Representative Richard Hudson of North Carolina, the chairman of House Republicans’ campaign arm, issued a stark message to the G.O.P. rank and file on Tuesday: Stop having in-person town halls with your constituents.
The directive, relayed to lawmakers during their private weekly meeting in the basement of the Capitol, comes as
Republican town halls have devolved into angry shouting matches across the country. They have become forums where voters confront members of Congress about the sharp spending cuts they are proposing and President Trump’s moves to fire federal workers and defund programs across government.
Mr. Hudson told Republican lawmakers that Democratic activists were bombarding town halls and drowning out actual constituent voices, and predicted the trend would worsen, according to two people in the room for his remarks. He encouraged House Republicans to instead hold tele-town halls or Facebook Live events. Both of those formats allow moderators to filter questions and comments.
Speaker Mike Johnson endorsed the approach at a news conference later on Tuesday, arguing that in-person town halls no longer provided lawmakers with an effective way to communicate with constituents.
“Democrat activists who don’t live in the district, very often, will show up for these town hall events and they’ll go in an hour early and they’ll fill all the seats,” Mr. Johnson said. “Now I’m not saying everyone in these town halls that you’ve seen on television were not from the local area, but look, there are people who do this as a profession. They’re professional protesters. So why would we give them a forum to do that right now?”
At recent town hall events, some of the most strident complaints have come from participants who identified themselves as Democrats. But a number of questions pressing lawmakers have also come from Republicans. During a telephone town hall with Representative Stephanie Bice, Republican of Oklahoma, a man who identified himself as a Republican and retired U.S. Army officer voiced frustration over potential cuts to veterans benefits.
“How can you tell me that DOGE with some college whiz kids from a computer terminal in Washington, D.C., without even getting into the field, after about a week or maybe two, have determined that it’s OK to cut veterans benefits?” the man asked, referring to the Elon Musk-led effort known as the Department of Government Efficiency.
Similar scenes played out in 2017, when protesters
swarmed Republican town halls across the country and urged their lawmakers not to vote to replace the Affordable Care Act. Since then, a number of members of Congress have scaled back their participation in public town halls events, leery both of security concerns, and the optics of being subjected to testy confrontations.
