When Emily at Congressman Ben Cline’s office called last week, my husband accidentally hung up on her. She was trying to set up an appointment. But right away, my phone rang. You answer, I hissed.

So there we were, two days later, waiting in a nice outer room, dark wood floor, dark wood desk, framed certificates in a row on the wall leading down the hall. Somebody else was behind the dark wood double doors. Her voice and Cline’s leaked out but we couldn’t catch enough. Through the crack I could see she had a baby along.

On the table beside me lay magazines and a Daily News Record newspaper. Paulson asked me to pass him the paper. I handed it over—just the top section. Oh. February 21, 2024.

I put it back down. I riffled through. The sports section, too—there’d been a game with Hokie High. And a Food Lion flier, dated February 21-27, 2024.

In the meeting room—Emily across the round table from Paulson, Ben opposite me—we tried desperately to keep our heads.

As you probably know, said Paulson, we’re in the 37% who didn’t vote for you.

Are the views in your newsletter yours? I asked, referring to the reports that slide weekly?—biweekly?—into our inbox.

Yes, said Ben, I approve everything.

And you never have different views?

No, not that I recall.

This second Trump term? we asked. Have you ever voted against the administration’s moves?

Ben wasn’t sure. He said he’d get back to us on that.

Do you ever use the term “fake news”? I asked.

I won’t say I never said it, said Ben. It might even be in my newsletter.

Are you uncomfortable knowing that your constituents are relying on Fox News? asked Paulson. We’d brought along a small stack of items. I’d put the pages on the table. Included was a printout of Ad Fontes Media’s chart ranking news outlets for factuality vs. bias.

I know that chart, said Ben. He listens to lots of sources, he said. He gets news from all sides.

You could be educating your constituents, said Paulson.

They can make their own choices, said Ben. I have confidence that they’re getting their information to the degree they want.

Paulson was supposed to be taking notes, same as me. That was the plan. But he wasn’t getting stuff written down. And then, to my horror, I saw that I’d laid out the wrong set of pages. Right there on the table, in front of Ben and Emily, was our sheaf of scribbled-up copies. Oh, I gasped, I gave you the wrong pile.

I rummaged around, remedied things. At least we still knew what we were after.

Does Trump lie? I asked.

I think the president has a good understanding of the facts, said Ben.

Has he lied? I asked.

Not that I’ve heard, said Ben.
What are you listening to? I asked, incredulous. My head drooped. I don’t know what to say, I said.

We didn’t get to talk about this and this and that and that. When Paulson brought up Trump’s false claims about other countries’ tariffs, I scrabbled to find the information we’d jotted on one of our pages for Cline. Our time was up. We had to leave. I scrabbled and scrabbled. Whew, finally. Japan 3%. China 7.5%. Algeria, Cameroon, Tunisia, 19%. I thrust the page at Cline. He pondered it.

When we left, another person was waiting, seated in one of the chairs next to the table where lay the old newspaper.

In the parking lot, Paulson told me the tags in my top were sticking up. He kindly fixed them. I said I wanted to get a photo, but he’s always annoyed by my picture taking—I waste too much time. So here’s my only shot.