‘You’re not fighting!’: Dems run into angry crowds at town halls
Congressional Democrats — who were hoping to blast Republicans over budget cuts — instead took incoming from their exasperated constituents when they traveled home to host town halls.
In Arizona, Sens. Ruben Gallego and Mark Kelly were confronted at a joint forum Monday by an attendee demanding to know if they “would support removing” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. In Oregon, an audience member told Sen. Ron Wyden and Rep. Janelle Bynum on Sunday that he is “so pissed off right now at the leadership in the United States Senate that they are not willing to step up and fight.”
“Schumer has done what I think is the most destructive thing that he could possibly do as Democratic leader,” another cried on Saturday to Sen. Peter Welch of Vermont.
And those reactions were relatively mild compared to the scene that played out in the Washington suburbs Tuesday night when Rep. Glenn Ivey (D-Md.) held a town hall.
“You’re not fighting!” one woman shouted from the balcony, before being escorted out. “We are suffering!”
If Democrats were wondering where their 2017-era grassroots resistance army had gone, they’ve found their answer. Schumer’s willingness to vote with Republicans to advance a spending bill — and avoid a shutdown — has enraged the Democratic faithful not just in Washington, but across the nation. The blast radius is spreading throughout the party, far beyond Schumer.
In testy exchanges, town hall attendees pressed congressional Democrats to stop trying to strike compromises with Republicans, to adopt a stance that matches the gravity of the moment and to cease using court rulings or the midterms as their solution. What many hoped could have been a unifying force — a principle-driven government shutdown — exposed deep cleavages in a party still smarting from widespread losses last fall.
“If you’re Chuck Schumer, you’re wondering, ‘Why aren’t you screaming at Trump? Why aren’t you angry at the Republicans?’” said former Democratic Rep. Tom Malinowski, who began a town hall last week in his old New Jersey district just as news broke of Schumer’s decision. “We could ride that anger in two years to take back the House and the Senate. But most Democrats worry that we can’t wait for two years.”
Malinowski held the event because the GOP incumbent who ousted him would not.
It was only weeks ago that House Republicans were facing their own rowdy forums as constituents and liberal grassroots groups protested Elon Musk’s attempt to dismantle the federal government. In response, the House GOP campaign chief urged them to stop holding in-person town halls.
Democrats seized on that hesitance, organizing their own events as a contrast. National Democratic groups even organized a tour to hold town halls in the districts of GOP Congress members who refused to schedule any themselves.
But the congressional recess kicked off with Schumer’s announcement that he would vote to advance the GOP bill to fund the government. And so congressional Democrats returned home to voters exasperated not just by Republicans, but also by their own party’s leadership.
Two local progressive groups organized “empty chair” town halls to be held later this week in the districts of Rep. Jared Golden (D-Maine) and Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.), who both helped enact Republicans’ spending bill.
At the town halls that Democrats did hold, plenty of attendees expressed frustration with Trump, Musk and the GOP-controlled Congress. But voters also critiqued the Democratic party, according to a review of video, audio and local news reports of town halls in Arizona, Oregon, New Jersey, Maryland, Massachusetts, Illinois and Vermont.
Democrats hosting the events fielded the barbs differently.
In Maryland, Ivey initially won over the crowd gathered Tuesday in a high school auditorium when he suggested “it may be time” for Schumer to step aside.
But the event grew more raucous as anger built over Ivey’s repeated pivots to declaring the courts to be the best bulwark against Trump, while looking ahead to the midterms – some 20 months from now – as Democrats’ most efficient tool to thwart the administration.
Barbra Bearden, a recently fired federal employee, tersely told Ivey: “Don’t talk to me about the courts, don’t talk to me about the next election … I came here to find out what my congressman is specifically doing.”
Similar to Ivey, Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-Ill.) nodded and said “yes” when asked by a town hall attendee if Schumer should “retire or step down.”
In Arizona, when an attendee demanded to know if the senators would support ousting Schumer, Gallego deflected. “We’re focusing on this right now,” he said before turning to address Spanish-speaking voters and media.
Others pleaded with their constituents to stay united.
In Oregon, Wyden said he prepared to field questions about Schumer’s future and rose early in the morning pondering his response. “Trump would love to be able to bait Americans over various distractions and I would just ask please, please don’t fall for it,” he said, declining to directly address whether the minority leader should be deposed.
And in Vermont, when Welch acknowledged fears that a shutdown could make it easier for Musk to continue his “destructive work,” a constituent interrupted to voice skepticism.
“I understand you don’t buy it,” Welch said, later pleading: “We have to get over the fact that we lost in that particular debate and not turn our ally, who just has a reasonable disagreement with us, into the enemy.”
With Congress in recess, Schumer this week has embarked on a charm offensive aimed at improving his public standing.
Yet he is doing so from the comfort of a television studio rather than taking the risk of any close up and sustained encounters with a seething activist base. Citing “security concerns,” Schumer canceled public appearances in Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia and New York this week for “Antisemitism in America: A Warning,” his newly released book.
During an appearance on “The View” Tuesday, Schumer sought to not just explain his rationale for backing the Republican-drafted funding measure, but project confidence that he will maintain his grip on leadership of the Senate Democrats.
“When you’re a leader, if you see a real crisis a little bit down the road, your job is to stand up and say, ‘We cannot do that.’ And that’s what I did,” Schumer said.
When host Alyssa Farah Griffin, a Republican, asked if it was time to step down, Schumer was unequivocal in his response.
“When we don’t have a president, we have a lot of leaders,” the embattled Brooklynite said. “We have a lot of really strong talent in the Senate, in the House, in the governors, we have a great bench. But as far as the Senate caucus, of which I’m the leader — I should be the leader.”
That is far from a consensus view within the party. Democratic strategist Aisha Mills suggested the lingering anguish over the funding measure exposed a widening gap between elected officials and the activist base.
“He didn’t have the fight that we really as Democrats wanted and needed him to as a leader,” Mills said of Schumer. “It felt like a bit of a cop out.”
