Congressman Sean Duffy was in Spooner today to hold a town hall meeting so I thought I would stop in - not to cover it but just to observe as this was my 1st time being at town hall meeting like this. I was not planning on typing anything about the meeting but I changed my mind after it was over and thought I would share my thoughts and observations.
The room was wall-to-wall with community members even with the town hall meeting only being announced just yesterday.
Joel Zimmerman, Executive Director of the Washburn County Economic Development Corporation, was the moderator.
Duffy was running a few minutes behind from his earlier town hall in Hayward, so Joel read through the list of rules which were pretty basic: ask a question, let the Congressman answer.
Duffy arrived at 9:36 a.m and also started off with telling everyone that he will listen to their questions without interrupting, and asked for everyone's reciprocation when he answered a question. Seemed pretty simple.
I quickly found out it wasn't simple enough.
The 1st question was regarding healthcare, which drew a loud applause from a seemingly anti-Duffy crowd, on why can't we as a country just fix ObamaCare instead of 'trashing' it and replacing it with a new plan? Not even ½ way through his response the crowd began loudly booing with several people yelling “LIE”, and holding up signs saying 'NOT TRUE' and 'DISAGREE'. Duffy again asked the room to let him finish his answer but the crowd continued to speak over him. When Duffy was finally able to finish, the crowd didn't seem very impressed with his answer.
Internet Privacy was also brought up by a woman who spoke for several minutes about how Duffy had voted for a bill that would decrease our privacy on the internet and said that it was 'shameful' and “disrespectful to sell the privacy of the internet.”
When she finished Duffy replied: “What is disrespectful is lying to the room. To say I voted for a bill, well, you should actually know what I voted for and didn't vote for.” Duffy continued to say that not only did he not vote for the bill, but has “been an advocate of privacy”. This was the quietest the room had been up to that point.
The situation in North Korea was also brought up and the question was asked why the United States is acting like the world's policeman.
“This is delicate and complicated stuff,” Duffy said calmly. “The philosophy of our last 3 administrations has been to allow them to be a rogue nation. The 'do nothing' philosophy is a bad approach to take.” Duffy continued to say that the threat of North Korea, and other countries, is real to the United States as these countries continue to get closer and closer to being able to put nuclear warheads in ICBM's that could reach the U.S.
Other questions that were asked included the topics of Apprenticeship, the Environment, regulations by the Department of Labor, VA prescription dispensing, NAFTA, Banking, Small Business, and National Security. There were moments of quiet while Duffy answered the questions, but there always seemed to be a level of angst as people continued to talk to each other about how they disagreed with Duffy so it was hard for a lot of people to actually hear his answers. Several more times loud boos rang out in disgust by some of his answers, and as I gazed across the room, I noticed some had a look of embarrassment by the actions of others on their faces.
Unfortunately, because of the situation of constantly being interrupted, and the fact that people were speaking at length before they actually asked their question, most people did not get a chance to have their question answered.
The last question came from an elderly woman who had moved here from Germany. She had a lot to say about her concerns over when Trump was elected and people raising their arms saying “Heil Trump” and referenced many images with swastikas being seen in the media by Trump supporters. Duffy said he had not seen some of the things she had referenced, which again was met with loud boos and “LIE” being yelled, but Duffy continued on and tried to speak to the concerns of the individual, but before he could finish – and with the room knowing this was his last question he would have time to answer - the crowd got so loud and with so many talking and yelling he could not finish his answer and simply thanked everyone for coming out.
So after attending my 1st town hall I truly hope this was just an anomaly and not the norm. I like a spirited debate and being able to have access to ask direct questions to our elected politicians, but it seems like a lot of the questions were asked just to ask - the answer was irrelevant.
Though some people had questions that they really wanted to have answered but when the person who asked the question has to stand up and tell the crowd to stop yelling and talking in the middle of Duffy's answer to his question, well that is just very disappointing.
Ah Ha! That's it! “Disappointing”. I've been trying to find the word that best described my 1st-time experience at a town hall meeting like this.
Huh. Now that is disappointing.
Last Update: Apr 19, 2017 1:52 pm CDT
