Rep. Doug LaMalfa, the Republican who represents much of California’s rural north, had barely begun his prepared remarks at a town hall in Chico early Monday when a chorus of boos and jeers overpowered him.
The raucous interjections didn’t relent for nearly 90 minutes.
The crowd of more than 650 people at the local Elks Lodge peppered him with obscenity-laden comments and slammed him for his vote for President Donald Trump’s budget bill, which cuts more than $1.1 trillion in federal spending for Medicaid, Medicare and plans under the Affordable Care Act over the next decade. The crowd excoriated LaMalfa for supporting legislation they said will “devastate” rural hospitals and hurt vulnerable people with disabilities and poor families.
But LaMalfa claimed the legislation makes “no cuts to the people themselves” in California’s Medicaid program, known as Medi-Cal, and instead only targets “waste, fraud and abuse” – a common and misleading line that House Republicans across the country have employed to defend the legislation.
“That’s a lie!” several attendees shouted when LaMalfa trotted out this refrain, amid a chorus of boos. “Shameless!”
“Is this how you get stuff? By yelling?” LaMalfa shot back.
LaMalfa largely defended his record, and those of his party and the president, at his first in-person forum in close to eight years in Chico, a Democratic college town that is one of a few blue dots in his Republican-leaning congressional district.
Tasked with selling constituents on the president’s new domestic policy law, which polls show is widely unpopular, congressional Republicans across the country have faced hostile crowds as they return to their home districts for the six-week August recess.
Voters in blue cities like Chico have shown up in force at GOP town halls to vent their frustration, which the Democratic Party hopes to channel into a victory at the midterm elections. One town hall in Lincoln, Nebraska played out similarly to LaMalfa’s, with constituents lined up around the block to get inside and then, once in the room, booing incessantly.
LaMalfa’s town hall also comes as Gov. Gavin Newsom and California Democrats charge ahead with a frenzied effort to redraw the state’s congressional districts to offset Trump’s plan to retain control of the U.S. House by squeezing more Republican seats out of red states like Texas and Florida. The proposed California maps, expected to be made public this week, could draw LaMalfa and four other Republicans into much bluer districts, according to sources who have seen the proposed districts but aren’t authorized to speak publicly.
The spacious community room was so tightly packed that several turned around and left. Inside, two lines snaked haphazardly down both sides of the room as constituents lined up to ask questions and comment. In an effort to reduce audience outbursts, staff handed out red and green placards for attendees to signal their opinion – but it did little to quiet the crowd.
Mathew Hilliard, a youth mental health counselor and social worker from Mount Shasta, drove more than 2.5 hours and waited outside for another hour to be the first in line to question LaMalfa about his support for the megabill. He told the congressman he was very concerned that defunding Medi-Cal could force rural hospitals in Siskiyou County and across the district to close.
“These facilities are vital to our disabled and our working-class people,” Hilliard said. “How could you support a bill that is going to devastate our already fragile infrastructure?”
LaMalfa, from his perch atop a barstool onstage, responded with the misleading Republican claim that the legislation will instead cut people who he believes should be ineligible for the program, such as people living illegally in the country and able-bodied working adults with no dependents.
“Ask Gavin Newsom why he wants $12.5 billion to go to people that aren’t even citizens of our state, thereby hurting the Medi-Cal program,” he said.
Newsom expanded Medi-Cal enrollment to people in the country without legal status, but was forced to rein that in this year amid a forecast budget deficit.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has estimated that Trump’s legislation will cause more than 10 million people to lose health insurance coverage by 2034, including more than 3.4 million Californians.
While health care dominated the boisterous forum, other questions ranged from Congress’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files to the Israel-Gaza war, and multiple commenters lamented White House overreach as Trump pushes the boundaries of executive power. Several people accused LaMalfa of aiding a descent into fascism and unleashed their fury over immigration agents rounding up U.S. citizens and legal residents in indiscriminate raids.
LaMalfa later agreed that immigration officers “shouldn’t be capturing people that are U.S. citizens,” and he said he would support a pathway to legal status for undocumented workers in crucial industries like farming and services. But he then contradicted himself and said the fear of wrongfully detaining a citizen or legal resident shouldn’t deter officials from casting a wide net, as they have in recent raids at Home Depot parking lots in Sacramento and Los Angeles, and sorting out the wrongfully detained people later.
The in-person, open mic town hall has gradually become a relic in the age of social media, as fewer elected officials are willing to prostrate themselves in today’s hyperpartisan era. House Republicans even discouraged their members from hosting face-to-face forums after a wave of negative headlines out of viral town hall confrontations – including with their own GOP supporters – earlier this year.
LaMalfa’s staff reminded the audience they could get through more questions and comments if they quit interrupting. But there was little appetite for civil discourse, even after several speakers implored their fellow attendees to pipe down.
Ryan Rogoski, a Navy veteran from Chico, told LaMalfa that due to lack of mental health providers in the area, he has to drive three hours round-trip to San Rafael to see a therapist for PTSD, which the congressman admitted was “crazy” and unacceptable. But when Rogoski begged LaMalfa to do something about the provider shortage, LaMalfa blamed it on “a few bad apples” in leadership at the local Chico VA who he said mismanaged existing funds.
“You’re giving the Pentagon so much money!” Rogoski yelled before storming out of the building in tears. He later told CalMatters that LaMalfa’s answer was “extremely false,” using an expletive to emphasize his frustration.
“It has nothing to do with taking care of veterans and our unique challenges,” Rogoski said.
Several constituents implored LaMalfa to denounce all the redistricting efforts this year as has fellow California Rep. Kevin Kiley, who recently introduced a bill to ban mid-decade redistricting.
But LaMalfa said California’s effort was especially reprehensible since voters established an independent redistricting commission nearly 20 years ago.
“Maybe the people in Texas, maybe the people in other states will put their own commissions in place in order to have it be independent,” LaMalfa said in an interview. “It’s really ugly,” he added. “It doesn’t give you more faith in the political process.”
