Rep. Allen West Demands Retraction of 'Inaccurate' Town Hall Coverage

Rep. Allen West is disputing the account by a left-wing website, ThinkProgress, that the congressman "pre-screened" questions at his town hall meetings this week.

After a small group of protesters tried to disrupt a meeting in Fort Lauderdale on Tuesday, a more civil gathering was conducted in Boca Raton on Wednesday evening.

Angela Sachitano, spokeswoman for West, R-Plantation, issued this statement Thursday about ThinkProgress' coverage and the events:

"The article is factually incorrect and we have already demanded a retraction.

"The facts are in both town halls:

"Congressman West did not prescreen his questions and didn't even see them ahead of time.

"Every person who entered the town hall had the opportunity to write down a question.

"The questions were sorted by a third party -- the employees of the venue.

"No staff was involved with the questions. We did this intentionally so there was no bias with the questions.

"The decision to do this was based on getting through as many questions as possible.

"In the past, with such a large number of people showing up -- sometimes up to 600 people -- very few questions were asked, as people waited for an hour in line at the microphone, and many questions were asked over and over."

Sachitano added:

"If the reporter was actually there, he would have seen that Congressman West answered some very tough questions on everything from abortion to Medicare. It was never a cakewalk, and he doesn't want it that way.

"The new approach -- which was determined several weeks ago after analyzing what we could do better after last month's town halls -- is working. We got through about 70 questions -- more than double last month's town hall."