Rep. Tom MacArthur (R., N.J.) was repeatedly heckled and interrupted at his town hall Wednesday night while discussing the health problems of his special needs daughter Grace, who died at age 11.
In the midst of his town hall, MacArthur said he wanted to "go back to my daughter, just for a moment."
"Shame on you!" one person yelled.
Angry attendees seemed to suggest he was using her story to distract from his key role in the American Health Care Act, which passed last week in the House as a means of repealing Obamacare. The Senate is currently drafting its own health care legislation.
"I will say shame on you right now, actually," MacArthur said. "Don't tell me what I'm using. I'm going to tell you because this affects my perspective. It affects my perspective on this issue of health care."
Someone yelled out, "We've heard this story." A woman said the story was a "canned response."
MacArthur insisted that his daughter's birth and life profoundly affected how he viewed health care policy, discussing her life in a wheelchair and death at a young age.
"So if I talk about my daughter too much, then so be it, but this is the one human being that impacted my life more than everybody," he said.
"Write a book," one person called out derisively.
He was repeatedly interrupted as he discussed the struggles of paying for her hospital bills, even with health insurance. As he laid out being there for her final heart beats, he said, "If you think that I don't care about health care—" and he was shouted down again.
"The far-left's hateful, vitriolic rhetoric was on full display in New Jersey last night," National Republican Congressional Committee spokesman Chris Martin said. "Democrats should be ashamed of the despicable response from these liberal agitators."