When your Congress Member comes to town

— from David Turnoy —

Orcas Issues Editor Lin McNulty asked me to take notes on Rep. Larsen’s appearance and write an article, so what follows is a summary of his presentation from my perspective as a private citizen, not as chair of the county Democrats. The views expressed will be those of the Congressman, not my own. I will use the abbreviation RL to refer to him.

Rep. Larsen was very generous with his time, spending almost two hours with us, first giving a summary of the past year, then answering all questions presented. He also acknowledged that we were meeting on land that originally belonged to the Coast Salish.

RL stressed the importance of the upcoming census. The funding of many federal programs is dependent on the census numbers, so it is very important to participate. Susanna from Lopez attended the Town Hall to speak briefly about the census. She says that they have 17 positions to fill, and these jobs will pay $20-22 per hour. They would very much appreciate each of us filling out our census information online; I think it is only nine questions. We may receive something in the mail that will direct us where to go online, which will be available starting on March 13.

RL told us that over 400 pieces of legislation were passed in the House of Representatives during the past year, but over 300 of them have languished on Senate Majority Leader McConnell’s desk. Some of the legislation that was passed includes strengthening voting rights, comprehensive gun reform, lower prices for prescription drugs both in Medicare and in the private sector, infrastructure repair, and strengthening the Affordable Care Act. Luckily some of the legislation passing the House that was refused a look by the Senate was folded into appropriations bills so that a number of these good bills became law.

RL’s office assisted over 300 constituents on consumer casework in the last year. He has also traveled a lot as part of his job, especially to visit our troops and to assure nervous allies that we are still their allies, contrary to what seems to emanate from the president’s mouth.

The president’s proposed budget for the next year includes cuts to infrastructure, which he had campaigned to improve, and cuts to Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, which the president has also said he would never cut. Social Security and Medicare are earned benefits; people have paid into these programs with their tax dollars during their working years, and the payment of these benefits is mandated by law. The president also wants to cut affordable housing.

RL has introduced four bills on infrastructure, a bill on school grant funding, and bills on updating our influenza plans. He says that 36,000 Americans die every year from the flu.

RL has supported extending the deadline to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment, and he is in support of the Wild Olympics wilderness bill now in the Senate. He has been involved with the PRO Act to protect workers, giving them the right to organize and more bargaining rights.

RL voted for the sixth time to repeal the Authorization for the Use of Military Force approved 18 years ago which is still being used for sending troops to the Middle East. RL says that contrary to popular belief, he never voted for it in the first place.

RL is chair of the Aviation Subcommittee. They have been looking at the working conditions of aviation ground workers, and they have conducted a hearing on the shortage of aviation workers. They have also conducted five hearings on the crashes of the Boeing Max.

There has been too much delegation of safety inspections to industry; the FAA should not have been given so much authority to delegate. The FAA is now being required to look at every Max before it is allowed to fly. RL has a list of 55 recommendations, some to be accomplished through legislation and some through regulation. Issues include pilot training, software, programming of the flight deck, and more. Boeing needs to commit to being a safety and engineering company as opposed to a financial services company, and the FAA needs more funding.

RL is leading the push for a Moving Forward bill, which would provide $700 billion for infrastructure over the long term. He is a cosponsor of Net Zero by 2050 and wants the US to rejoin the Paris Accords. He is helping to introduce electric buses in Everett and other places in the district.

RL was asked about breaching the Lower Snake River dams. The questioner said that three of the four dams are not profitable and that the channel for boats needs to be dredged continually. RL said he does not support breaching, that it could be 15 years before breaching would have its intended effect, which could be too late for the salmon. Instead he is supporting Governor Inslee’s task force on salmon and orca recovery through a series of 23 actions he has taken in the House, addressing prey, vessels, contaminants, and climate change. RL provided a handout on this, and you might contact his office to get a copy.

RL says he does not support the Green New Deal but that he is doing many things to fight climate change. He had another handout on the things he is doing in this regard, listing the following topics he is working on and his specific actions:

• greenhouse gas emissions
• clean air and water, climate and community and sustainable environment
• smart power grids
• energy and water efficient buildings
• transportation, infrastructure and agricultural industries
• labor
• justice and equality
• hazardous waste and abandoned sites
• higher education, health care, and housing

RL says the infrastructure plan he is working on has a “fix it first” orientation, i.e., let’s fix existing roads and bridges rather than building new ones. Lower carbon emissions need to be a part of this. At this point County Councilor Rick Hughes spoke up that RL has been a great advocate for federal money for local road repair and that RL has been move involved than any other official in transportation.

RL was asked if large campaign contributions influence his votes, and he responded in the negative. Citizens United allows undisclosed and unlimited amounts of campaign contributions as “political free speech”. RL opposes this, and he says that transparency laws can be introduced to limit the effect of Citizens United. He and the House passed HR1, the For the People Act which works on more transparency and voting rights. He takes PAC money from unions and the Planned Parenthood PAC. A constituent in attendance brought up that 73% of RL’s contributions are from PACs (political action committees), that RL is influenced by this. RL responded to look at his voting record as proof, and the constituent said that he has. Another constituent then brought up the feasibility of public financing of elections. RL said that the money for this would be taxpayer money which would have to be taken from funding for something else, also that it would most likely apply only to candidates themselves and not to other groups that want to spend money on the election.

An interesting note is that even though there are about 750,000 people in RL’s Congressional district, 150-200 letters on a particular topic is a lot, that this kind of response to an issue will get a Congressman to pay attention.

A couple of young fishermen from Lopez attended the meeting, and they asked about the Pebble Mine proposal in Alaska. Hundreds of fishermen from RL’s district go up to Alaska to fish, as Bristol Bay has an incredible sockeye salmon fishery, producing 40-50% of the world’s sockeye. Unfortunately, a big Canadian mining company wants to put a mine right next door, where gold, copper, and other minerals would be mined. There would need to be ponds for tailings, and an accident would foul these waters and ruin the fishing, costing perhaps thousands of jobs, far more than the jobs provided by the mine. RL opposes this mine, but the current
administration is in favor and is trying to push it through before the election. The process has been flawed. Rep. Huffman of California has been the leader in the House opposing this, and RL is supportive and willing to take any other actions suggested to him.

RL was asked what we can do to change what is going on in this country. His answer was an emphatic “VOTE!”, and get others to vote, too.

One other note of interest is that RL supports eliminating the cap currently in place on Social Security taxes. Currently it is a regressive tax, only affecting taxpayers up to about $135,000. Scrapping the cap means that all income would be taxed for Social Security, not just income below the cap. If the current system sounds backward, it is.