This is a three part series.

Click here to watch Part 2: "A Dose of Texas Medicine"

Click here to watch Part 3: "Inside the Care Zone"

What do we want from our government? How do we get it? And what is the chance your member of Congress will listen to you?

We sought answers to these weighty questions in the vast stretches of Texas’ 23rd Congressional District, in the southwest corner of the Lone Star State. Last fall, we followed Rep. Will Hurd, a Republican congressman. He represents a district where party registration is nearly evenly divided, and his last margin of victory razor thin, prompting him to work across party lines. 

“Our office, we have two goals, everybody knows it,” Hurd said in an interview recently. “Number one: be a leader on national security. Number two: be the gold standard in constituent services.”

One constituent has a request for Hurd, and an unusual one: helping to fund equine therapy for women who were sexually assaulted in the military. What, if anything, can the congressman do to help?