February 10, 2017

“Do Your Job!” Hundreds of People Shout Down Jason Chaffetz Over Lack of Trump Probe

”We want to get rid of you!”

 

 

At a town hall meeting on Thursday night held by Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), the chair of the House Oversight Committee, the mood got rough, when hundreds of people demanded answers from Chaffetz regarding a host of controversies: his unwillingness to investigate President Donald Trump’s conflicts of interest, his support for Obamacare repeal, a proposal to sell off public lands, and more.

 

“You’re really not going to like this part,” Chaffetz said at one point. “The president under the law is exempt from the conflict of interests laws.”

That remark—and many of his other comments—was met with jeers, as people chanted, “Do your job!” and “We want to get rid of you!” The raucous event came amid complaints from Democrats on the committee that Chaffetz won’t investigate the Trump administration’s various global entanglements and possible ethics violations. Critics noted he had enthusiastically pursued Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server to portray him as a hypocrite for not investigating Trump’s conflicts.

The angry crowd also blasted Chaffetz for a bill he introduced in January to sell off public lands and for his efforts to defund Planned Parenthood.

 

During a meeting with Trump in the Oval Office Tuesday, Chaffetz afterward said the president had instructed him not to raise the topic of “oversight“—to which he had replied “fair enough.” Some town hall attendees expressed anger over Chaffetz’s failure to confront the president on this point. Others threatened his current term would be his last.

The town hall meeting reportedly ended 40 minutes early, with Chaffetz refusing to take questions from the press as he departed.

 

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

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