Monday, April 1, 2019

Beto O'Rourke Announces He Would Sign Executive Order Requiring Cabinet Members To Hold Monthly Public Town Hall Meetings With the American People

 

WASHINGTON -- Beto O'Rourke announced today that he would sign an Executive Order requiring that every single member of his Cabinet hold a monthly public town hall meeting with the American people. Speaking at the We the People Summit Monday afternoon, he introduced the idea as a way to commit to historic levels of transparency, accountability and engagement from the administration while ensuring the genius of our democracy and the diversity of our nation are reflected in the White House's Cabinet room and federal departments across the government. 

 

"At a time when we face an extraordinary concentration of power and access, when our government does too little for too few, we must ensure that the people of this country can hold their government to account for the decisions it makes in their name," said O'Rourke. "It is only by listening to those we are sworn to serve and represent -- by gaining the full benefit of their ideas, their experiences, their creativity -- that we can come together to confront and overcome the very real challenges before us."

 

Today's announcement follows more than a decade of O'Rourke's commitment to holding regular town halls and being accountable to his constituents. During his time on the El Paso City Council, he held weekly bilingual town hall meetings where he explained the votes he had taken the week before and previewed the agenda for the week ahead. After defeating a 16-year Congressional incumbent by personally knocking on 16,000 doors across El Paso, O'Rourke held monthly public town halls in his district in addition to quarterly veteran-focused town halls. He ultimately held 104 Congressional town halls -- each open to the public and a forum where anyone could ask any question on any topic. Campaigning for the U.S. Senate, O'Rourke visited all 254 counties of Texas and held more than 350 town halls. 

While in Congress, O'Rourke also took action to return power to people. He authored the No PAC Act, introduced the Real Time Transparency Act, co-sponsored a resolution to undo Citizens United, co-sponsored the Voting Rights Advancement Act of 2017, co-sponsored the We the People Democracy Reform Act and co-sponsored the Get Foreign Money Out of Politics Act. He also swore of all PAC money during his re-election campaign to Congress, his race for the U.S. Senate and now his campaign for president.