Lane County residents express fear, resolve as Trump administration unfurls its agenda  

Two Oregon Democratic leaders promised Wednesday to fight against the torrent of federal cuts from the Trump White House. 

So far, their actions are matching their words: Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield has filed or joined a dozen federal lawsuits against the Trump administration that seek to overturn federal funding cuts, reinstate fired workers or unwind other executive actions, including Trump’s order to withhold birthright citizenship from some infants born in the United States. At this same point in the first Trump administration, Oregon only had filed one lawsuit, Rayfield said.

About 200 Oregonians attended the April 9 town hall meeting in Eugene to hear Rayfield and House Speaker Julie Fahey, D-Eugene, speak about their roles in resisting Trump’s arsenal of cuts and other executive actions, including policies that led to the revocation of four student visas at the University of Oregon, where the event took place. 

“The chaos and confusion that is coming out of the federal government is harming real people,” Fahey told attendees. 

Two area Democratic state legislators joined them: Reps. Nancy Nathanson, whose district includes north Eugene neighborhoods; and Lisa Fragala, whose district includes the University of Oregon and central and south Eugene neighborhoods. 

Rayfield is one of 23 Democratic attorneys general in the United States, a figure that includes the District of Columbia. Every day, he said, the group meets early to map out strategy and look for the latest executive actions from the White House. For Rayfield, those talks may start at 4 a.m. 

“We begin the work of maintaining a line of sight on the Trump administration,” Rayfield said.

The town hall, the first of at least three statewide, one each in Eugene, Portland and Bend, gave Rayfield a chance to hear the concerns of constituents. The 90-minute event gave Lane County residents a chance to talk about their fears for the future amid the tumultuous federal landscape. 

Ken Hubbard, a Transportation Security Administration officer at Eugene Airport, said the morale of he and his fellow officers has plummeted. 

They are fearful of losing their jobs, but also concerned about the lack of inclusiveness under the new administration. 

“We are discouraged that anyone who does not look like me — a straight white male — is looked down upon and attacked,” Hubbard said, stressing he’s speaking for himself, not the agency.

The officials heard from others with concerns about varied cuts. They include access to health care, including gender-affirming care, and a program that supplies food to Lane County pantries.

Amid the concerns, they also acknowledged their limits. For example, the Legislature has limited funding and cannot backfill every cut the federal government makes, Fahey said. 

That’s especially true for Oregon programs that rely heavily upon federal funding such as Medicaid, which provides health care to 1.4 million low-income Oregonians. That’s about 1 in 3 residents, both statewide and in Lane County, where about 130,000 people are enrolled, state data show. 

In a meeting with reporters before the town hall, Fahey said a “worst-case scenario” would be if the federal government significantly slashed Medicaid funding, which would force the state to make difficult decisions about access to health care. If the federal government made cuts in the billions, no state could withstand that, Fahey said. 

“We are not set up to backfill that kind of federal funding,” she said. “No state is going to be able to do that.”