3 in Wash. among 150 in Congress who haven't held town meetings
Three members of Washington's congressional delegation are among 150 members of the Senate and House who have not held a single town meeting since Congress began its current session in January of 2017.
U.S. Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., and Republican U.S. Reps. Dave Reichert and Jaime Herrera Beutler are on the list, along with such Capitol Hill heavies as House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
Reichert has spurned calls for a town meeting even when 750 people showed up outside his Issaquah district office last year. The seven-term congressman has since announced his retirement.
The list was published Tuesday by Town Hall for Our Lives, an outgrowth of students' nationwide March for Our Lives movement that followed the massacre of 17 students and staff at a Parkland, Fla., high school.
It includes 133 Republicans and 17 Democrats, including Murray and Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer. Congress has 535 members.
Town halls are a tradition among some Washington lawmakers.
Rep. Derek Kilmer, D-Wash., regularly makes the rounds of his Olympic Peninsula district. Rep. Rick Larsen, D-Wash., held a series of meetings on health care last year, as the Trump Administration pressed for repeal of the Affordable Care Act.
With the emergency of a front-rank challenger, former state Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown, Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers laid on four town meetings during the Easter Recess. The frequently asked question: Why don't you hold more town meetings?
Town meetings are very much a part of Oregon's political culture.
Sens. Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley, D-Oregon, hold hundreds of sessions in far corners of the Beaver State. They sometimes cross the state line to Walla Walla to catch a flight home.
Public appearances by Sen. Murray often follow a well-planned formula. She meets in round-table format with a group of constituents who agree with her on a problem. She hears them out and then explains legislation she has introduced that would deal with the issue.
Murray is ranking Democrat on the Senate Health Education Labor & Pensions Committee (HELP), which deals with such sensitive issues as rising health care costs and the depredations of U.S. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos.
Neither Murray nor HELP Chairman Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tennessee, has held a town hall in the last 17 months.
After taking some heat, Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., did hold a town hall at the University of Washington. The cost, including security arrangements, was substantial. The town hall saw a succession of liberals stand up and thank Cantwell for holding the town hall.
Rep. Herrera Beutler, Washington's lowest-profile House member, held town halls after her election in 2010. She had difficulty handling critics.
She has since held coffees to which people receive invitations, a device used by McMorris Rodgers until recently. Herrera Beutler once served as an aide to McMorris Rodgers.
Newly elected Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., represents an overwhelmingly Democratic district and is cutting a national profile.
But Jayapal is diligent about town meetings. She has picked venues as disparate as Shoreline Community College and the Horizon House retirement home on First Hill.
Some members of Congress need to be shielded from constituents.
Rep. Don Young, R-Alaska, has a history of making intemperate remarks, including an obscene reference to anal sex before a high school assembly in Fairbanks.
Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Florida, was challenged by Parkland shooting survivor Cameron Kasky to quit taking money from the National Rifle Association. He defended NRA ties, and has taken verbal fire since.
Rubio has not held a town hall.
By: Joel Connelly
Source: Seattle Pi