OPINION: Latah County deserves better than Dan Foreman

Moscow’s own state senate representative Dan Foreman has embarrassed himself once again. Last week, Foreman yelled at Native American candidate Trish Carter-Goodheart to “go back to where you came from” during a forum held in Kendrick, Idaho.  

The statement, which included expletives according to Carter-Goodheart’s account of the situation, was made in response to one of her answers during the forum. After being asked whether they thought discrimination occurs in the state, Carter-Goodheart discussed North Idaho’s history of white supremacy and stated that racism and discrimination are real problems throughout the state. 

Rather than calmly observe this comment and move on with the forum, the extremely level-headed Foreman chose to completely derail the meeting by reportedly shouting, “I’m so sick and tired of this liberal bull****. Why don’t you go back to where you came from?”  

Following his tantrum, Foreman promptly left the meeting.  

Even if you disregard the incredibly ironic nature of telling a Native American to go back to where they came from while they’re standing on American soil, Foreman’s outburst was inappropriate, unprofessional and opposite to anything you’d want to hear from a government official.  

Unfortunately, this instance is not even close to being the first unbecoming act Moscow’s senate representative has displayed. Back in February 2018, Foreman did more yelling, this time the targets being our very own University of Idaho students. The students, who had traveled from Moscow to Boise to advocate for birth control and sex education during a lobbying event, were attempting to meet with Foreman to discuss reproductive health.  

In an exchange that was caught on camera, Foreman refused to meet with the students, bellowing that “abortion is murder” and threatening to call the police if they attempted to speak to him again.  

One might think this to be the only occasion of Foreman treating people of Moscow with disrespect – but that thought would sadly be wrong. In 2017, he was the topic of discussion after getting into an altercation with a local man at the Latah County Fair. Bodycam footage obtained during police intervention shows Foreman calling the unidentified man a “son of a b****” and telling him to “go to hell.” 

The reasons for their argument were unclear, but regardless of the details, Foreman is once again proven to be incompetent at the professionalism aspect of his job.  

If the senator has nothing nice to say to the people of Moscow, what about Latah County as a whole? Well, according to comments made by Foreman in 2018, our Republican senator views the very own county he represents as a “cesspool of liberalism.” 

The evidence here is staggering; not only does Foreman act on every rude and impulsive thought he has, but he also literally doesn’t even like the county he is meant to represent. His behavior is beyond disrespectful, both to people like Carter-Goodheart and the lobbying UI students, and to residents of Moscow as a whole.  

Foreman shouldn’t be allowed to continuously get away with his irreverence. The counties he represents deserve an individual with dignity and virtue to portray them in the state senate; and until the man stops hurling shouts and curses toward every person he disagrees with, it appears we are without a representative worthy of our respect.