In the northwest corner of the continental U.S., an informal group of neighbors meets every week to come together over their disagreements.
JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
What would make someone go out of their way to talk with people they disagree with? That is one of the questions that came up as NPR reported our series Seeking Common Ground. We sent reporters all around the country to find people talking about their differences. We followed one group in Washington state where Democrats, Republicans and independents open up about the issues. Lauren Gallup of Northwest Public Broadcasting reports on why they do it.
LAUREN GALLUP, BYLINE: It’s just before 9:30 in the morning. People are filing into the Port Angeles Senior and Community Center. Democrats, Republicans and people in between all sit around the table together. Their discussions can get a little heated. At one point, the group is discussing what happened on January 6, almost four years ago. Regular attendee David Fox, a Democrat, says he doubts that former President Donald Trump offered to secure the Capitol.
DAVID FOX: And nobody in the military remembers that conversation. That’s the main thing. So that’s all we got to go on on that.
GALLUP: Sandi Lytle, a Republican, argues back.
SANDI LYTLE: And you’re Nancy Pelosi, and that’s your department, and you know this event is getting ready to happen. I mean, wouldn’t you, in your common sense, say, we’re going to need more than what we’ve got here today?
GALLUP: You wouldn’t know it from this, but Lytle and Fox have actually become friends. I talked to them at a small cafe last month after one of their meetings. Both Fox, a Democrat, and Lytle, a Republican, just started going to the meetings this year. Neither of them is afraid to point out their differences.
LYTLE: I am a conservative Republican. I’m not hardcore, but I am very conservative – just probably more traditional. And these are my friends, these Democrats on the other side of the table.
GALLUP: They like that the discussion group creates a place to be open and talk about their differences. It’s what keeps them coming back.
FOX: I think that’s the big draw for me. It really is – just to be face to face with other people’s ideas. And we don’t hold back.
GALLUP: The group has been around since at least the 1990s. It’s mostly been Democrats who go. And last year, worried they’d become an echo chamber, they reached out to the county’s Republican Party office. That’s how Lytle, who’s president of a Republican women’s group, joined. Coming from a family that always talked politics, she doesn’t mind being outnumbered.
LYTLE: I’m always in hot water, always in the hot seat, so I say I’m just sharpening my tools.
GALLUP: It’s mostly retired folks. Most of them are white, like Fox. Lytle is Black. The meetings happen once a week. People bring clippings from media outlets across the spectrum, from The Guardian to The Epoch Times. They’re allowed to bring up whatever issues or current events they’d like. Fox says the dynamics of the group are something he doesn’t find anywhere else.
FOX: You read the news, and you’re not interacting. You watch TV, and you’re not interacting. You talk to your friends, and a lot of them – they might already agree with me on many ideas.
GALLUP: Fox says he appreciates that back and forth, and so does Lytle, but this month’s election has been a test. I called Fox, and he said the day after the election, he felt enraged with Trump voters.
FOX: The first day, I felt like telling those people, you know, I’m so mad at you. I wish you’d go away. I don’t want to see you. I don’t want to look at you. But that’s not going to help.
GALLUP: Democrats in the group said in the first meeting after the vote, the discussion was painful, and some of the Republicans gloated. Lytle says she tried to avoid that and wants to move on past the election.
LYTLE: We still need to keep talking, and we still need to keep discussing the issues that are on our heart.
GALLUP: And Fox wants to keep talking.
FOX: Whatever happens, whatever difficulties confront us, what’s most important to me is that we don’t go further and further away from each other.
GALLUP: He says they’ve learned to accept each other on their own terms. The group plans to keep going. For NPR in Port Angeles, Washington, I’m Lauren Gallup.
SUMMERS: Tomorrow in this series, we’ll take a look at what happens in the brain when we disagree.
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