human and labor rights organizations, and even local animal farmers who are motivated to fight back against industrial farms.
- Maintaining flexibility and being willing to accept compromise may lead to long-term success. As participants shared, compromise is inherent to the legislative process, and windows of opportunity are always shifting. Legislative staffers expressed that animal advocates can compromise on their strategy without compromising on their ultimate goal of ending animal suffering and should be both flexible and persistent in their approach.
- How an issue is framed can have a significant impact on buy-in. Although the ultimate goal of advocating for a policy is to protect animals, framing the issue around priorities and interests that tend to have more bipartisan support, such as economic benefits or impacts to human well-being, can go a long way in generating the kind of broad support that is often needed to propel legislation forward.
Recommendations
For Grassroots Advocates
- Whenever possible, target policymakers who directly represent you. Legislators and their staff prioritize communications from their own constituents, making direct engagement more impactful. Focus on building relationships with your local representatives to increase the likelihood of gaining their support.
- Be professional and respectful in your approach to communications. Legislators and their staff have limited time and capacity and are more likely to meaningfully engage with constituents who are well-informed, have a clearly articulated ask, and take the time to follow-up after an initial engagement.
- Take the time to build up your policymaking expertise. Understanding legislative processes, committee structures, and the key decision-makers will make advocacy efforts more effective. Consider attending advocacy training, working with policy experts, or seeking mentorship from experienced advocates.
- Stay in it for the long haul. Recognize that effective advocacy is not a singular effort, but requires commitment and persistence to build strategic relationships and make progress toward a long-term goal. Policy change rarely happens overnight. Advocates should stay engaged, follow up regularly, and be prepared for setbacks while maintaining a focus on incremental wins that build momentum over time.
- Think creatively about how the goals of animal advocacy may align with those of other advocacy groups and find opportunities to join forces. For example, collaborating with organizations focused on public health, environmental sustainability, rural economic development, or consumer protection can strengthen advocacy efforts and expand legislative support.
- Don’t discount legislators who do not have a history of supporting animal protection legislation. Just because a legislator has not previously championed animal issues does not mean they will not in the future. Many lawmakers may be open to learning more, particularly if the issue is framed in a way that aligns with their priorities or district needs.
- Be strategic about how you frame and message around an issue. Tailor messaging to align with legislators’ values and concerns while avoiding overly polarizing frames in politically challenging environments to increase the likelihood of bipartisan support. Some key frames that staffers mentioned as effective are animal welfare, economic benefits, climate (for left-leaning offices), and the harm that animal agriculture has on human health.
For Animal Advocacy Organizations
- Expand training opportunities for animal advocates interested in legislative advocacy. Continue to invest resources to provide workshops, webinars, and mentorship programs to help advocates develop the skills needed to navigate legislative processes, engage policymakers effectively, and craft persuasive policy messages.
- Emphasize the value of personalized messages when sharing action alerts and templates. Encourage advocates to personalize their messages and calls rather than relying solely on form communications. Provide resources that guide advocates in crafting individualized messages that resonate more effectively with legislators.
- Create opportunities to support animal advocates in building diverse coalitions. Facilitate connections between animal advocates and organizations working on related issues, such as environmental protection, public health, and economic justice, to strengthen advocacy efforts and broaden support. This could include hosting networking events, collaborating on advocacy campaigns, or developing formal partnerships.
- Identify opportunities for meaningful incremental policy change at the state and federal levels. Focus on achievable policy wins that can create momentum for larger reforms. Providing advocates with model legislation, policy research, and case studies of successful incremental changes can enhance their effectiveness.
- Support advocates in understanding their individual efforts as part of a broader strategic movement. Help advocates see how their local and state-level actions contribute to national and global animal protection goals. Encourage long-term engagement by reinforcing the collective impact of sustained advocacy efforts.
- Encourage and equip advocates to engage with a broad spectrum of legislators. Provide resources and tools to support advocates in engaging with legislators with diverse backgrounds and legislative priorities, including guidance for tailoring message frames and initiating communications with legislators without a history of engagement on animal protection issues.
Applying These Findings
We understand that legislative advocacy can be especially difficult for activists, both due to the high time and effort investment and the relative lack of impact data as compared to other interventions. To help, we’ve compiled a few resources, some of which we referenced in this study, that may help advocates apply these strategies to their work:
- Getting Started In Legislative Advocacy – Faunalytics
- A Time For Pragmatic Vegan Advocacy – Faunalytics
- Local Action For Animals As A Stepping Stone To State Protections – Faunalytics
- How to Communicate Effectively with Legislators – Animal Welfare Institute
- ASPCA Legislative Alerts Study – Faunalytics
- Telling Your Personal Story – All In Together
- Effective Advocacy Guide – PETA
- Bridging U.S. Conservative Values And Animal Protection – Faunalytics
- Reforming Animal Agriculture Subsidies: A Guide for Advocates – Faunalytics
- Center for Effective Lawmaking
We understand that reports like this have a lot of information to consider and that acting on research can be challenging. Faunalytics is happy to offer pro bono support to advocates and nonprofit organizations who would like guidance applying these findings to their own work. Please visit our virtual Office Hours or contact us for support.
Behind The Project
Research Team
This project’s lead author was Erika Berglund (JG Research and Evaluation). Drs. Jo Anderson (Faunalytics) and Andie Thompkins (Faunalytics, Mercy for Animals) contributed to the research design and reviewed the final report.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank several advocates who provided valuable input about this research throughout the process. In addition, we are grateful to Faunalytics’ donors for your support — your donations allow us to conduct essential research like this to help you take action for animals.
Research Terminology
At Faunalytics, we strive to make research accessible to everyone. We avoid jargon and technical terminology as much as possible in our reports. If you do encounter an unfamiliar term or phrase, check out the Faunalytics Glossary for user-friendly definitions and examples.
Research Ethics Statement
As with all of Faunalytics’ original research, this study was conducted according to the standards outlined in our Research Ethics and Data Handling Policy.
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Citations:
Berglund, E. (2025). Effective Communication With Political Staffers: A Framework For Animal Advocates. Faunalytics. https://faunalytics.org/effective-communication-with-political-staffers/
