HOOD RIVER — Every year, Sen. Jeff Merkley visits each of Oregon’s 36 counties. After talking with folks in Wasco County, freshman Rep. Maxine Dexter joined him at Hood River Middle School for a town hall Jan. 25.
“We are in very scary times of a powerful authoritarian momentum that is going to destroy our country. We may be depressed after this election — I spent three days curled up on a couch, maybe some of you did too,” Merkley said to a packed gym. “We have to be vocal, and we have to stand up for the values of this county.”
Focused on preparing for President Trump’s second term, which he began by issuing a slew of executive orders, questions from the crowd largely revolved around the violence in Gaza and deportation threats. Already, Trump revoked asylum for people arriving at the southern border, is moving to end birthright citizenship, and the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has begun raiding cities from Seattle and Los Angeles to Chicago and Atlanta.
An immigrant and longtime Hood River resident asked what Merkley and Dexter are doing to protect their community.
“We will stand with our state and local leaders to make sure that they have everything that they possibly can have to hold tight on the promise of sanctuary here in Oregon,” said Dexter, who recently replaced Earl Blumenauer in Oregon’s 3rd Congressional District, stretching from Portland to Hood River. “It’s going to be those of us who don’t have brown skin, who don’t speak another language, who must be a barrier.”
Merkley denounced the Laken Riley Act, which mandates that federal authorities detain any undocumented immigrant, even minors, accused of or arrested for nonviolent crimes like shoplifting with no mechanism for their release. Trump signed the act into law last week, and Merkley also pushed back on the narrative that immigrants, even undocumented ones, commit more crimes than American citizens, which data from the National Institute of Justice disproves.
“There are 120,000 undocumented individuals in Oregon, and they comprise all kinds of different roles in our society — all kinds of different jobs, all kinds of different presences in our grade schools, our high schools. We need to recognize how terrified they are,” Merkley said during an interview prior to the town hall. “What Trump is doing goes way too far.”
Both Merkley and Dexter voted against the Laken Riley Act.
Given that Merkley was the first senator to call for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza, several people probed Dexter’s stance on the Israel-Hamas war. While the two parties have agreed to a temporary pause in fighting, violence has escalated in the West Bank and there’s no guarantee the conflict will end. Reverend John Boonstra, representing local advocacy group Gorge Gaza Action, asked whether Dexter would support conditions on any future U.S. aid to Israel.
“We absolutely need to make sure that we are enforcing the laws that we have, which preclude us from sending aid to countries that are using the defense aid in ways that are against humanitarian law,” said Dexter. “I absolutely will vote to support that.”
During her primary campaign last year, Dexter benefitted from more than $2 million of positive advertisements from a group called 314 Action Fund, which purportedly bolsters Democratic candidates with a background in science. Another group, called Voters for a Responsive Government, poured over $3.2 million into negative ads against Dexter’s main opponent, former Multnomah County Commissioner Susheela Jayapal, a staunch supporter of Palestinian rights.
While Dexter is a career critical care doctor, both groups took donations from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the most powerful pro-Israel lobby in the U.S. By law, she couldn’t consult or coordinate with these groups, but Dexter also didn’t pressure them to disclose their donors as her opponents called for. Reverend Vicky Stifter, also with Gorge Gaza Action, asked how that funding will influence Dexter’s positions on Gaza.
“I refused an endorsement, but they had more concerns about someone else in the race, so I was a means to an end, and I mean no disrespect to the fact that money went through my race,” said Dexter. “I fought for campaign finance reform here at the state level, and I will continue to fight for it at the federal level.”
Dexter urged constituents to hold her accountable, and her positions on Gaza, like demanding a ceasefire that ensures long-term peace, are fairly similar to Jayapal. Merkley echoed her calls to keep dark money out of political races.
“With the maldistribution of wealth, a very small number of people have huge power, and that power can override the vision of one person,” said Merkley. “I’m talking about folks who have the money to have huge numbers of bodies, huge numbers of lawyers, media campaigns that change the way we think about things, regular campaign donations at a level none of us could imagine giving.”
He's working to pass the DISCLOSE Act, which would require organizations spending money on political races to promptly reveal donors who have given $10,000 or more during an election cycle.
As the town hall began, Merkley and Dexter presented an American flag from the Capitol to Executive Director Cindy Thieman and the Hood River Watershed Group, commending their local habitat restoration work. They also invited Chad Mayo, nurse and member of the Providence Hood River bargaining team, to speak on behalf of striking healthcare workers.
“They are the people who take care of our people,” said Dexter prior to the town hall. “Without making sure that they feel valued, supported and have safe working conditions where they feel like they can give the care that they know is standard and to the degree of consistency with their values, we will not have a system that works if we don’t support them.”
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