here are strategies to avoid these people:

1. You just want to be left alone:
“Thanks so much for what you’re doing! I’m already a member and make a monthly contribution!”
(They HAVE to leave you alone now b/c there is nothing more they can ask of you).

2. You really like the canvasser and they’re nice and sweet and not pushy and you want to help them out, but you KNOW you’re not giving them money:
“Actually, I’ve been wanting to get involved, but I don’t have a lot of cash, could I make like a $!0 monthly contribution?”
(Canvasser thinks “JACKPOT!” because they make much more commission on “Sustainer” contributions)

So you give them a fake credit card number!

(they still get the commission AND by the time the bull shit organization (who isn’t really a citizen lobby but a place that essentially just raises money between elections to keep their offices open) realizes its fake, the canvasser has already been paid)- we used to turn in fake “Sustainers” ALL the time to boost our averages/ paychecks.

Sure its unethical, but so is asking someone to work 80 hours a week for $100 a day.

So is Grassroots Campaigns INCORPORATED. You can’t be a corporate grassroots. You just can’t.

3. I’m not talking you AT ALL- you look like an asshole.
Interior Monologue: “I’m walking, I’m walking, I’m on a fake phone call, I smile at Sr. Canvasser and make a gesture to my phone… I’m walking, I’m walking…”

Thus you have it! How to avoid the canvassing trap!