While the national organizations hold a press conference in Washington, DC to announce the actions across the country, we are calling on our respective affiliates, chapters, and grassroots activists to organize an event in their respective cities. The national offices will do PR work to promote the actions taking place around the country, which should show, perhaps for the first time, the width and breath of the movement in this country that is demanding to have the sanctions ended. We want to make the anti-sanctions movement part of the national consciousness. Many of you might have been notified about our organizations' previous efforts to put together a press conference with representatives of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops and the National Council of Churches, which represents the mainstream Protestant denominations. While these two national groups have decided to do a press event on their own time line, we are including national religious leaders in the press conference in Washington and urge you to invite concerned local religious leaders to speak at local press conferences.
Religious leaders can speak with moral authority and carry huge credibility.
Also try to include individuals who have participated in aid shipments to Iraq and have first hand knowledge of the devastation there. A list of statements by the mainstream religious denominations opposing the sanctions is in preparation and could be very helpful in recruiting local religious leaders to your event and in educating the media and the public. A Post Office Action. Many of you might have heard of this also. This form of action has gotten great press where it has been done.