“Unless you actually read this bill, you don’t know what the bill is. I have to rely on my congressman.”
In rural western North Carolina, faith runs deep. It is a place where a two-hour stretch of highway has more Baptist churches than houses and local law enforcement officers pray together before starting a lunch meeting.
Right now, Rep. Mark Meadows, the local congressman, is banking on his constituents having faith in him, even if they are not sure what he is up to.
“I have faith in my congressman and one thing that I have learned in (the sheriff’s) office is listening to these members in the legislature, in these bills, unless you actually read this bill, you don’t know what the bill is,” said Macon County Sheriff Robert Holland, a Republican. “I have to rely on my congressman.”
In the nation’s capital, Meadows and the fiery band of hardline conservatives he leads — known as the House Freedom Caucus — were the critical force behind the March implosion of the Republican bill to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act.
Repealing Obamacare has been a core promise of Republicans since the law passed in 2010, but Meadows does not appear to be suffering from the failure of the GOP-controlled Congress to deliver on that promise.
“I have enough faith in him that I believe if he’s talked to enough of his constituents, that it’s just not a good bill ... that’s not the bill for us and I believe that he will fight to get that bill where it needs to be,” Holland said.
“We understand that it’s easy to have opinions when you don’t know the whole story,” said Henderson County Sheriff Charles McDonald, who describes himself as conservative. “Even people who were going kind of, ‘Well, gee, gosh I wonder if this is exactly the right thing’ you know I think they look at his heart and say, ‘You know, he’s got more information than we do, we trust him to do the right thing, he knows what we want — we’re going to support him.’ ”
In reaction to the bill’s failure, President Trump threatened to find primary candidates to challenge Meadows and other members of the Freedom Caucus. But USA TODAY spent two days traveling with Meadows as he met with constituents, and the notion that someone could run successfully against him seems far off.
Meadows remains broadly popular here — he won the district by 28 points in November — and even some Democrats say they like his work on behalf of the district.
Lenoir, N.C., Mayor Joe Gibbons is a longtime Democrat and considers Meadows a friend. He said that while the two disagree on many of the larger policy issues, Meadows has been an ally on local issues. They’ve worked together to try to secure community development block grants and are trying to build a new fire station in his town. And even though Meadows is a hard-line conservative, Gibbons believes he’s the right person to represent the 11th District in Congress.
“I think most people are starting to believe that trust is being returned,” Meadows told USA TODAY. “They know that I’m not in this for personal gain and that even though they may not understand totally what I’m fighting for or the policy nuances, they do know that I’m fighting for them and that’s the most important thing to me.”
The district is overwhelmingly Republican, although Democratic Rep. Heath Shuler held the seat from 2007 until he retired in 2012. The prospect of Shuler being re-elected had dimmed after North Carolina approved a redistricting map in 2011 that put far more Republicans into the district. Meadows won his first election in 2012 by almost 15 points.
“He is very in tune, I believe, with his constituents. I know that his team, they put a lot of people on the ground that actually reach out to constituents to hear their opinions and get the facts about