If you had a horrible disease and didn’t know how long you were going to live, would you spend your days driving around the country chasing down politicians who cast votes to repeal Obamacare?
That’s what Ady Barkan is doing. The progressive activist, who has nerve-degenerating Lou Gehrig’s disease, is spending 42 days in an RV on a mission that led him to Pueblo last Sunday in search of U.S. Rep. Scott Tipton (R-CO).
Tipton, according to a video Tweeted by Barkan, was invited to a Pueblo town-hall meeting on health care issues, but didn’t show up, leading Barkan to pull out a cardboard cutout of the Congressman, who’s represented southwestern Colorado since 2010, when he defeated Democrat John Salazar.
Barkan’s video shows the Tipton-less meeting, with folks directing questions about health care at the cutout and Barkan saying the Congressman “seems reticent” to answer the queries, drawing laughs from the group.
Barkan, who gained viral fame when he pleaded with Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake in 2017 to save lives by voting against the Trump tax bill, speaks slowly in his video, claiming Tipton hasn’t held a town hall meeting in Pueblo since 2016.
Tipton’s office did immediately return a call seeking to know why he’s avoided Pueblo–or if he could dispute the no-show allegation.
“The point is to highlight for the American people just how irresponsible and unresponsive their congress members are,” Barkan told the Reno Gazette Journal, explaining his tour. “They refuse to prioritize our best interests.”
Health care issues are a top concern of voters in southwestern Colorado, according to one recent poll from a Democratic pollster.
Tipton represents what’s been considered a solidly Republican district, but national political analysts at the Cook Political Report recently determined that Democrats have a greater chance to win Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District this year than they have in recent elections, though Tipton is still favored.
