Rep. Mike Lawler, R-NY, defending administration agenda and officials at the volatile city hall in West Nyack, New York, he framed himself as a moderate Republican willing to criticize the Trump administration as needed.
“I have been rated as the fourth most bipartisan member in Congress and as the most effective freshman member of 118 Congress,” Lawler said. “So for you who feel you’re not represented, the fact is that I’m working effectively on behalf of our district.”
The crowd at the event, which is made up solely of residents of New York’s 17th Congressional District, consistently thwarted freshmen’s lawmakers through the nearly 90-minute event, urging them to push back more aggressively against some of Trump’s agenda items.
Town Hall participants asked Lawler about Trump’s deportation policy, particularly his administration’s recent decision to fire Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadra native and a two-year-old American child.
Lawler, including a ruling that he called on the administration to comply with federal court orders and ordered Abrego Garcia to “promote” his return to the United States. Otherwise, Lawler said the administration could face a petty empty charge.
“If the administration doesn’t promote both the return of US citizens or Abrego Garcia, what you have will make the courts lightly empty and take important actions to hold it,” he said.
Roller received several questions from attendees who were worried about cutting profits through budget adjustments.
“When it comes to Medicaid, I was very clear. I’m not cutting profits because of the qualifying recipient period,” he said, but the crowd kept pushing him onto the subject.
Asked about Defense Secretary Pete Hegses’ reporting on the use of signals, Lawler said that using the platform was “wrong” “to convey classified or confidential information” before defending the former Fox host.
“The problem for me is about actual military preparation and preparation, and so far, those operations themselves are going well on track for the operations the military has been under Secretary Hegses,” Lawler said.