Can you tell us a little bit about yourself, your background, your experience?
My name is Laura Brockelman. I am 20 years old and going to be a junior at the University of Notre Dame. I was born and raised in Tempe, AZ. I interned with the Government Relations section of Citizens for Global Solutions during the Spring 2007 semester.

Before you interned with Citizens for Global Solutions, had you ever lobbied before?
No, in fact I really had no idea what lobbying was supposed to be like.

What was your biggest fear in attending your first lobby visit? How did you prepare for the visit to overcome this fear?
I was completely terrified that someone was going to start asking me questions that I couldn’t answer. I didn’t feel better about this until I realized that it isn’t a bad thing to tell them you will get back to them after you research a certain fact. It also made me feel better that I was with other people who might know the answer.

Can you tell us a little bit about your first experience with lobbying? Were you nervous? What surprised you?
The first time I went lobbying I think it was to the Foreign Policy Legislative Assistant for Senator Cardin. I truly had no idea what to expect. I think the part that surprised me the most was how much material we covered in such a short meeting. It was the most productive half hour meeting I have ever attended. Also, I had always envisioned lobbying as argumentative by nature, but the visit was very social and cooperative. It was just informative, rather than being a debate.

What sort of topics did you lobby on? Would you consider yourself an expert on these issues before your visit?
I lobbied on many issues including peacekeeping funding, energy issues, a U.N. Emergency Peace Service, and the Law of the Sea Treaty. I didn’t have any previous knowledge of these issues before my internship started. To prepare for the visits I read the Citizen’s for Global Solutions fact sheets, read any active legislation on the subjects, and listened to what other people were saying about the issues.

What sort of insider tricks did you learn through successive lobby visits?
One of the key things I learned is to try and say “I’ll get back to you on that” at least one time during the conversation. This way it gives you a built-in reason for you to stay in contact with the person. (But always be sure that you really do follow up if you say you are going to!)

You even did solo lobby visits on the Hill! Tell us a little bit about the solo lobby visits, and what got you to the point where you felt confident enough to do so.
Oh goodness, I cannot even tell you how nervous I was before I went on the solo visits. I knew I wanted to do them, but I didn’t feel very prepared. I was going to be lobbying on the U.N. Emergency Peace Service. Unfortunately, there are not tons of documents or essays to read on the subject. However, I did read as many documents as I could get my hands on (that was only about 3). I think the thing that helped me the most, though, was role playing practice visits with other people. I wrote out bullet points of things I wanted to be sure and mention and then practiced on all of my roommates, my boyfriend, and my family. All that practice made me much more comfortable with the material.

Do you have any other suggestions/words of wisdom for people new to lobbying?
I think the biggest thing to remember when you are doing lobbying visits is that you know more than they do. The person you are lobbying to is responsible for all kinds of legislation, so they probably do not know this one issue very well. Lobbying visits are really informational meetings. You try to give them as information on the legislation and reasons that the Congressman should support it. If you go in with confidence and speak clearly and articulately you will have a successful visit.

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