To the editor:

I have lived in the Fort Dodge, Iowa, area all my life. Also raised with ethics and values. I see how our free speech is being attacked in this day and age. How people are calling each other names and if you don’t think as they do, we treat them pathetically. My faith is questioned everyday.

We’ve accepted what’s happening in our government. Our expenses are still going up. Families can barely put food on the table for their children and government help has cut down. I would like to know where all the money from those federal employees’ job losses has gone.

I’ve worked 40 years, paid taxes, Social Security taxes, and exist on my Social Security check each month. My savings are gone. I am 76 and buying my own home. Buying is cheaper than renting now.

As for tariffs, people are asked to give it time. Time for what? To watch small businesses fight to exist and keep going hopefully. We have the tariffs added to us and our cost of living every day.

Are the people in our government ignoring the facts?

As for me I don’t need to help build another jail for illegals or homeless or mentally ill street people. Can’t people be helped, not locked up?

I see all the government agencies being cut or done away with so our states can help us? Is this the America we want now?

Independent help instead of working together.

Wake up people. This is not what I consider making America great again. Maybe the well-to-do can buy groceries, but my check just pays my expenses. A lot of us are struggling just to exist in our country. I know I’m not alone.

Lelane Doyle

Fort Dodge