At his first tele-town hall Tuesday evening, U.S. Rep. Jeff Hurd told constituents he is concerned about the number of firings across the federal workforce and the president’s recent rhetoric toward Ukraine.
The congressman from Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District also called out state policies that prioritize green energy, saying he is prioritizing an “all-of-the-above” energy approach as a way to lower costs.
The call was Hurd’s first public speaking event since taking office Jan. 3. About 7,500 people tuned in, according to a spokesperson from his office.
Since his swearing-in, Hurd has taken a markedly different approach from his predecessor, Rep. Lauren Boebert, a firebrand conservative who is now serving in Colorado’s 4th Congressional District. Hurd has adopted a low profile, focusing on hyperlocal issues and hesitating to weigh in on national issues.
But his quiet approach has attracted its own kind of attention, as hundreds of constituents have turned out at local events asking to hear from him or his staff.
On Feb. 22, in his hometown of Grand Junction, more than 300 people showed up to the “Musk or Us?” rally asking Hurd to speak out against federal workforce cuts, according to a report from The Daily Sentinel. Then, The Journal in Cortez reported that more than 200 people showed up for a chance to meet with Hurd’s Southwest director at the library in Dolores on Feb. 24. The staff member didn’t show, and organizers later told The Journal that she went to the library but left because she may have not been prepared to meet with a crowd of that size.
Hurd first spoke out about his concerns with cuts to the federal workforce – among other issues – in a Feb. 27 interview with Colorado Public Radio’s “Colorado Matters.” It was nearly a month after the Trump administration offered buyouts to federal workers and about two weeks after 3,400 U.S. Forest Service workers were fired. During that time, Southwest Colorado saw several federal lands workers fired and many more who expressed uncertainty and fear about the future of their careers.
During this week’s tele-town hall, several callers raised concerns about broad cuts being made to the federal workforce, especially to the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management.
Hurd said he shares those concerns. While he supports the president’s efforts to find efficiencies, he said cuts must be more targeted.
“It’s not the land managers on the ground in western Colorado and southern Colorado that should be cut,” he said. “… It should be the bureaucrats in Washington, D.C., that are seeing their ranks trimmed. So that’s something that I certainly am in communication with the White House on and with leadership in the Department of Interior and also the Department of Agriculture, making sure that the cuts that we see are happening in the right spots and those efficiencies are in the places that they’re supposed to be.”
He also pointed to his co-sponsorship of the Protect Our Probationary Employees Act. The bill would allow civil servants fired in their probationary period to resume that probationary period – ensuring that they don’t have to start the period over – if they are rehired. It was introduced Monday but is unlikely to pass the House.
Other callers asked Hurd about energy policy and rising costs, which they said were a result of shifts toward renewable energy.
Hurd shared those concerns, saying “a lot of these costs are being driven by bad public policy from Denver that’s requiring, in my view, poorly thought out changes from reliable, low cost carbon-based fuels to renewable energy.”
That “bad public policy” effectively acts as a hidden tax on every Coloradan, he said.
“If you genuinely care about reducing global greenhouse gas emissions, you ought to support producing as much energy out of Colorado as possible,” he said.
He echoed a point from a March 9 letter he signed urging the House Ways and Means Committee to uphold Biden administration clean energy tax credits, arguing for an “all-of-the-above” energy approach. The letter noted that repealing those incentives could disrupt the energy industry and cause costs to increase for ratepayers.
Hurd answered a question about potential cuts to Medicaid, saying Medicaid should have some type of work requirement for those who are able to work. He acknowledged there should be exceptions for students and others who may be balancing other responsibilities.
Hurd joined House Republicans in voting to adopt a budget resolution in February that directs the Committee on Energy and Commerce – which oversees Medicaid – to cut $880 billion in spending. Though Republicans say the resolution does not specify cuts to Medicaid, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found that hitting the $880 billion target would require significant cuts to the program.
Another caller asked Hurd for his thoughts about the president’s rhetoric toward Ukraine and the administration’s pause on aid to the country as it defends itself against Russia.
Hurd responded that Russia and President Vladimir Putin are “indisputably adversaries of America” and that it is “dishonorable and wrong not to stand up against the tyranny of Putin.”
“Pausing military aid to Ukraine weakens our hand, it emboldens Russia, and it invites greater danger down the road from countries just like China, who, again, are watching what’s happening here,” he said.
Other topics he hit on included his recent trip to the U.S.-Mexico border, his first bill that would move the BLM headquarters back to Grand Junction and his support of a bicameral bill to compensate those impacted by the 2015 Gold King Mine spill.
One caller asked if Hurd plans to do any in-person town halls.
He said he opted for the virtual format because it was the best way to connect with people from across the vast 3rd Congressional District, one of America’s largest. He added that he would be open to doing in-person town halls, but said “I want to make sure that it’s a productive dialogue and that we’re talking about the issues, that I’m hearing from my constituents, and that we’re not devolving into political theater.”
The tele-town hall came just one week after Politico reported that the chair of the National Republican Campaign Committee urged Republicans to avoid in-person town halls amid backlash over the Trump administration’s cuts to the federal workforce and federal funding freezes.
Indivisible Durango, a progressive-leaning grassroots organization, is working on putting together an in-person event similar to the rally in Grand Junction.
Durango resident Jimbo Buickerood, who is helping organize the event, said the group aims to host the event during the April congressional recess to give Hurd more time to plan ahead to attend or send a staff member in his place.
In his interview for “Colorado Matters,” Hurd was asked about the “Musk or Us?” rally in Grand Junction in which people spoke out against the federal workforce cuts. Hurd chalked it up to “political theater.”
Buickerood took umbrage with Hurd’s characterization of the event as “political theater,” saying it was an “incredibly demeaning and dismissive” comment.
“Nothing rankles me more than saying ‘political theater’ when you have people who’ve thought about what they’re going to write. They write it down, they stand up, they only have two minutes, and they tell their story and concern,” he said. “That is not political theater. That’s people talking about their lives, their livelihood, their families, their heritage.”
Kathryn Squyres is an intern for The Durango Herald and The Journal in Cortez and a student at American University in Washington, D.C. She can be reached at ksquyres@durangoherald.com.
