For representatives and senators who are Democrats. They are the party with the votes to hold hearings, demand documents, and set the agenda — this template asks them to use that power. The frame is oversight and majority responsibility. Copy the letter below, fill in the [brackets], print, sign, and mail.
[Your Name]
[Your Street Address]
[Your City, State ZIP]
[Your campaign email: [email protected]]
[Date]
The Honorable [Representative/Senator Full Name]
[District Office Address — from Step 2]
RE: Proclamations 10949 and 10998 — Use the Power You Have.
Congress Must Act.
Dear [Representative/Senator] [Last Name]:
I am your constituent, and I am writing about the travel bans and
visa freezes created by Presidential Proclamations 10949 and 10998.
[ONE PERSONAL PARAGRAPH — pick the one that fits you, delete the rest:
• "My [husband/wife/fiancé(e)/parent/sibling], [name], is from
[country]. [His/her] case was [approved / paused mid-process /
unable to even begin], and we have been [separated/waiting]
since [date]."
• "I am an employer in [city]. The [employee/case] my business
depends on has been frozen by these proclamations."
• "I am a student admitted to study at [school] in the United
States, and I cannot begin or continue my studies."
• "I was selected in the diversity visa lottery the U.S.
government itself runs — and my selection is expiring while
I wait."
• "I am a [refugee/asylee] whom the United States has already
granted protection — and the cases reuniting me with my
family have been stopped indefinitely."
• "I am not directly affected, but I believe a system that blocks
people by where they were born, at every stage, is wrong."]
These proclamations do not block people because of anything they
have done. They block people because of where they were born —
across every pathway of our immigration system: families, workers
and employers, students and scholars, diversity visa winners, and
the relatives of refugees and asylees the United States has already
granted protection. At every stage: applications just beginning,
cases paused mid-process, visas already approved.
The evidence is already on the public record. The State
Department's own internal guidance — produced in federal court in
Chikumba v. U.S. Department of State, No. 1:26-cv-00332 (D.D.C.) —
instructs that exceptions be "used rarely," and lists visiting U.S.
citizen family members, work, education, and even hardship as
reasons to DENY. And in A.A. v. State (E.D. Va., July 29, 2026), a
federal court vacated the application of these proclamations to
the families of approved asylees, ruling the policy unlawful as
applied to them. Two federal courts have now looked at this system
and found it cannot be defended.
There is also a separation-of-powers question at the center of
this: in 8 U.S.C. § 1202, Congress assigned visa adjudication to
career consular officers. That authority has been shifted to
political appointees. Article I wrote the immigration laws. A
statute passed by Congress should not be overridden by an internal
memo — and Congress is the institution with the power to say so.
You have that power, and you do not need a supermajority to use
it. Hearings compel answers. Questions for the record compel
answers in writing. Document requests compel the guidance itself
into the open. Every one of these tools is available to you now.
I ask you to take five actions:
1. Hold oversight hearings on the exception process and the
internal guidance produced in the Chikumba litigation — put the
"used rarely" guidance and its authors under oath;
2. Restore the immediate-family exception that existed under
Proclamation 10949 until December 2025;
3. Press for the resumption of processing at every stage — new
filings, paused cases, and approved visas;
4. Urge the State Department to preserve DV-2026 eligibility for
winners from affected countries;
5. Press for the end of the proclamations — restoring case-by-case
adjudication under the law Congress wrote.
[If you have a specific case:] I would also ask your office to open
a congressional inquiry into our specific case. I will promptly sign
any privacy release your staff needs.
I would appreciate a written response to [your campaign email
address / this address]. Congress must act — and you are Congress.
Respectfully,
[Your Signature]
[Your Printed Name]
[City, State]
Enclosures: [list any documents you enclosed, or delete this line]How to use this template
- Replace every [bracketed] item; delete any paragraph or fill-in option that doesn’t apply to you
- If your member sits on the Judiciary or Foreign Relations Committees (or their House equivalents), add one line naming their committee seat: “As a member of the [Committee], you can do this directly” — committee members hold the gavel
- Enclose copies (never originals) of case documents
- Print, sign in ink, and mail to the district office (from Step 2)
- Keep a copy of what you sent; when the office replies, send it to [email protected](Step 5)