U.S. Representative Tracey Mann speaks at Oskaloosa's City Hall as part of his 'Mann Listening Tours'
Article/Politics - 5 minute read
OSKALOOSA - Representing the largest Congressional District in Kansas by area, the 11th largest in the country, U.S. Representative Tracey Mann (KS-01) appeared at Oskaloosa’s City Hall in Jefferson County as part of the yearly ‘Mann Listening Tours’. This was the third tour in a row that Mann has done—Jefferson County being a new county for Mann after redistricting. In this tour, Mann is going to all 60 counties that he represents to visit with and hear his constituents thoughts and concerns.
Representative Ron Ellis (R-47) and Chairman of the Kansas Republican Party Mike Brown were also in attendance along with two of the three Jefferson County Commissioners.
The meeting started at 8:30 a.m. with over 30 people in attendance. The Pledge of Allegiance was said before Mann began speaking, providing statistics on the district.
“There’s 435 congressional districts and we are the number three ag district in the whole country,” Mann stated. “There are only three congressional districts that produce more than $10 billion a year of ag products and last year our district did about $12.5 billion…. We’re the number one district out of 435 in the country for wheat production, number one for sorghum or milo production, and number one for beef production.”
He noted that his district has a lot of other businesses as well, but agriculture specifically “drives the economy.” Mann noted the bigger universities in the district including KU, K-State, and Fort Hays, and made mention that the district has more critical access hospitals than any other district in the country as well. He said that healthcare and access to healthcare are issues he spends a lot of time on and is passionate about.
“I look through the lens of ‘what do I do to advocate for agriculture and our conservative Kansas matters,’” Mann said.
He mentioned that a lot of regulations coming from Washington, D.C. are bad and damaging for the district, pointing specifically to the regulations coming from Waters of the U.S. He mentioned the Clean Water Act and the jurisdiction it would give federal government over farm ponds, drainage, and ditches, “far beyond what the intention of what the Clean Water Act was.”
Due to this, Mann claims to be working hard to push back against this while the Administration is in the process of adding prairie chickens to the threatened species list, something that could be damaging for agriculture, especially Kansas’ western most counties.
Mann mentioned some changes in Washington, D.C. since the start of the year including Republicans taking the majority in the House, Nancy Pelosi being replaced with Kevin McCarthy as Speaker of the House, and a changing of the rules package that Mann feels is “positive.”
He mentioned the $32 trillion debt of the U.S. and how we need a conversation on our spending and how we got here, claiming it will be an issue that will receive a lot of attention as it will be one of the biggest issues in Washington.
Lastly, before he took questions from the audience, he spoke on a farm bill—the governing policy for agriculture—which lasts five years with the current farm bill expiring on September 30, 2023. Being on the House Agriculture Committee, this is an issue Mann has been working on for months.
“The farm bill will come before this summer, as well as the FAA—the Federal Aviation Administration,” Mann said. “They have to reauthorize so often, and they have to reauthorize this summer by September 30.”
Questions that constituents asked included updates on Ukraine, more information on the farm bill, and “how many children are going to have to die from assault weapons.”
Small business owner, Stephanie Lambert, who owns Steph’s Garden, asked Mann about small business regulations, claiming she had to change her business model, having been subject to two inspections by the state and one from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
“It occurred to me that actually there is probably more money being spent on regulating my very small business than my small business makes,” Lambert told Mann.
Lambert claimed an FDA inspector told her that if she sold to regular people instead of wholesaling—which she said makes sense for her business—that she wouldn’t have to be regulated.
Mann, who just got put on the Small Business Committee, said that generally he is for less regulation due to his belief that if you grow government, you restrict freedom. He also offered to speak with Lambert afterward.
Julia Kirk of Winchester raised concerns about China.
“They are all over South America now,” Kirk said. “They are getting into Central America. They’re in the Pacific. They have a port in Pakistan…. But you kept talking about the inflation. They’re trying to influence Africa, Asia to get off the petrol dollar and get to the Yuan. If that happens, it’s predicted that inflation would be even higher and our dollar would weaken and we would be even more in debt.”
Kirk also raised concern about China buying land next to American military bases.
Mann responded to Kirk, saying he sees three big threats for the U.S. moving forward—debt, China, and drifting from our fundamental founding values.
“There’s a new special select committee on China,” Mann said. “First time ever. Just looking at what are the Chinese doing, how are they doing it, where are they at in our country—really taking this threat more seriously. The Chair of that committee, by the way, is a gentleman from Wisconsin, Mike Gallagher (R). He’s the right guy to lead that effort.”
Mann addressed TikTok, which he said he does not have and believes no one should have, saying it is surveillance for the Chinese government. He went on to talk about how Chinese entities have bought large and small tracts of farmland near a lot of U.S. military installations.
“We have not seen this very much at all in Kansas, but it’s in West Texas, in the Dakotas, Montana, and it’s crazy to me that our nation allows that to occur,” Mann said. “There are various ways to fix it. Four of five different ways we could fix it. I would be for all of them. You’re also going to see various state laws that are kicking in to prevent this. There’s no reason that we’ve let a foreign country, specifically an adversary like China, own farmland right next to our military installations. It makes no sense at all because they install surveillance and listening equipment. It’s bad, bad, bad.”
Mann, a Republican, did have nine Democrat constituents show to the townhall meeting, however, some, if not all, left the meeting disappointed.
“I appreciated having a townhall meeting here from Tracey Mann in Jefferson County,” Kansas Silver Haired Legislature Paula Hladky said. “A little disappointed it did not make all parties comfortable because we are all his constituents in the Big First and that’s what I came for. I was a little disappointed in some of the remarks that were made about our present administration. I thought we were coming to a meeting to talk about what’s going on in the Big First and that’s what I came for.”
Mann’s 2022 Annual Report was passed out near the end of the meeting. It provided a ‘legislative year in review,’ a track record of what Mann has done with his time in Congress, his stance on certain issues, and more.
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Thanks for this report. I live in Lawrence, and was surprised to see we were redistricted to the 1st from the 2nd district. I like what have seen of Mr. Mann.
As an aside, I was watching some Youtube or Rumble videos of congressional hearing on the "twitter files" and saw Jake LaTurner speak and ask a question or two of someone from Twitter. I was glad to see him get in on the action, although he didn't have a marquee position like Josh Hawley or Rand Paul have had. Of course they are senators...
"Small business owner, Stephanie Lambert, who owns Steph’s Garden, asked Mann about small business regulations, claiming she had to change her business model, having been subject to two inspections by the state and one from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). "
It's my understand the CDC only inspected one or two of the plants making COVID-19 vaccines in the course of a year. And yet the FDA (I think the CDC is under the FDA) is able to inspect somebody's little farm business.
Do you remember in 2021 March 2021 when Johnson and Johnson (the manufacturer) inspected Bioemergent Solutions' plant in New Jersey, found their quality control was appalling, and caused almost their entire run to be recalled? That was the manufacturer inspecting, not the FDA or the CDC.
And as an aside, even though those batches were supposedly not cleared to go yet, the US government announced that vaccine availability would be drastically reduced for the next few weeks, for reasons they never explained.