Rep. Jay Obernolte’s town hall started in Yucca Valley. It ended up on Rachel Maddow.
A social media clip of angry town hall-goers shouting down and booing the Southern California congressmember aired on the liberal TV commentator’s cable news show after the Saturday, Feb. 22, forum in which Obernolte, R-Hesperia, defended mega-billionaire and Donald Trump adviser Elon Musk.
“While there were some animated voices at the Yucca Valley event, many of those individuals were from outside the district and attended with the intent to disrupt rather than engage in a productive conversation,” Olbernolte spokesperson Connor Chapinski said in an email.
The Yucca Valley event was an “anomaly” and Obernolte “held six other community events across the district that had more constructive discussions,” Chapinski added.
“The Congressman maintains that our $36 trillion national debt is an existential threat to our nation and he supports efforts to root out waste, fraud and abuse of taxpayer dollars.”
Obernolte wasn’t alone in getting a hostile town hall reception.
Nationwide, Republican and Democratic members of Congress faced tough questions and raucous atmospheres as people angry about the Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency and proposed cuts to programs such as Medicaid took out frustrations on their elected leaders.
Musk, the world’s richest man, owner of the social media platform X and founder of electric vehicle maker Tesla and spacecraft manufacturer SpaceX, defends DOGE as a crusader against government waste and fraud. Critics accuse him of trying to usurp the Constitution with illegal, ham-handed spending cuts that threaten efforts to prevent diseases, forest fires and mid-air collisions.
Saturday’s combative town hall is an uncomfortable outlier for Obernolte, first elected to Congress in 2021 to represent a district that includes much of San Bernardino County, including the desert town of Yucca Valley along with parts of Colton, Highland, Loma Linda, Redlands and San Bernardino.
Not known as a high-profile, partisan bomb thrower, Obernolte, who founded a video game manufacturer, prefers to focus on issues like artificial intelligence. Last year, he co-chaired a bipartisan task force on AI policy.
Saturday’s event put him in the hot seat. A video shared on Instagram showed an unidentified woman grilling Obernolte about what he’ll do to stop Musk, who spent more than $250 million to help Trump win back the White House in November.
“Great question and I’m glad you asked it,” Obernolte replied as he held a microphone on stage. “I am very glad that someone is looking at all of the waste —”
The crowd drowned out Obernolte in mid-sentence with boos and jeers. Shouts of “Do your job!” filled the room as the former state lawmaker and Big Bear Lake mayor struggled to talk over the angry audience about the need to slash federal spending and the burden of federal debt on future generations.
In another Instagram video, someone shouted an obscenity when Obernolte, who was reelected in November with 60% of the vote, talked about how “for several years, a substantial portion of California’s state income tax” came from Musk.
Obernolte wasn’t the only House Republican to face a hostile reception back home. In Texas, Georgia and Wisconsin, people upset about Musk and proposed budget cuts gave Republican members of Congress an earful last weekend, The New York Times reported.
Democrats also have faced questions about Musk and DOGE at their town halls, including a telephone town hall hosted Tuesday, Feb. 23, by first-term Rep. Dave Min, D-Irvine.
“I was proud to hold a town hall with over 10,000 of my constituents,” Min, whose district covers much of Orange County, said in an emailed statement.
“People are deeply concerned about Elon Musk and DOGE’s illegal takeover of the federal government, and I made clear my commitment to doing everything in my power to enforce the rule of law and hold DOGE and Musk accountable.”
Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Los Angeles, also faced tough questions about the Trump administration during a recent telephone town hall. One caller expressed concern that Democrats weren’t doing enough to push back against Trump.
“If you want me to do performative things, I’m happy to do that, but you know what would be super helpful is (to) put pressure on Republicans,” Lieu said. “But if there’s something you think we should do, short of scaling the walls of the White House, I’m happy to consider it.”
Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Corona, who represents a swing district encompassing much of Riverside County, did not hold an in-person town hall last weekend. The longtime incumbent has been accused over the years of avoiding such events to dodge angry constituents.
But Jason Gagnon, a Calvert spokesperson, said via email that the lawmaker “held multiple telephone town hall meetings last year” along with a senior resource fair and roundtable of veteran service organizations.
“He looks forward to holding additional telephone town halls and other events with constituents in the very near future,” Gagnon added.
Protesters recently picketed Calvert’s district office demanding he oppose budget cuts and federal employee layoffs.
Gagnon cited an article in the Washington Free Beacon, a conservative news outlet, that linked one of the Calvert protests to MoveOn, a progressive political action committee.
“There’s a clear difference between authentic and organic constituent feedback — which Rep. Calvert values — and the outrage orchestrated by the same political organizations, like MoveOn, that are bankrolled by the same liberal billionaires that fund Democratic congressional campaigns,” Gagnon said.
Rallies were held last week in battleground Republican districts, including Rep. Young Kim’s, urging lawmakers to oppose Medicaid cuts. Kim spokesperson Callie Strock said the lawmaker is listening to constituents but did not say whether Kim, R-Anaheim Hills, will hold town halls in response to the rallies.
“Rep. Kim always appreciates her constituents advocating on issues that are important to them. She is listening and taking notes so she can fight on their behalf in Congress,” Strock said. “Our office has hosted several events open to the public, and the Congresswoman is constantly at public events in her district during the district work period.”
Protests didn’t stop House Republicans from passing a budget resolution Tuesday night, Feb. 25, that includes trillions in tax and spending cuts.
Democrats said the budget plan, passed by a 217-215 vote, cuts Medicaid to give billionaires a tax break. Calvert, Kim and Obernolte voted for the bill, while all House Democrats opposed it.
Town halls “can signal to the general public that they are not alone in their feelings,” Marica Godwin, a professor of public administration at the University of La Verne, said via email.
“There is no doubt that both local Republican and Democratic clubs send out email blasts encouraging attendance at town halls,” Godwin said. “The audiences tend to skew heavily to retirees and often are less diverse than the actual constituents. Everyone has a cell phone and multiple recordings get posted online if there is anything even remotely newsworthy.”
What’s different about recent town halls, Godwin said, is that lawmakers from both parties who represent safe congressional districts — meaning there’s virtually no chance they’ll lose reelection — are being targeted.
“Both are being pressed to do more to combat the Musk-led efforts and to reassert Congressional power,” she said.
“Much of the 2024 electorate’s anxiety seems to have turned to fear and anger. Musk is an easy focus of that anger, more than Trump. We also have to consider the high proportion of veterans and civilians who have worked at nearby military bases. They face real concerns about retiree benefits and health benefits, especially if they were injured or exposed to toxic working conditions.”
The GOP’s larger answer to avoid town halls like Obernolte’s may be to avoid town halls, period.
NBC News reported Monday, Feb. 25, that Republican leaders “suggest that if lawmakers feel the need to hold such events, they do tele-town halls or at least vet attendees to avoid scenes that become viral clips.”
House GOP leaders “are urging lawmakers to stop engaging in them altogether, according to the report.
Staff writerToni Sciacqua contributed to this report.