Marie G-P brings populist, blue-collar perspective to first year in Congress

Southwest Washington freshman representative says many lawmakers are 'out of touch with reality'

”A year after taking office, Southwest Washington Congresswoman Marie Gluesenkamp Perez said she is ”lonely” because “I don't feel like there are a whole lot of people in D.C. who share my values and who I really respect deeply.”

Members of Congress are disconnected from the concerns of average Americans — and that disconnect is one of the root causes of the nation’s political divisions, the Skamania Democrat said in Kelso during the congressional Christmas recess.

Representatives become “very out of touch with reality” and are too concerned with getting re-elected, satisfying lobbyists and enjoying the perks of congressional membership.

U.S. Rep.Marie Gluesenkamp Perez reflects for a moment during an interview in Kelso this month.

---

“Their families have everything they need… . They have access to childcare. Their kids are going into whatever school and career they want. … They don't share the sense of urgency that the American Dream is escaping us. People start to just like the power and the attention, and I think that's really, really dangerous.”

Too many members, she added, “just lose touch with what really is keeping people up at night. …. What's happening with the waitlist for daycare? Can I afford to have another kid. … Can I change jobs? Those things that are really what impact people day to day.”

Gluesenkamp, who is running for a second two-year term in the 3rd Congressional District, talked about the state of Congress, her legislative success and priorities, the Israel-Hamas war, immigration and other subjects during an hour-long interview with me and Centralia Chronicle freelance columnist and former Daily News colleague Julie McDonald Zander of Toledo.

Gluesenkamp Perez, 35, only briefly mentioned her two most prominent opponents, Trump-backed Joe Kent and Camas City Councilwoman Leslie Lewallen. The August “top two” primary will determine which of those two Clark County Republicans faces Gluesenkamp Perez in the November general election.

The race will again be the focus of keen — and expensive — national attention because the balance of power in the House of Representatives is so close and the 3rd District is independent “purple” territory. 

‘Democracies collapse when people don't have hope. They turn to authoritarianism.’

Gluesenkamp beat Kent by less than a single percentage point to flip the seat to the Democrats in 2022. She has had a commanding lead in fundraising, and Kent recently made a Facebook appeal to supporters telling them that campaign contributions are running short of goals.

Gluesenkamp Perez is a hybrid politician. She does not fit neatly into either party's  orthodoxy. She supports both abortion and gun rights, though she’s not absolutist about that, quipping, “I think we can have reasonable restrictions on Uzis and surface-to-air tactical nukes.” She and has a decided distaste for the culture wars. Call her a Democratic populist, emphasizing the need to protect middle and blue-collar jobs and opportunity.

As a freshman lawmaker, “finding common ground is the only way to make progress on the issues that matter most to Southwest Washington in a divided Congress,” she said in an email explaining why she joined the 60-member bipartisan “Problem Solvers"caucus.

“Ultimately, I didn’t come to Congress to be a cheerleader for either party, so I’ve sought to build relationships across the aisle whenever I can.”

Last week she co-sponsored a budget reform bill with Utah Republican Blake Moore, a fellow member of the Problem Solvers caucus and vice chair of the House Republican Conference. Also last week, she joined Rep. Young Kim, a California Republican and Problem Solvers member, in introducing a bill to reauthorize a grant program to help local law enforcement hire new officers — a major challenge in small rural cities like Longview — and increase community policing and training.

She again is emphasizing the themes that helped her win in 2022 and which make some pundits believe that she is a model for Democrats to reconnect with rural voters: Moderate politics, support for small business and labor, preservation and expansion of American jobs through career and technical training, and support for better childcare and healthcare.

She earned an economics degree from liberal Reed College and has deep family and blue-collar ties to rural Southwest Washington, including the timber industry. Her great-great grandfather Bert Gilmore was a quarry foreman who helped build the State Capitol Building in Olympia. 

She and her husband own a Portland auto repair business, and she showed up for the interview in blue jeans, blue cable-knit sweater and olive green flannel cap. She is an unpolished speaker, often pausing to search for the right words, frequently interjecting “like” and changing direction in mid sentence.

Too many congressional representatives “forget what it means to work for a living,” she said during the Kelso interview.  “They are not wrenching in a shop.” 

She said she’s frustrated that congressional committee hearings typically feature businessmen, academics and experts but not common citizens affected by legislation. It would be instructive, for example, if hearings on her “Right to Repair” legislation would include a washing machine repairman, she said.

“I was, like, ‘You guys are all talking about, you know, washing machines, at least, do any of you fix washing machines for a living? Do you respect people who work enough to invite them in and put them at the table.’ … They're listening to (campaign) donors” instead of everyday people.

Her “Right to Repair” bill is one of her pet efforts. She sees it as a way to save American jobs and prevent landfills from filling up with consumer products.

“I think it is really important. Are Americans going to be able to keep fixing their own stuff? Or are we going to have to just buy new stuff every five years — like people want disposable cars and disposable washing machines?”

In part to highlight the concerns of small farmers, Gluesenkamp Perez invited Maureen Harkcom, president of the Lewis County Farm Bureau, to attend the Congressional Christmas party.

“She's someone that's doing the real work of keeping family farms and Americans fed,” Gluesenkamp Perez said. “We’re importing approximately 40% of the fresh fruits and vegetables we eat. Like, that's what the committee hearings should be on, not on impeaching such and such. … You know, get to work. It's turned into partisan football.”

Kent’s supporters have tried to puncture her effort to project a moderate image, often referring to her as “Marxist Marie” and trying to tie her to President Joe Biden.

“My voting record does not support that,” Gluesenkamp Perez said, noting, for example, that she angered Democrats by opposing Biden’s student loan forgiveness program.

She also voted with Republicans on the Gas Stoves Protection and Freedom Act, which would prohibit use of federal money to regulate gas stoves as a hazardous product and perhaps eventually ban them from home use.

Through June, Gluesenkamp Perez had voted with Democrats 75% of the time on party-line votes, according Bloomberg Government. That “party unity” mark was the third-lowest among Democrats. “The pressure to vote in line with your party is just immense in DC,” Gluesenkamp Perez told Bloomberg.

“You have both parties (going)further and further into their corner and less and less willing to (work)  on bipartisan bills and actually do the challenging work fixing things.”

In a press release summarizing her first year in office, Gluesenkamp Perez said she helped secure nearly $1.7 billion in federal funds for the region. This includes $600 million for Interstate-5 Bridge replacement; $24 million for the Shoalwater Bay Indian Tribe; $24 million for rural broadband expansion in Lewis County; and $1 billion for green hydrogen production, some of which will to go to Centralia College.

According to Gluesenkamp Perez, she introduced 30 bipartisan bills, including one that passed the House to help pregnant and new mothers with substance abuse. Her bill to support veterans’ access to VA-certified specialists and examiners in rural communities has passed both the House and the Senate.

Congress passed only 27 bills last year, and two were hers, Gluesenkamp Perez said.

“I think I’ve been extremely effective,” she said.

Her gender, background as a blue collar business owner, newness to Congress and rural roots tend to make people underestimate her, she said.

“I’m good at being underestimated. It’s actually an asset …. to not be taken seriously, because then you can ask the question” others may not be aware of, she said.

In one of her few swipes at Kent, who lived in Portland before deciding to run for Congress here 2021, Gluesenkamp Perez said, “I did not move here to get elected. I am from here. And I really liked my life before getting elected” and will go back to running the auto shop if she loses the next election.

Her independence sometimes alienates her and makes it difficult to find co-sponsors for her legislation, Gluesenkamp Perez said, because incumbents are so wary of crossing party lines.

“All these folks are just concerned with not getting primaried (primary election opposition) by their own party. And so you have both parties (going) further and further into their corner and less and less willing to (work)  on bipartisan bills and actually do the challenging work fixing things.”

On the day of the interview, she visited the Mark Morris High School career and technical education program, Lower Columbia Head Start and USNR, a Woodland lumber mill machine manufacturer. She’s pursued legislation to boost forestry career training and help small businesses hire trade school grads.

Such visits are frequent. Her predecessor, 12-year incumbent Congresswoman Jamie Herrera Beutler, got criticized for declining to hold in-person town hall meetings, hosting them by phone instead. Gluesenkamp Perez reports holding 11 in-person town halls in the district — nearly one a month — in addition to 454 meetings with constituents from Southwest Washington. She’s willing to listen to angry voters, she said.

“I think you engender a lot more rage when you don’t show up. You have to show up and let people yell at you … and take them seriously.”

She said her own party is not taking the allegations against Hunter Biden seriously enough, and that kind of dismissiveness fuels a public sense that justice and opportunity are no longer equal, she said.

“I think our democracy really is under threat,” she said.

Still, she puts most of the blame for the nation’s turmoil on economic struggles that rob people of hope. She noted the high suicide rate among young men, the scope of fentanyl addiction and financial struggles that “have squeezed the middle class out of being able to volunteer for Little League coaching and (serving on) PTAs.”

“Democracies collapse when people don't have hope. They turn to authoritarianism.” she said.

We discussed immigration, the Hamas War and other issues, and what she said will appear in a follow-up article I will post Wednesday afternoon. Clearly, though, she is more focused on economic opportunities close to home. That’s why she ran for Congress, she said.

“Can the mom-and-pop businesses survive? Can a 17-year-old today in shop class in Cowlitz County go out and start a real business and be successful and make a path for themselves. …We've got to get our house in order.”

The second half of my interview with Marie G-P, in which she discusses her views about the Hamas-Israel war, immigration and other issues, will post Wednesday afternoon.