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GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. The voter identified himself as a cancer survivor, and he had something to say to Republican Rep. Justin Amash: I am scared to death that I will not have health insurance in the future.

The comment earned 61-year-old retiree Paul Bonis a standing ovation from the crowd packed into a school auditorium in Amashs Michigan district Thursday night. And the congressman was booed for his response: That the Affordable Care Act has hurt a lot of people, and he supports his partys plans to repeal and replace it, even though Republicansstill havent united around an alternative.

Its a scene thats played out around the country over the past several weeks as Republicans and President Donald Trump have assumed control of Washington and begun moving forward on their long-held promise to undo former President Obamas health care law. In an echo of the raucous complaints that confronted Democrats back in 2009 as they worked to pass Obamacare in the first place, Republicans who want to repeal it now are facing angry pushback of their own at constituent gatherings from Utah to Michigan to Tennessee and elsewhere, even in solidly Republican districts.

And just as the protests in 2009 focused on health care but reflected broader concerns over an increasingly divisive new president and Democrats monopoly control over Washington, now, too, constituent complaints at town hall meetings appear to reflect more general fears about the Trump administration and the implications of one-party GOP rule of the nations capital.

In a Salt Lake City suburb on Thursday night, Republican Rep. Jason Chaffetz faced irate constituents chanting Do your job! as they pressed the House Oversight Committee chairman to investigate Trump. Chaffetz struggled to be heard as he faced a litany of sharp questions and screams from a crowd of people who grilled him on everything from Obamacare to Chaffetzs desire to overturn a new national monument in southern Utah.

Come on, were better than this, Chaffetz protested over the hubbub at one point, practically pleading with the deafening crowd to let him speak.

In Tennessee, Rep. Diane Black faced questions from impassioned and well-informed constituents defending the Affordable Care Act, including one man who told her that he and others with health conditions might die without insurance. And you want to take away this coverage, and have nothing to replace it with, the man said. Black argued that the Affordable Care Act has been ineffective because although 20 million people gave gained coverage under the law, millions more have chosen to pay a fine and remain uninsured.

And in southern Wisconsin, RepublicanRep. James Sensenbrenner faced a voter who asked him: Whos going to be the check and balance on Donald Trump? Like others interviewed at town halls around the country, the woman asking the question, Barbara Kresse, said she has not been politically active, another similarity to 2009 when the advent of the Obama administration seemed to cause enough anxiety to awaken groups of voters who had never previously gotten involved.

Indeed the recent protests are being amplified by liberal activists modeling their opposition to Trump on the tea party groups that sprang up to oppose Obama and the Democrats. Calling itself Indivisible, a non-profit group that grew out of a how-to guide written by former Democratic congressional staffers has advertised town hall gatherings nationally, suggesting at least some level of coordination, which was the case with the anti-Obamacare protests as well.

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Angry voters flood Republican lawmakers' town hall meetings - Press Herald