During a House Ways and Means Committee hearing before the Congressional recess, Rep. Michelle Fischbach (R-MN) spoke about how members of both parties conduct town hall meetings with their constituents.
00:00Ms. Fischbach. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. And I just want to say thank you to the witnesses and thank you to our hosts because this is wonderful. And I am really excited to be here. And I do have to take the opportunity to address the issue of town halls because the other side likes to say, oh, you have to hold a town hall. But you know what? For them, it's political theater. It's just about political theater.
00:25I talk to my constituents. I go to their businesses. I go to the nursing homes. I talk to them, and they do appreciate this bill. So you can take the political theater and have town halls in everybody else's district, but we're about talking to our constituents one-on-one and not in some big auditorium having people yell at people. That's not constructive.
00:50And I will say we have had—I wanted to say thank you to Chairman Smith because we have been having these hearings across the country. And one of the first ones was in my district in a small town at a farm, and there was all kinds of people there.
01:05As a matter of fact, I served in the Minnesota Senate, and the former Democrat majority leader was one of the witnesses that I invited so that he could be there to testify on mining.
01:17So we do—we are listening to everybody. But most importantly, right now, I see witnesses in front of me that are saying absolutely, and regular people.
01:30And I think Mr. Kostoff asked a little bit about billionaires and millionaires, but I see regular people who are going to be helped by this.
01:40There are—it is not fake. You are going to see real money in your pockets. You are going to see—I mean, and that's what you are telling us.
01:48And so I appreciate that because we have a whole lot of regular people saying this is a good bill, and then we have one politician saying it's not.
01:56And I believe the regular people here that this is going to help them.
02:02And so no matter what the critics say, it's the regular people that we want to talk to.
02:07And I appreciate all the stories, and I wish I could go through every one of them because there's so much good in this bill.
02:13You know, we're talking about the no tax on overtime. We're talking about the no tax on dibs.
02:17We're talking about the tax deduction on Social Security.
02:20We haven't even mentioned, you know, the estate tax provisions that are going to help with estate tax, the manufacturing provisions, and the kinds of deductions we're doing there.
02:29The 199A deduction for small businesses.
02:34So we're not even talking about all of the wonderful things that are in this bill.
02:38And I certainly don't want to go over time, but I do want to just ask Mrs. Jones, you mentioned the child tax credit.
02:49And I want to know what that extra money is really going to mean for your family.
02:56It means a lot.
02:57We have kids in elementary all the way up to high school, so it gives us an opportunity to—we have a daughter that she could start driving soon, so she'll be able—we'll be able to help her purchase a car.
03:10So we want to show her worth ethic, so we're going to match what she brings to the table.
03:18We're not just going to hand her money.
03:20It's all about worth ethic.
03:22So when people are sitting here saying that there's not people out there working, that the One Big Beautiful Bill is taking from people out there, it's not taking from people, it's taking from the lazy.
03:38That's the problem.
03:40They want to hand hard taxpayer money to the lazy, illegal aliens and say, hey, you don't matter.
03:50So I'm not going to raise my child to say, you don't matter.
03:54We're showing her worth ethic.
03:57And the Big Beautiful Bill is showing her that, too.
04:01And in regards to the statement about my husband's employees, yes, we struggle to help with making sure their benefits are paid.
04:11But coming here today, they were very proud, all three—all five of them, and three of them are Democrats, and they said give them hell, and here we are.
04:24Well, thank you.
04:26Well, I appreciate that.
04:27And, you know, maybe I should just ask—I've got about 30 seconds left—is there any of the witnesses that wanted to respond to something quickly that maybe you heard that you want just a couple of seconds that—
04:37Okay, well, I appreciate it, and I am going to stay under my time, Mr. Chair, and I'd like a couple of brownie points for that.
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