Oregon Coast residents pack congressional town hall, hoping for answers

Hundreds crammed into the gym of Neah-Kah-Nie High School in Rockaway Beach, Oregon, on Saturday, hoping to hear some kind of plan from their elected officials for responding to President Donald Trump and the Republicans that control both chambers of Congress.

U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley and Rep. Suzanne Bonamici, both Democrats, hosted their first town hall in the region since Trump’s return to office and heard a wave of confusion and frustration from constituents. That’s been the trend nationally over the past several weeks as members of Congress returned home amid a wave of cuts and policy changes by the new Republican administration.

While Trump’s fellow Republicans have faced the brunt of local anger at town halls, Democrats are also hearing from anxious voters.

“This is not anything I’ve ever witnessed,” local resident Megan Irving told Merkley and Bonamici at the Saturday event. “I’m just kind of feeling like waiting and watching, and it’s such a marathon. It’s not something that we can do full court press every day.”

Many attendees at the coastal forum told OPB they worried about Trump’s mass layoffs of federal workers, potential impacts to efforts to provide more affordable housing and the elevation of billionaire Elon Musk in the White House. They wanted to know how Merkley and Bonamici planned to respond.

Tillamook County, encompassing much of Oregon’s northern coast, has recently been a purple district in presidential elections. It went for Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012, but for Trump in 2016, 2020 and 2024.

Casey Henley made 20-minute to drive from Manzanita hoping to hear a plan from Merkley and Bonamici about how they would respond to Trump’s actions.

“I want to hear that they have resources, that they have other people that are on our side, and that there’s actually going to be action and steps that we can take,” Henley said.

Merkley and Bonamici said everyone needed to make their voices heard online and in their communities. They encouraged people in the audience to call their representatives, join local organizations such as Indivisible and Planned Parenthood, and to actively protest measures they don’t agree with.

That way, the two elected officials said, they can relay those concerns to others in Washington, D.C.

“We’re helping to spread the word across the country; you are helping with that as well,” Bonamici said.

Town halls have been garnering more attention in recent days, including in Oregon as voters have gotten their first chance to tell their elected leaders how they feel about the rush of changes Trump, and Musk, have brought.

Merkley and Bonamici’s town hall in Astoria held Saturday afternoon attracted such a large crowd — more than 700 people — that some were turned away at the door, according to local radio station KMUN.

U.S. Rep. Cliff Bentz, the lone Republican in Oregon’s congressional delegation, held multiple town halls last week and heard plenty from upset voters. People yelled often and loudly so much during his La Grande town hall that he threatened to leave, according to the La Grande Observer.

By comparison, Merkley and Bonamici’s town hall was much more tame, with most in the audience appearing to agree with what the pair had to say. Still, they did hear frustration.

“I have not heard one thing about the Democratic Party leadership really vocally, publicly, pushing back,” Tillamook resident Dennis Becker said to loud applause.

Merkley and Bonamici said they have been present at various demonstrations across Washington, but that it may not reach their constituents given how social media algorithms work.

“It’s frustrating to us, because we are spending all day using every tool we can, including media, to push back now,” Merkley said.

Others wanted to know how Trump’s planned cuts to the federal workforce would impact commercial fishing, one of the Oregon Coast’s largest industries.

Jeff Wong, who runs a commercial fishing boat in Rockaway Beach, told OPB after the town hall that he’s particularly concerned about cuts to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which fishing crews rely on for weather updates, and research stations that are key for local agriculture.

“I think a lot of the cuts are more random and not really well thought out on the long-range impacts,” Wong said.

But Wong, who doesn’t belong to a political party, said the town hall did not fill him with much confidence. He said the audience, while large, skewed much older and relied heavily on an “us vs. them” mentality. In his opinion, there were large segments of Tillamook County that Democrats were failing to reach.

He left the town hall still wanting a plan.

“I heard a lot of the same, you know, ‘Go out and rally,’” he said. “I don’t think there was a real good action plan there.”