Basu: Does your senator read your letter? And does it matter?

Editor's note: This column was revised from its original version, which began with Christine Wagner-Hecht of Cedar Rapids, who clarified that Sen. Chuck Grassley responded separately to two emails she sent regarding the immigration ban and to the nomination of Jeff Sessions as attorney general.

Cynthia Hanevy of Grinnell didn't think Sen. Chuck Grassley was hearing her when he responded to comments she submitted through his website about President Donald Trump's immigration ban being discriminatory and poorly thought out.

The senator thanked her for her contact “to express your support for helping Syrian refugees.”

The problem: “I may have mentioned the Syrian refugees, but I doubt that it was the primary focus of my letter,” Hanevy wrote me.

One can only imagine how many communications senators are getting from concerned or indignant constituents. At the Women's March in Washington, marchers resolved to make their voices heard meaningfully by contacting their elected officials on policies they couldn't support. The recent call volume has overwhelmed the Senate switchboard, said Jill Gerber, Grassley's communications manager in Washington, D.C.  She said he sent out the equivalent of 300,000 emails a year as of last October.

Still, if the point is to get your representatives to hear your point of view,  generic talking points dispatched in mass mailings don't quite cut it.

Hanevy was one of several Iowans who contacted me after receiving form letters from Grassley.

It wasn't until the sixth of his eight paragraphs that Grassley addressed the executive order that Hanevy raised — after heralding America’s historic generosity to refugees, 9/11 and the threat of "radicalized Islamic extremists who are hard-wired to kill innocent people and destroy our way of life.” He said the temporary halt (since put on hold by a judge) was necessary to get a more thorough screening process.

She wanted to know what that would be, given that the existing process to get refugee status in particular takes about two years. She also asked why Saudi Arabia, where 9/11 terrorists had come from, was excluded. Did it have to do with Trump’s business interests there?

She wrote back to Grassley saying as an informed voter, she found his responses condescending. She belongs to a Facebook group whose members share similar concerns, which they try to get addressed by elected officials.

Susan McIntyre of Grinnell wrote Grassley with multiple concerns: Trump's Cabinet appointments, his “lack of concern for the stability of our country,” and his use of an unsecured smart phone, among other things.

Grassley replied: “I appreciate hearing your thoughts on the nomination of Senator Jeff Sessions to be Attorney General of the United States.”

To Grassley's credit, when Allice Reynolds sent him petitions on multiple issues of concern, she got back multiple form letters, on the Affordable Care Act, Sessions, Betsy DeVos as education secretary and Scott Pruitt as head of the Environmental Protection Agency.

Kelcey Patrick-Ferree got the DeVos email after calling Grassley's office to urge him not to vote to confirm her. It made the following points:

• The secretary of education is not a national schools superintendent and DeVos won't be in charge of Iowa's public schools. (Does anyone not know that?)
• She doesn't oppose public schools, and any claims she does stem from her life’s work "to help low-income families, regardless of their ZIP code, access the same educational choices that wealthier families routinely exercise.” (Read: Divert public education funds to private or semi-private schools). 

Patrick-Ferree's reaction? “I am an attorney and a generally well-informed constituent; this was a very disappointing response.”

Gerber said the senator's letters are written in collaboration with legislative correspondents and staff. She didn't like the phrase "form letter," saying Grassley's are substantive. "The process isn't perfect but he works hard to answer everything as best as he can."

But does he read the responses that people send if they're still not satisfied?

"He's said many times that if people feel he isn't answering their questions, they should contact him again, and he'll respond and does respond," Gerber said. But, she said, "there might come a point where there's nothing more that can be said that would satisfy the writer."

Maybe that's the way it has to be, given time limitations. But does he even care what constituents think? Could it influence his actions?

Reaching out to our elected representatives is the way any civics class teaches us to engage in a participatory democracy. It doesn't seem, for all their efforts, that the people I spoke to are getting through.

"His communications just don’t seem to be responsive to what he is asked," Hanevy said. " We know they are form letters, and I wonder if anybody is even reading our comments."