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OUR OPINION
Michael Baumgartner, the first term U.S. Representative from the 5th District, which includes Pend Oreille County, faced withering questioning at the recent town hall in Spokane. In our opinion he deserves credit for not only holding the town hall but reaching out to The Miner via his wife, Evelyn, to make sure a place was held for us.
We had written to Rep. Baumgartner weeks earlier saying we wanted to be notified of such events and that if we knew about the event we would likely come for the benefit of our readers. After not hearing anything back and not being able to get one of the 800 free tickets available online, we were planning on just running the Spokesman- Review’s story and blaming Baumgartner.
During the town hall, from start to finish, Baumgartner was loudly heckled and criticized as he tried to get mostly standard Republican points across, blaming former President Joe Biden, saying demonstrations against Israel’s war on Gaza were antisemitic and refusing to support raising the cap on the amount of wages people pay in tax for Social Security.
As a freshman representative, he has limited power, although he is in the majority party and sits on some influential committees, such as the House Judiciary Committee, the House Foreign Affairs Committee and the House Committee on Education and the Workforce.
With the rest of the Congressional GOP falling over itself to go along with whatever President Donald Trump demands, Baumgartner has been one of the few Republicans to make a stand for fairness, such as supporting bi-partisan legislation to help unfairly fired federal workers who were reinstated retain their probationary status and making statements about money appropriated by Congress being spent as it was intended. He said he disagreed with President Trump about tariffs.
At the Spokane town hall, Baumgartner calmly stood in the face of the left leaning storm and spoke his mind as much as he could. There was no doubting he was a Republican and he took the heat for it. We think more Congresspeople should follow his lead and hold town halls, something few do. As he said, it is the People’s House. He needs to hear what his constituents think in this unsettling time.
We invite him to hold a town hall in Pend Oreille County. He may get some criticism, but also some support and it buys him credibility.
-Don Gronning
