AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:
Last week, when the House voted to give John Boehner a second-term as speaker, Michigan's Justin Amash was the first Republican not to back him. The conservative revolt against Boehner ultimately failed with less than a dozen following Amash's lead. The second-term congressman is now back in his Grand Rapids district for the first time since that drama.
Last night he took questions at a town hall meeting, and NPR's Don Gonyea was there.
DON GONYEA, BYLINE: Congressman Amash was back in his district for an event at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum, a place that honors the presidency and long congressional career of a consummate party loyalist and legislative consensus builder. Amash, who was born three years after Ford left the White House, is taking a different path - bucking the GOP leadership on issue after issue, including last week's challenge to speaker Boehner's re-election.
A crowd of about 175 turned out for the town hall in downtown Grand Rapids.
(APPLAUSE)
REPRESENTATIVE JUSTIN AMASH: How is everyone doing?
CROWD: Good.
GONYEA: Amash alluded to his new-found notoriety.
AMASH: It's been a very eventful last month or two in Congress...
(LAUGHTER)
AMASH: ... to say the least. Yeah, even I am sick of seeing myself in the paper.
GONYEA: But the very warm reception was also a reminder that for a conservative Republican, elected from a conservative district, being labeled a troublemaker by the establishment is not necessarily bad politics back home.
Amash said his two main goals as a congressman are to get a handle on spending and to bring transparency to the process. He says Americans need to better understand how Washington works and what Congress does, in order to begin to fix things.
AMASH: There's a system in Washington D.C. that is not right. And it's not because people are Republican or Democrat. The whole thing is broken.
GONYEA: Last night he was again critical of the deal to address the so-called fiscal cliff. He was a no-vote, citing the lack of any serious attention to spending cuts. Amash is a Tea Party favorite, though he describes himself as a Libertarian. Both groups were well-represented at the town hall, and there was plenty of ire directed at both Washington in general.
There was this question about President Obama.
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UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: You've been great in standing up in what you can do. But is there nobody in this Congress has got the guts to deal with this guy? He's scaring me to death.
AMASH: Let me say, I'm not a fan of President Obama. But I also want to reiterate what I said before, which is if we think that the problem is President Obama, then we have missed the point.
GONYEA: That kind of response does set Amash apart from a large portion of the Tea Party. The Tea Party does applaud the way he stood up to Speaker Boehner. Amash is one of four Republicans stripped of key committee assignments, a move seen a punishment for insufficient loyalty. Amash lost his seat on the Budget Committee.
That prompted the toughest question he got last night from college senior Zack Sikkema.
ZACK SIKKEMA: I'm very confused how getting kicked off the Budget Committee and voting against leadership, whether they're right or wrong, helps us as your constituents when you serve us.
AMASH: At the end of the day, the kind of where you go along with everyone just to get-along-politics, it doesn't really do much for the American people. It doesn't do much for you as my constituents - the people I'm representing.
GONYEA: Congressman Amash and the other Republican caucus rebels seem certain to remain a thorn in Speaker Boehner's side. David Rhode, a congressional scholar at Duke University, says it's a product of the very slim majority Republicans hold in Congress.
DAVID RHODE: But it just shows there is a group that is prepared to withhold their support from Boehner's initiatives in specific circumstances. Like the debt ceiling, for example. He may not have the votes among Republicans to do it.
GONYEA: Amash rejects any suggestion that his relationship with Speaker Boehner is a problem for him or for his district. He also makes it clear that he and the others who voted against Boehner last week will be watching the speaker closely in the coming months as new battles over the debt ceiling and automatic spending cuts approach.
Don Gonyea, NPR News.