Speaking to a town hall audience last week, freshmen Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ) cautioned his constituents against raising taxes on wealthy Americans. As he made his case, he meandered into an explanation of his own personal wealth, which he said was not particularly noteworthy, saying he was “just like the rest of you folks.” The small crowd was made up of police officers, public school teachers, a city council member, and about fifteen others from the Tusayan area:
GOSAR: In the last election I was labeled a millionaire. Seriously. I ain’t wealthy. I built my own house, I wouldn’t do it again. I own my building, I have a dental practice. I live just like the rest of you folks. It’s all on paper, it’s not in cash.
Watch it:
Reliable wealth data is unavailable for Arizona’s first congressional district, the vast, largely rural area represented by Gosar. However, the median income is about$32,900 — a far cry below Gosar’s approximate $174,000 a year gig as a member of Congress. As Gosar mentions, he also owns substantial real estate, including a building worth up to $1 million, a dental practice worth up to $500,000, an antique store worth up to $500,000, and other assets.
ThinkProgress has reported extensively from town halls in Florida, Wisconsin, Arizona, and elsewhere. In addition, citizenjournalists have attended town halls and reported about them online, allowing others who couldn’t attend in person to see the event.
However, some congressmen are concerned about what could happen if citizen journalists repost their town halls on the Internet. At least two members of Congress have taken extraordinary measures to shut down the spread of information.
ThinkProgress readers passed along the following photos, taken outside town halls held by Rep. Lou Barletta (R-PA) and Rep. Joe Heck (R-NV). Barletta specifically barred citizen journalists and other non-credentialed media from recording the event, while Heck took a more encompassing approach of “no recording devices” at all:
When Republicans won back the House in 2010, one of their central promises was “to make Congress more transparent.” However, when it comes to their own congressional events, the same standard apparently does not apply.
Indeed, with members like Lou Barletta and Joe Heck barring citizens from recording the events and preventing those who couldn’t attend from seeing what the congressmen had to say, one has to ask: what are they trying to hide?
UPDATEAt his town hall, Heck reportedly faced a rowdy crowd upset about his vote for the Medicare-ending House Republican budget. When pressed, he backed away from the plan a bit, saying, “I’m not saying it’s the best idea, but it’s the only one and the best being proposed now."
The town hall backlash that began last month over the Republican plan to end Medicare and extend tax breaks for the wealthy is showing no signs of abating.
Rep. Dan Webster (R-FL) encountered many angry constituents Tuesday night during a town hall meeting outside Orlando. Attendees repeatedly admonished Webster for his support of the Ryan budget and pleaded with him to do more to ensure corporations pay their fair share in taxes.
One such constituent was Falcon Taylor. She asked why he was ruling out any tax increases, noting that previous Republican presidents had balanced budgets by raising taxes along with lowering spending. Webster responded that the problem was future generations would end up footing the bill. Taylor instead encouraged Webster to help close the nation’s budget deficit by raising taxes on corporations, manyofwhom are currently paying little to nothing in corporate income taxes. Moving in towards Taylor’s seat, Webster threatened to have her removed from the town hall, telling her “you’re making a choice of whether you want to stay or not.” Two other constituents then walked out in protest:
TAYLOR: What I want to know is, we’ve been able to balance our budget before by raising taxes and lowering spending and we know this because Eisenhower did it, Ford did it, Reagan did it, Bush the first did it, they were all Republicans. I want to know who’s going to pay, who’s going to pay for this? Because I don’t think we should take away Social Security [sic] just because we’re under 55 and public education, we need public education. [Inaudible] That’s wrong.
WEBSTER: The problem is this. Who’s going to pay? Your children and your grandchildren. That’s who’s going to pay. If we continue on this, yes, can we fund a lot of things going up this line? Sure can. But just know, most of it’s borrowed money.
TAYLOR: You need to raise taxes on the corporations! [Inaudible] And stop the wars! Just stop all the warring.
WEBSTER: Just a minute. I can hear, everybody in here can hear. So you’re making a choice of whether you want to stay or not.
TAYLOR: Answer the question!
[Audience cheers] [Two men walk out in protest]
Watch it:
This is not Webster’s first encounter with voter revolt over he and his Republican colleagues’ priorities in Congress. Last month, Webster was one of the firstcongressmen to encounter a wave of anger following the Republican-led House’s approval of the Ryan plan to end Medicare and extend tax breaks for the wealthy. (The scene at his April town hall was described as “bedlam.”)
ThinkProgress spoke with Taylor following the town hall to get her reaction. She was saddened by his “typical Republican response” that encouraged spending cuts alone with no tax increases. Taylor went on to express her disappointment that she was threatened with removal for pushing the idea of increasing taxes on corporations:
UPDATEIf you record video of your representative’s town hall that you think we would be interested in, please let us know.
Last month, ThinkProgress took note of a strange new defense of oil subsidies: denying their existence. Rep. Rob Bishop (R-UT), a top recipient of oil industry campaign contributions, defended billions in targeted oil subsidies by telling a constituent that they don’t exist, so Congress shouldn’t cut them. Now, it appars freshman Rep. Ben Quayle (R-AZ) is adopting Bishop’s novel defense.
At a town hall in Anthem last night, Quayle was asked by a constituent why he had pushed to cut services for the elderly and women while pushing massive tax cuts for the rich and tax subsidies for the oil industry. In a condescending manner, Quayle demanded that the constituent name the specific subsidies targeted towards oil companies. The constituent didn’t miss a beat, and reminded him that the Senate just last week held a hearing where oil industry CEOs defended billions in special taxpayer money. Quayle then went on to deny that any of the subsidies used by the oil industry are at all targeted:
CONSTITUENT: I’d like to know why you’d like to do this on the backs of seniors, and of women. All the cuts are going to hurt seniors, future seniors, and women! Your attacks on Planned Parenthood are hurting women who need healthcare. [...] And why are you are choosing that way rather than cutting oil subsidies [...]
QUAYLE: In terms of the oil subsidies, if we’re going to address it, can you just tell me what oil subsidies you’re talking about so I could have better information on what to expand on it?
CONSTITUENT: Why were the oil companies coming to defend their subsidies in front of the Senate? Those subsidies, anything in which we give them money when they’re making billions off of us every day.
AUDIENCE: That’s right!
QUAYLE: The things they were talking about were actually tax deductions that corporations across all sorts of sectors take in terms of R&D, in terms of equipment deductions, the life of the equipment, those were the deductions that they were talking about and it’s not specific to the oil industry [...]
[AUDIENCE LAUGHTER]
Watch it:
Earlier this year, Quayle and his Republican colleagues in the House of Representatives voted in lockstep to extend billions in tax breaks to oil companies. The subsidies include special tax breaks only available to oil and gas companies. For instance, there is the “Intangible Drilling Costs” tax break ($7.8 billion over ten years); a deduction for “tertiary,” or enhanced oil recovery methods ($67 million over ten years); and the percentage depletion allowance for owners of oil wells ($10 billion over ten years). Indeed, Quayle’s claim that targeted tax subsidies to oil companies dont exist is laughable.
And while Quayle promised his constituents that he would clear out all the tax loopholes at some future point, he voted for a second time two weeks ago to extend the same subsidies to oil companies.
UPDATEFox Phoenix reports that Quayle also took heat for his vote to end Medicare.
Motor City Liberal Comment: I suspect a lot of these Repugs like Quayle who got swept into office on I hate that Negro president movement will be one termers based on the fact they're going to spend two years doing nothing and jerking off the socially regressive wing of the Republican party by passing bills even their own leadership will admit they don't have a pray of passing in the senate.
The GOP-led House’s passage of a 2012 budget — engineered by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) — has laid the Republicans’ values out in the open for all to see:Strip huge amountsof funding from Medicare, Medicaid, andother programsaimed at supporting middle- and lower-income Americans, all to balance the budget (depending onwhose numbersyou believe) while keeping taxes on the wealthy atunprecedentedlows.
Now that Republican representatives have returned to their districts for the congressional recess, everyday Americans at town hall meetings across the country are reacting with outrage at the perverse priorities of the Ryan budget. And this latestmanifestation of the burgeoning Main Street Movement against the right’s economic agenda has only grown in intensity since both ThinkProgress (and even some mainstream media outlets) began reporting on the phenomenon.
Watch a compilation video of some highlights from town halls across the country over the past week:
As ThinkProgress has been reporting, all over the country a Main Street Movement of ordinary Americans is fighting back against right-wing attacks on their basic services and safety net. In recent days, this movement has beenfocusedonconservative legislators who voted for the GOP budget plan that would effectively end Medicare.
Rep. Charlie Gibson (R-NY) felt the heat of that movement last week when constituents responded to his fear mongering about undocumented immigrants not paying taxes by asking him, “You mean like GE?!” Yesterday, at yet another town hall meeting captured on YouTube, his constituents angrily and passionately rejected the GOP’s budget plan and demanded that the rich pay their fair share.
At one point, a young man named Daniel challenged Gibson about eliminating Medicare and handing seniors over to insurance companies. Gibson earned lengthy applause from the audience when he said it is “unconscionable” to put Medicare in the hands of the insurance industry:
GIBSON: As it [the GOP plan] relates to out of pocket costs, I think that’s an assumption you’re making as to how the insurance companies would react to that, isn’t it, Daniel?
DANIEL: No, actually the Congressional Budget Office, a nonpartisan organization, said that this would cost about 68 percent of seniors’ [income for] health care. And you mentioned how Congress, it’ll be like what Congress has, and yet they only pay about 28 percent.
GIBSON: Well, this is coming from the Congressional Budget Office, the figures that I have… I think the open question is how are the specifics of the law written, as it relates to the insurance company’s role in this. That’s where I think the specifics are yet to be defined.
DANIEL: I’ll have to disagree and say that the more important thing is that Medicare is something there’s been a consensus for decades that this is important American institution and to put in the hands of the health insurance industry who obviously are only concerned with their own profits is unconscionable.
(applause from audience)
GIBSON: I have to tell you one last thing though, if you’re preparing our proposal with the status quo, that’s a false choice. The CBO says that in a decade the plan’s going to be broke. Something has to be done to save it.
MULTIPLE PEOPLE IN CROWD: Tax the rich! (applause from audience)
Watch it:
At the same town hall, Gibson was also booed over his vote to de-fund Planned Parenthood and angrily confronted over claiming that the GOP plan does not privatize Medicare. (h/t: GibsonTownHall42611 YouTube account)
As voters around the country continue to voice theiranger at town halls over the Republican plan to end Medicare, Republican congressmen are using a range of tactics to try to avoid constituent wrath. In a heated Orlando town hall yesterday, Rep. Daniel Webster (R-FL) largely ignored contentious questions, leading many in the crowd to demand the congressman “answer the question!” Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), the architect of the GOP budget, even ducked out a back entrance during his town hall last night and left in a police car rather than his own vehicle.
Last night, ThinkProgress was in attendance for a Fort Lauderdale town hall where Rep. Allen West (R-FL) took a different approach: pre-screening all questions. Not only were all questions pre-approved by the congressman’s staff, but the attendees were not even permitted to ask the screened questions themselves; staff members read the questions instead, lest a constituent ask an unscripted question. The Sun Sentinel noted that West’s move to pre-screen questions was a far cry from “his usual practice at previous town hall meetings, where West took questions from people who lined up at microphones.”
Watch a short clip:
Still, a few upset voters attempted to circumvent West’s screening process and make their voices heard. These town hall attendees were thrown out by security and at least one woman, a former Air America radio host, was arrested.
It’s understandable why West would want to screen all the questions he would be asked. Voter anger over the Republican budget – West gave the plan a full-throated endorsement – has popped up in town halls across the country. Constituents have been giving an earful to many GOPers who support the Republican budget, including Reps. Paul Ryan (R-WI), Daniel Webster (R-FL), Charlie Bass (R-NH), Chris Gibson (R-NY), Sean Duffy (R-WI), Patrick Meehan (R-WI), and Robert Dold (R-IL). West’s move to pre-screen all questions was an unfortunate attempt to head off the voter backlash that’s plaguing other supporters of the Republican budget.
UPDATEIf you record video of your representative’s town hall that you think we would be interested in, please email it to us.
As members of Congress return to their districts and conduct town hall meetings with constituents, lawmakers who voted for the Republican budget are facing a backlash from their constituents. The budget, written by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), effectively ends Medicare, severely cuts Medicaid, cuts taxes on the rich, and lowers corporate tax rates. As ThinkProgress has reported, everyone from Ryan, to Rep. Pat Meehan (R-PA), to Rep. Lou Barletta (R-PA), to Rep. Charlie Bass (R-NH), and others have faced heated questions about the GOP plan.
Slate’s Dave Weigel reports that American Action Network, a relatively new conservative front group founded by a group of Wall Street bankers, is loading up conservative activists with softball questions and talking points to bolster Republican lawmakers on the Ryan plan:
Meanwhile, the American Action Network, the think tank and campaign shop run by former Republican Sen. Norm Coleman, is making Ryan budget talking points and questions available for conservatives who want to buck up their members.
American Action Network did not return ThinkProgress’ request for more information on the budget talking points. As we reported last year, the group was founded by investment banker Ken Langone, former Goldman Sachs executive Robert Steel, and investor and former Nixon official Fred Malek.
As the Wonk Room’s Pat Garofalo has explained, the Republican budget also contains provisions to unwind new regulations imposed on major financial services corporations. The Ryan plan repeals provisions in the Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform law that allow “the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC) to designate some firms as systemically significant and subject them to stiffer regulation” — a major reform Wall Street has lobbied aggressively to stop. The American Action Network board features a number of executives and lobbyists with a potential interest in rolling back financial regulations:
– American Action Network board member Fred Malek is chairman of the investment firm Thayer Capital Partners. – American Action Network board member Isaac Applbaum the founding General Partner of Opus Capital. – American Action Network board member Dylan Glenn is the Senior Vice President of Guggenheim Advisors. – American Action Network board member C. Boyden Gray is a director of FreedomWorks and founder of a lobbying firm called Gray and Schmitz. Gray recently penned an article calling financial reform unconstitutional. – American Action Network board member B. Wayne Hughes Jr. is the founder of American Commercial Equities Inc. – American Action Network board member Ken Langone is the chairman of investment banking firm Invemed Associates LLC. – American Action Network board member former Sen. Mel Martinez (R-FL) is an executive at JPMorgan Chase. – American Action Network board member Vin Weber is a lobbyist for a number of banks and insurance companies.
During the debate over health reform legislation, health insurance companiescontracted a number of lobbying firms to bring people to congressional town halls and ask industry-friendly questions. Similarly, banks like JP Morgan and Bank of Americaworked through fronts like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to battle financial reform during the legislative debate last year.
UPDATEHere is a copy of one of the Paul Ryan budget talking point lists distributed to conservative activists by the American Action Network.
