Huelskamp stops in Dodge
US Congressman Tim Huelskamp held a town hall meeting at Casey's Cowtown Club on Tuesday.
Topics of discussion were Veterans Affairs, agriculture and trade as well as answering questions from those in attendance.
One of the people in attendance was Michael Burroughs, CEO of Western Plains Medical Complex, who thanked the Congressman for his support of the hospital.
"I appreciate the thanks," Huelskamp said. "But I also want to thank you for your support as well as the support of our veterans.
"There are more than 300,000 employees working for the VA and a few bad apples have tarnished their work but they still won't fire them."
Huelskamp added that recently another VA scandal occurred in Wichita but did not discuss any of the details regarding it.
"But we in Congress have been able to pass VA Choice legislation," he said. "Which would allow those veterans to be able to get medical at their local hospital.
"I know some veterans were forced to visit VA hospitals in Kansas City because that was the closest hospital they could go too.
"More than 8,000 veterans said they preferred going to their local hospital and now they will be able to, especially throughout the big first district."
Some of the questions asked had to do with the tax code and current Speaker of the House Paul Ryan as well as former speaker John Boehner.
"It is hard to pass things," Huelskamp said. "Especially when bills have 74,000 pages filled with things geared towards special interest groups and lobbyists.
"But I do know when talking about the tax code, will the vote happen this year? I don't know. But I know Paul Ryan is committed to the tax code vote.
"Most people are in favor of a flat rate and of course corporations are not."
Huelskamp also spoke in regards to agriculture and the upcoming farm bill.
"Ag prices are a concern," he said. "Another concern is that there is insurance programs that just don't work, especially here in southwest Kansas and we will be trying to improve them."
Agriculture exports was another concern.
"52 percent of our wheat is exported," Huelskamp said. "And our beef tariffs going to Japan compared to going to Australia is hugely different.
"Those prices were set from previous negotiations between each country but overall we have more to sell but we want the same amount of bushels for the same amount of prices."
Huelskamp still believes the US could be competitive against China.
"We are very entrepreneurial," he said. "We are better than China in that we are always inventing new things and they are not.
"They find ways to steal what we do and reverse engineer it but they do not invent new things like we do.