Paul Bucksman recalls how excited he was to meet his new congressman, Devin Nunes, in the early 2000’s, when Nunes showed up at his organic fruit farm in the Central Valley of California.
Bucksmann assumed that the nuns, coming from Portuguese dairy farming stock, were really interested in the use of permanent land. Perhaps they will be able to talk about pesticide or water or farm labor issues in one of the world’s largest food producing sectors. Maybe Nunes would ask Buxman to address the crowd he would bring with him.
None of that happened. “I thought, as a member of Congress, this is our first farmer to come out to visit the farm,” says Buxman. “But it was a photo op.”
Buxman was never able to arrange a meeting even though he had gone ahead with Nunes several times. Soon, he stopped voting for her. Then, after Donald Trump became president and Nunes, as chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, emerged as one of Trump’s staunchest defenders until 2019, Buxman began leaving messages with congressional staff. “You have to remember, you don’t just represent the people you agree with. At least, sit quietly and sit with us, ”he said.
Nunes paid no attention until Buksman signed the petition, demanding that Nunes stop calling himself a farmer on the election ballot. The petition argued that Nunes’ parents had moved the family dairy farm to Iowa a long time ago and that Nunes had no farming affiliation other than a small investment in a friend’s Napa Valley winery.
Now, Nunes responded – with the lawsuit, accusing Bucksman of being part of a dark money conspiracy that threatened his good name and the integrity of the electoral process. It is a flurry of lawsuits filed against critics of Congress and media organizations after Trump faced heavy criticism for his role in various Russia scandals.
Attacking his critics in this way was not without political cost. Two years ago, after 16 years in Congress, Nuns faced his first significant re-election fight when a local prosecutor, Andrew Janz, came within five percent of his dismissal. This year, small business owner and civic activist Phil Arballo could come closer with a campaign that focuses primarily on local issues that many elements accuse Nunes of ignoring.
Recently, in a district considered one of the few safest Republican seats left in California, Arbelo is voting five points behind Nunes, but according to a recent Internal Democratic Party vote, it is closing fast. Democrats have also been successful in pursuing large-scale fundraising transactions, including hundreds of thousands of dollars, mostly in response to Nunes’ continued legal action. (However, nuns still have the advantage of raising a large fund.)
Arblo’s alliance is built on two pillars: the changing demographic content of the area, which is now about 50% Latino, and obscurity with nuns. As Nunes has focused his powers largely on Washington’s toxic political culture and has made himself less visible in his district, the unrest has only evolved.
“He has forgotten about his constituents. That’s fine, “said Arbello in an interview with the Guardian. “Instead of pushing for stimulus money and PPE in response to the coronavirus, instead of holding themselves accountable and assuring people that they will be protected, he talks about Hillary Clinton on Fox News. She’s in a different world. He has no plans for the future. He believes he deserves this seat and allows every voter. “
Nunes’ requests Fees did not respond to repeated requests for comment, but his critics say he has done little to counter the criticism. According to local media reports, he has not held an open constituency meeting for nearly ten years. He doesn’t always give media interviews other than Fox News and the friendly district radio station. Her rhetorical style is hot and imaginative, whether it’s talking to her favorite TV hosts or on a podcast she launched last year. Increasingly, he has rejected any suggestion of inaccurate Russian influence on Donald Trump, haunted Democrats as closet socialists, and JB Biden as a revolutionary like Mao Tse Tung and Paul Pot.
Last month, he published a 95-page pamphlet called Countdown to Socialism, which he has since distributed widely among his constituents. In it, Democrats write, “There is sympathy for the rioters and the statue-toppers, they are ashamed of their nation and their history, they believe that their fellow countrymen are vaguely racist and most importantly, they want to ‘transform’ our country.” Something different. ”
Such rhetoric may excite the Trump base in his district, but it also makes many people tired and upset. Amy Aragon, a schoolteacher and her husband who runs a trucking company, is a lifelong Republican who voted for Nunes in every election of her past. But this summer they decided they would have enough when they saw how Nuns and Trump reacted to the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.
The same religious belief that once led him to Rs servicism, he said, has now led to a moral uprising against his political leaders, as he equates anti-racism opponents with thugs and criminals. “When we saw the contempt they were raising,” Aragon said, “we couldn’t stand it any longer. We went to the Democratic Party’s headquarters in downtown Fresno and asked for the Arbello sign. Then we asked if there was a way to get involved.” ? “
Two years ago, Andrew Janz campaigned heavily on national issues, noting Nuns’ readiness to cheerlead for Trump and questioning whether a member of Congress was being used as a tool by opposition to Russian interests. In contrast, Arballo has focused on issues in which he believes voters in all political spheres care the most: health care, epidemics, lobbying for emergency financial aid, and worrying about deteriorating air quality in the central valley.
Much of Arblo’s appeal is his biography, which is immersed at many junctions with these concerns. Arballo had nothing to do with it: his father was an alcoholic and he died at the age of 14, and he had to scrape every dollar he could to become the first member of his family to graduate from college. His wife, Cynthia, lost her job as a translator at a local school when the epidemic struck, and they are struggling to make ends meet when enrolling their 6-year-old ship through distance school education and taking care of a 2-year-old child. .
They know what it is like to wait months for unemployment benefits. And he worries that his 6-year-old may lose the loss of health care because he has asthma, which would not cover the current situation if the Affordable Care Act is overturned because he advocated nuns.
“People relate to my story,” Arballo said. “I know what it’s like to live a paycheck-to-paycheck and budget a home. I grew up here, and my family is still here … Devin Nunes couldn’t be more different than that. He has been a representative for 18 years and knows nothing beyond that. ”
The question of political integrity plays a large part in this contest and helps to nuisance sensitivities that he is not really a farmer. A few years ago, the owner of the winery, who describes himself as a “good friend,” from his association with Alpha and Omega Winery in Napa, then organized a party on his yacht involving prostitutes and cocaine, then generated unfamiliar headlines. (Nunes was not present.) Last year, Nunes claimed farming as one of his assets immediately after he filed a lawsuit against farmer Paul Buxman. But he also admitted in a congressional disclosure form that the property was worth less than 15 15,000, had a storage shed and generated no revenue – an entry that sparked widespread ridicule among his opponents.
Despite the large number of Trump supporters in the district, the administration’s agenda has, in some respects, been in conflict with local interests. For example, the fictitious crackdown on immigration has made it harder for fresno and dairy farmers to produce and market their wares to large almond and raisin growers in the vicinity of Whistley South as most farm laborers in California are undocumented immigrants. .
Buxman, a soft-spoken man in his 70s who said he would soon spend his retirement making marmalade, lamented more than anger over Nuns’ path from the farmer’s son to the hot-headed ideology. “I have said prayers for them,” he said. “The way I look at it, the best thing that can happen to it is that it lost the election. For his own sake. Then he will actually be able to start farming. I would love to help them do that. “
Nunes quietly sued Bucksman and his co-defendants last year. And, this year, the designation “farmer” will no longer appear next to his name on the ballot.
