House Republican craps on constituents raging about DOGE destruction
A town hall held by GOP Rep. Rich McCormick went off the rails Thursday night, when constituents in the safely Republican House district confronted the Georgia lawmaker over the cuts President Donald Trump and his co-President, Elon Musk, are making to the federal workforce.
McCormick’s staff was “caught off guard by the massive crowd of hundreds that gathered outside Roswell City Hall,” the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported, with constituents booing and accusing McCormick of doing a “disservice” to his constituents by not fighting back against the cuts being made by Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency.
The scene was reminiscent of the backlash Democratic lawmakers got in 2009, when Congress was seeking to pass then-President Barack Obama’s health care law. The explosive scenes at town halls were one of the early indicators that Republicans were going to do well in the 2010 midterms. That year, Republicans wound up romping to victory and taking back control of the House.
“I covered so many Tea Party town halls in 2010 that I feel like this Georgia town hall is a complete replay. Voter reaction is a real thing, even if you just won an election,” AJC reporter Patricia Murphy wrote in a post on X.
Similar backlash to GOP lawmakers took place in 2017, when Trump was trying to repeal the health care law that Congress passed in 2010. A year later, Democrats went on to win back control of the House.
McCormick, for his part, was defensive when constituents accused him of not standing up to Trump and Musk, going as far as to compare the peaceful protest his constituents were waging to the violent mob that ransacked the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, to try to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election win.
McCormick told the crowd that they were like “Jan. 6ers who are yelling just as loud as you,” which led to booing from the audience, the AJC reported.
It’s likely that McCormick’s own constituents are likely caught up in rampage, as his suburban Atlanta district is located near the headquarters of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which has been a target of the federal worker purge.
At the town hall, McCormick defended the cuts, and said many CDC jobs are redundant because of Artificial Intelligence.
The blanket cuts DOGE is making have caused chaos in the federal government. For example, the Trump administration had to scramble to hire back almost 300 employees it laid off who were tasked with maintaining the country’s nuclear weapons arsenal.
DOGE also had to backtrack on firing Department of Agriculture staff working to stave off an even worse bird flu outbreak, which is currently threatening the country’s supply of eggs and causing skyrocketing egg prices.
The cuts have been so destructive—impacting military families, veterans, and 9/11 survivors and first responders—that Republicans are starting to speak out, albeit tepidly.
Republican House members from New York urged the Trump administration to reverse course on job cuts to the 9/11 first responders health care fund, as well as cuts to research on illnesses caused by the deadly 2001 terror attack.
Rep. Troy Balderson, a Republican lawmaker from a safely Republican district in Ohio, said Trump’s executive orders are “getting out of control,” the Columbus Dispatch reported.
“Congress has to decide whether or not the Department of Education goes away,” Balderson told business leaders on Thursday, according to the Columbus Dispatch. “Not the president, not Elon Musk. Congress decides.”
Polling also shows that voters are pissed about Musk’s role in the Trump administration, and that they do not support the cuts Musk has helped Trump make.
A Washington Post poll released on Thursday found that 57% of Americans believe Trump has exceeded his authority with his executive actions in his first month in office. What’s more, just 34% approve of how Musk is handling his job, with 49% disapproving, according to the poll.
Ultimately, backlash this early should cause Republicans heartburn.
“Any republican member of congress who denies that public opinion has swung against them is welcome to host a town hall about it and find out,” Pat Dennis, the president of the Democratic opposition research firm American Bridge, wrote in a post on X. “Weirdly, few of them are.”
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