Oregon Public Broadcasting

Thousands of Maryland residents may have been a bit surprised by a call they received Tuesday night. They were invited to join a town-hall-by-phone with a Congressman that was definitely not their own.

Jes Burns reports.

Oregon Rep. Peter Defazio thought he'd try a new way of connecting with voters. His office contracted with a company called Tele Town Hall that simultaneously calls 30,000 - 40,000 registered voters in an area and invites them to ask their Congressman questions.

Peter Defazio: "They say they've had up to 5000, 6000 people. So I thought that's worth a try. I don't have to drive 1200 and spend a week doing it."

Instead of calling 40,000 voters in Lane County, the company called numbers in Maryland.

Peter Defazio: "They figured it out before they got to the point of any of them asking me questions. They were probably a little puzzled by who I might be and the kind of the issues I was emphasizing might not have fit, you know, Baltimore area."

Congressman Defazio says Tele Town Hall was extremely embarrassed by the flub and has offered to schedule another try without charge.