Merced, Atwater mayors meet President Trump during White House visit
Merced Mayor Mike Murphy and Atwater Mayor Paul Creighton wrapped up their three-day stay in Washington, D.C., on Friday, as they represented their cities at the U.S. Conference of Mayors winter meeting.
The trip was highlighted with a three-hour discussion about “Transforming America’s Communities,” at the White House, which was attended by President Donald Trump and many of his top senior administration officials.
Both Murphy and Creighton introduced themselves to Trump. “We got the opportunity to hear him speak and I had the opportunity to introduce myself and shake his hand,” Murphy said.
Creighton briefly spoke to the president. “’I told him, ‘You’re doing a great job, but we need your help in California. We have a lot of things we need to turn around. We have a major homelessness problem,” Creighton said.
“He said, ‘I need your help, too. You’ve got my commitment as long as you’re committed to working with us.’ I told him, ‘Absolutely.’”
The group of mayors from across the country heard from Trump, his senior administration officials and cabinet secretaries, including Senior Advisor Kellyanne Conway, Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson, Jovita Carranza, administrator of the Small Business Administration and Alex Azar, secretary of Health and Human Services.
Democratic presidential candidates Mike Bloomberg and Pete Buttigieg also spoke to the mayors during the three-day event.
According to Murphy, the speakers stuck to areas of their expertise. Topics included affordable housing, homelessness, reducing poverty and stimulating small businesses.
“One of the things that stood out for me was trying to provide relief for farmers,” Murphy said. (Trump) talked about increasing the opportunity of trading farm goods. It was encouraging to hear.”
One of the discussions that stood out to Creighton was Trump talking about religion and government. “He talked about not segregating religion completely out of government,” Creighton said. “Maybe if we’re more inclusive it would help impact the community.”
Murphy also visited Capitol Hill and met with Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s staff to talk about transportation and affordable housing in Merced.
Murphy and Creighton said it was important they were able to be in Washington to represent Merced, Atwater and the region. The trip gave them an opportunity to share issues their cities are facing with people at the federal level.
“I think it’s important to have voices from Merced and Atwater be here at the nation’s capital,” Murphy said. “We were able to meet with people at the staff level all the way to the president.”
“The president talked about how the people who aren’t here will have to get in back of the line,” Creighton said. “Being here was like setting up a placeholder.”
This story was originally published January 24, 2020 at 6:06 PM.
