Congressman Stephen Lynch visited UMass Boston on Tuesday, kicking off the McCormack Graduate School’s “Your Congress” series with a wide-ranging discussion with students, faculty, and staff on issues from health care and diversity to student debt and climate change.
Your Congress aims to bring each member of the Massachusetts delegation to campus on a rotating basis, providing opportunities to hear from those who represent us in Washington, according to McCormack Dean David Cash.
“We all know we’re getting much closer to the 2020 elections, and so there is no better time to launch Your Congress,” Interim Chancellor Katherine Newman said. “With this 24-hour news cycle that we’re all living with, often driven by conflict and by tweets, it’s really refreshing to have a forum that’s substantive and meaningful, where we can dig into the issues that really matter to all of us as citizens.”
UMass President Marty Meehan, a former congressman himself, introduced Lynch to the crowd, saying that while a lot of people in the Capitol talk the talk about working families, it is rare that you have someone who has actually walked the walk.
Lynch, a South Boston native, has served as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives since 2001, representing Massachusetts’s 8th congressional district, which includes the southern fourth of Boston and many of its southern suburbs. He currently sits on the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, the Committee on Financial Services, and the Committee on Oversight and Reform.
“He has been in Congress in both the minority party and the majority party and has found a way in both instances to be effective,” Meehan said.
Lynch, who was headed back to Washington D.C. after the event, updated the crowd on the issues Congress is currently tackling— gun control legislation, a $2 trillion infrastructure deal, and an election security bill to address vulnerabilities in the electoral process as the country heads into the 2020 election.
He also explained the legislative process, saying the House will send its ideas and incorporate it in a bill to the Senate, and on rare occasions the Senate will agree. More often, the Senate will have their own ideas and offer their own bill. That bill will go to conference. They argue it out and come up with a compromise.
“That’s not happening today,” Lynch said. “We in the House say the Senate is a place where good ideas go to die. That’s been the practice over the last year since the Democrats have taken over the House.”
Lynch opened the hour up to questions from students, faculty, and staff, wanting to hear what is most important to them.
Osagie Ihegie, a first-year MPA student in the McCormack Graduate School and a graduate assistant, asked Lynch how we can bring more diversity to Congress, specifically representation of people from state schools.
“There’s an abundance of individuals in Ivy League schools that happen to be members of Congress. Is this done intentionally?” he asked.
Lynch agreed that Congress does need more diversity.
“I think I bring as much to Congress as an ironworker strapping on a pair of work boots for 20 years and building bridges and high-rise office towers. I bring as much from that background as I do from being an attorney and graduating from B.C. Law or getting my MPA in Harvard,” Lynch said.
“You take a different view of the world—a diversity of experience, of backgrounds and riches. In government, we want all those perspectives to inform the decisions that we’re making,” he added.
Krystal-Gayle O’Neill, a global governance PhD student, asked what conversations were happening on a federal level on reducing the crippling student loan debt and increasing funding for public school education.
Lynch said that lawmakers were able to get legislation through that provides some minor downward pressure on interest rates.
“However, we don’t do enough to allow people from my background, middle class and struggling families, to send their kids to college,” he said. “There are not enough opportunities. Clearly we have to do more.”
Distinguished Professor of Science Education Arthur Eisenkraft asked how we put the science and evidence-based reasoning back into discussions on climate change in Washington.
“The evidence is there all around us,” Lynch said. “All we can do is call people out when they try ‘alternate facts’ and try to undermine our efforts at pushing back on climate change. … I do think it’s a small minority. The more evidence gathered, the more ridiculous those positions look.”
Cash gifted Lynch with a biography of John W. McCormack, the former U.S. House Speaker that the graduate school is named after.
“What a fantastic way to launch Your Congress,” Cash said. “Congressman Lynch, who sits in the seat once occupied by Speaker John W. McCormack, brought insights, great stories, and policy ideas in his back-and-forth with students, faculty and staff.”
Cash said Congressman Richard Neal, who represents western Massachusetts, and Congresswoman Katherine Clark, who represents the swath of eastern Massachusetts from Framingham to Winthrop, are also on deck for campus visits this semester.