WPSU is interviewing candidates running for Congress in our listening area. Republican Glenn “GT” Thompson represents the 15th Congressional District in the U.S. House. The district covers a large stretch of central and northern Pennsylvania, including Centre, Clearfield, Cameron, Elk, Forest, Warren, McKean and Potter counties. Thompson has served in the House since 2009. We’ll hear from his Democratic opponent Zach Womer on Thursday.
Here is Glenn Thompson's conversation with WPSU:
Anne Danahy
Congressman Thompson, thank you so much for talking with us.
Glenn "GT" Thompson
Anne, thanks for the opportunity. It's always great to be here.
Anne Danahy
You're chairman of the House Agriculture Committee, which is responsible for the Farm Bill. It's a huge piece of legislation. This one could be $1.4 trillion —
Glenn "GT" Thompson
Over 10 years.
Anne Danahy
It's typically passed every five years, but you haven't gotten it through Congress, yet. There was an extension last year. You're looking at another extension now. The committee passed it, but it hasn't gotten the full vote by the full House, which is controlled by your party. Why? What's stopping Republicans in the House from approving it?
Glenn "GT" Thompson
Anne, just first of all, I'm very proud to be the first Pennsylvanian in 170 years to chair the U.S. House Agriculture Committee, our No. 1 industry in Pennsylvania, and proud to be the first Penn Stater to be able to chair this committee. Farm Bills are not partisan, and I wouldn't want to see a Farm Bill that was passed just on a partisan basis. I dedicated myself three years and nine months ago when I became ranking member — now I've been chair for a year, nine months — that this would be a bipartisan, bicameral bill. And, in fact, I like to describe it as a tripartisan bill, because I have traveled not just my district in Pennsylvania, but the nation, listening to the voices of American agriculture, those farm, ranch families, forestry families, key stakeholders in rural America. Forty states and one territory, over 100 listening sessions. And so we have a good bipartisan bill. The bill that we passed out of committee, by the way, with some Democratic votes, there's 40 measures I put into that bill that were just led by Democrats. 140 measures that were led by both a Republican and Democrat, and then a whole host were just Republican-led. And so...
Anne Danahy
Sorry to interrupt, but what's holding it up though?
Glenn "GT" Thompson
Democratic leadership, Democratic leadership intervened with the members of my committee and told them, you know, "don't vote for this bill because, you know, we've got an election coming up." They put politics before people and politics before food security. Now they've come around. I give credit where credit's due. The Senate Democratic chair, who's a friend of mine, Debbie Stabenow, from Michigan, is now supporting the bill. There's always members on both sides of the aisle that will vote against the Farm Bill, whether they... some believe there was too much others think is too little. And so it really is a good bipartisan coalition that will pass this bill, and we need to do it, because America today is facing a farm and a food crisis nationally.
Anne Danahy
So you expect to have a new five-year piece of legislation by the end of the calendar year.
Glenn "GT" Thompson
That is correct.
Anne Danahy
What do you see, aside from the Farm Bill, as the biggest issue facing Americans, and what would you like to do about it?
Glenn "GT" Thompson
Gas and groceries. It's a pocketbook issue. I hear about it all the time as I travel my district, which is 18 counties, one-third of the landmass of Pennsylvania. You know, where you have gas prices or some are around 38% increase since 2020. Groceries, like I said, on the average, 13%. But depending on the commodity, it's a whole lot more. People are going to the going to the grocery store, and a lot of folks just aren't able to buy everything on their grocery list because they can't afford it. There's a lot to that we can change with that. A lot of that inflation was driven by just some, you know, bad energy policy that drove up the cost of energy, and energy is the cost of everything.
Anne Danahy
What can Congress do about it to bring those grocery prices back down? Gas is starting to come down, but …
Glenn "GT" Thompson
Well, first of all, certainly it's coming back down, but it's nowhere near what it was, less than $2 a gallon in 2020. Now, part of that is just making sure that we're not just supporting better gas prices, better household energy costs, electricity costs, you know, by making sure that we're using all of the resources, all the above and all the below, in terms of producing affordable electricity, helping to facilitate the production of good, reliable energy, is one thing. Certainly, passing the Farm Bill would help a lot, because that, you know, that's helping those hard working families that both produce and process food for us. And, you know, avoiding overspending, because we know that when government puts a lot of cash through government, into anything, those government monies coming out does impact inflation. So being, you know, just being prudent, right? Being fiscally responsible, investing where we should and where we need to, but to avoid some of the overspending that we've seen over the past past few years actually, you know where we're talking, trillions of dollars being spent.
Anne Danahy
In light of the COVID pandemic. But OK, so it's a presidential election year, there's been a lot of political vitriol. In particular, I want to get your reaction to Republican nominee Donald Trump saying that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, are reportedly eating pets. There's been a lot of reporting on that. It's not true. The Republican Governor, Mike DeWine, he says it's not true. And I wonder if you think the former president's rhetoric is taking the focus off of the real issues: immigration, or like the issue you just brought up the cost of living.
Glenn "GT" Thompson
I think political rhetoric on both sides of the aisle is a problem. And unfortunately, you know, I think that there are some residents of that community who reported that because of whatever issues with their pets, and once that became public, and then that was grasped on to and was repeated. But I think we need to be very careful with our rhetoric, I find. You know, we should be able to talk to each other. We need to be at the table, you know. I look at the threat to democracy, I would call it, you know, with some of the rhetoric by President Biden of, you know, we need to put a bull's eye, put a target on President Trump. Now, he didn't mean that, obviously, but he's talking about putting a focus on what he's saying. But at the same time, if you've got folks out there that are just unstable, you know, pretty historical times where we've had any presidential candidate that's had a threat, not once, but twice, within 60 days on their lives, this uncontrolled rhetoric, you know, and bring it closer to home for me and in the House. We have individuals on both sides of the aisle, you know, that agitate and use and weaponize words, right? But it's not helpful. It may help them get likes and clicks, and quite honestly, media time. They tend to be the ones that are, you know, are on the cable news programs. But it's not helpful in terms of legislating. It's not helpful in terms of getting the things done that are priorities in the lives of of our American families.
Anne Danahy
Congressman Thompson, thank you so much for coming in to talk with us.
Glenn "GT" Thompson
Anne, my pleasure anytime. Thanks for the opportunity.
