U.S. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, R-Battle Ground, the 3rd District, hasn’t held a live, face-to-face town hall since last January.
She has chosen instead to conduct what she likes to call “live, telephone town halls.”
A large block of her constituents experience this format as offensive, controlling and manipulative. The questions are screened, most questions don’t make it through the filter, and the ones that do touch on the least controversial issues.
There is no opportunity for meaningful, back and forth dialogue. A person asks a question. Herrera Beutler gives her canned answer. Her staff feeds the next softball question into the queue.
This month is the best opportunity for a face-to-face town hall as it’s the longest Congressional recess of the year. But, we’ve heard nothing from our Congresswoman about a town hall — in any format.
Her constituents have many questions about the relentless attacks of the Trump administration on our democracy, and we deserve face-to-face answers from Herrera Beutler. If she remains out of touch with us, we won’t go away. We’ll make our voices heard during the 2018 election.
