All posts tagged "mike lawler"

New scandal rocks MAGA's most vulnerable congressman: report

Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) was facing scrutiny on Wednesday after a new Politico report revealed he was receiving overlapping payments, raising questions about his past as a political operative.

Lawler's advocacy and political groups paid more than $720,000 to Checkmate Strategies, the consulting firm he co-founded and sold last year for up to $50,000. While ethics experts say the arrangement is legal, it has fueled speculation about potential conflicts of interest as the Republican lawmaker pursues reelection in a highly competitive district.

"POLITICO has previously reported that Lawler’s campaigns paid his former firm $500,000 for campaign services," according to the outlet. "A new analysis of other campaign finance and lobbying records shows that in addition to those payments, before entering Congress, Lawler directed a host of organizations that paid a combined total of at least $221,515 to Checkmate for its services between 2019 and 2021."

Lawler previously worked as a lobbyist, political consultant and an executive director of the New York State Republican Party.

"But the lines between the three roles often blurred together — a reality that now poses a political liability as Democrats eye his suburban congressional seat as a prime pickup opportunity this year," Politico reported.

A review of public records has revealed that when he was serving as the director of the natural gas advocacy group New Yorkers for Affordable Energy, the organization paid Checkmate Strategies $97,000 to lobby for it in 2019 and 2020. At the time, Lawler was listed as the group's lobbyist. As leader of the economic development group 17 Forward 86, that organization ended up paying Checkmate $95,000 for lobbying. Checkmate was paid more than $26,000 for campaign mailers and consulting services from 2019 and 2021, while Lawler was chair of the Orangetown Republican Committee.

Government watchdog groups called the payments from organizations Lawler directed to his former political firm "improper" and urged that such arrangements forbidden.

"These kinds of self-dealing transactions should be banned," Rachael Fauss, a senior policy advisor with the group Reinvent Albany, told Politico. "No nonprofit board or political committee should allow their leadership to enter into contracts with another entity they have a financial stake in. Unfortunately, attempts to rein this in have failed for decades."

'You're all cowards': MAGA lawmaker drowned by jeers and boos as town hall turns ugly

Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) faced off with an angry crowd as he was booed during a fiery town hall this weekend in New York, according to reports.

Lawler was meeting with constituents at Mahopac High School on Sunday when he was met with a hostile audience, lohud.com reported.

"As at his previous sessions, a steady din of jeers and shouts washed over his responses and drowned him out at times — mixed with applause and cheers from his supporters after some responses," the outlet reported.

This was Lawler's third town hall so far in 2026 and his seventh public chat in his 17th district since President Donald Trump's second term in office. He tried to defend himself throughout the contentious event, claiming he was one of the few Republicans in Congress currently hosting town halls.

He reportedly kept defending his positions and lectured the crowd while the public was showing frustration towards him and the Trump administration.

"We're in a high school auditorium, and high school students act a lot better than you are acting," Lawler told the crowd as the heckling started. "Actually act like an adult, and stop."

Lawler defended Trump's war in Iran, reiterating the Trump administration's talking point that the conflict was aimed to avoid Iran obtaining or making a future nuclear weapon.

But one of his constituents challenged him — and the crowd cheered him on when he directly called Lawler out for his support of Trump. He continued his criticism of Trump until security guards pulled the microphone away from him and escorted him out.

"You say that when you disagree with Trump, you will tell him so, but that's not enough," one man said. "You must impeach. He's a fraud, he's corrupt, he's an incompetent psychopath. The Republican Party and you are enabling him. You're all cowards, and you're spineless."

Lawler was slated to hold another town hall later this year in Dutchess County. That date and location has not yet been announced.

Struggling MAGA rep under fire as veteran kicked out of town hall meeting amid ICE fury

Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) has come under fire after he had a veteran removed from a town hall meeting after asking questions about ICE.

The Trump-supporting congressman, whose seat is considered at high risk in this year's midterms, appeared at the SUNY Rockland Community College's Cultural Arts Center, where 450 members of the public attended to ask questions. A cordoned-off area outside saw a further 100 people gather in a protest labeled "Vigil for Victims of ICE".

Lawler was asked for his thoughts on what his "line" was when it came to opposing Donald Trump's administration and the rise in ICE presence in states across the country. One person shouted, "Answer the f---ing question."

That person was removed from the audience after Lawler requested they were taken out of the venue, the local news website Lohud reported. Lawler said, "Hey, bro, you can leave now. Goodbye, goodbye."

The audience member was escorted out by a Rockland County sheriff's deputy as other members of the crowd chanted "let him stay." It has since been reported that the audience member escorted out of the building was a former US Navy veteran.

Nyack resident Emily Feiner, who previously made headlines after being carried out of a separate town hall meeting hosted by Lawler, has since commented on the incident.

Feiner, a retired social worker for the Veterans Administration, said, "Tonight (Lawler) had two U.S. veterans removed for demanding that he actually answer constituents' questions rather than grandstanding and gaslighting us.

"As a retired VA social worker this is shocking to me."

Lawler has since stated those removed from the venue during his town hall meeting were "removed for their conduct, not their questions."

Lawler made it clear he thought the deaths of both Renee Good and Alex Pretti at the hand of ICE agents in Minneapolis were "tragic" instances, but added both situations were "preventable." The GOP rep has also said ICE agents should not be wearing masks.

'Eleven years of this': Swing-seat Republican shrugs off Trump’s Davos 'pandemonium'

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s erratic behavior on the world stage — threatening to seize Greenland from Denmark, making rambling speeches and attacking key NATO allies at Davos — was just business as usual, a prominent moderate Republican insisted.

“Eleven years of this, have people not figured it out?” Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) told Raw Story at the Capitol.

The U.S. will benefit “if the end result is that he gets greater access, increased military presence” in Greenland, Lawler said, bemoaning the media’s “pandemonium” coverage of a head-spinning week.

President Trump first told Norway’s prime minister he wanted to buy or seize Greenland, in part because the Nobel Committee passed him over for the Peace Prize he so covets, even though the committee is completely independent from the Scandinavian country’s government.

Then, at the 56th World Economic Forum in Switzerland, President Trump saw Canadian PM Mark Carney win rave reviews for a pointed speech about the need for mid-sized countries to work together and not rely on America in the wake of the tariff-fueled trade wars Trump’s waged across the globe.

In stark contrast to the clarity offered by the leader of America’s northern neighbor, Trump’s own remarks in Davos saw him continually confuse Greenland with Iceland; promise not to use force to seize the former but insist he wants to take it regardless; say he and NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte had worked out the “framework of a future deal” for increased U.S. access to Greenland; and then abuse NATO allies whose troops fought alongside the U.S. in its post-9/11 wars.

"We've never needed them," Trump told Fox News, adding: "We have never really asked anything of them.

"They'll say they sent some troops to Afghanistan and they did, they stayed a little back, a little off the front lines."

Just in the case of the United Kingdom, 457 British troops were killed in Afghanistan and another 179 in Iraq, while waging former President George W. Bush’s “global war on terror.”

Denmark lost 43 service members in Afghanistan and eight in Iraq.

‘Permanent damage’

Now that 2026 is here, November’s midterm elections are starting to engulf everything in Washington, especially for endangered Republicans like Lawler who have tried to create distance from Trump without enraging his MAGA base.

While Lawler and others in the GOP straddle that Trumpian tightrope, Democrats insist they won’t let them off the hook for letting Trump embarrass America on the world stage.

“Trump's craziness has done permanent damage,” Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-PA) told Raw Story.

Boyle, who serves on NATO’s Parliamentary Assembly — a body comprised of 281 parliamentarians from 32 countries — is visiting the organization in Brussels next month. He expects to perform damage control.

“This is doing permanent damage,” he stressed.

In the wake of Trump’s gaffes in Switzerland, Boyle got started on international diplomacy early, after American allies freaked out and blew up his phone throughout the week.

‘President was a draft dodger’

Other members of Congress have also been trying to clean up the president’s international messes, many of which predated the Davos disaster.

Last week, Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-OH) “spent time with the representative from Greenland and the Danish Ambassador.”

“I think [Trump’s] staff didn't inform him of our relationships with Greenland and Denmark,” Kaptur told Raw Story this week.

The midwestern progressive is embarrassed that President Trump threatens allies with U.S. military might, despite what she dismissed as his own lackluster record on military matters.

“Well, the President was a draft dodger,” the Congresswoman said, “so, yeah, I don't really think he has a sense of the military. I think he views it as his police force.”

Trump, 79, obtained five draft deferments during the Vietnam War, four for academic reasons and one due to a claim to have bone spurs in his heels.

Infamously, in 2015 and 2016, during his first run for president, he stoked controversy by deriding Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain, a decorated war hero, for having been captured by Vietnamese forces.

"He's a war hero because he was captured,” Trump said. “I like people that weren't captured.”

Perhaps more infamously still, Trump once told shock jock Howard Stern that avoiding sexually transmitted diseases while dating in New York had been his “own personal Vietnam.”

“I feel like a great and very brave soldier,” he said.

Blackface scandal used to link MAGA Republican with racist text furor

The Congressional Black Caucus PAC is using a blackface scandal to link a MAGA Republican to the recent racist text leak furor involving young Republicans, according to reports.

Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) is the focus of the targeted five-figure ad called "Not for Us, which will air on YouTube and television in his district, Politico reports Thursday.

The ad will also mention Lawler's use of blackface while he was a college student. Lawler has said it was "an homage to pop star Michael Jackson."

“Mike Lawler keeps showing us exactly who he is — between now and Election Day we’re going to make sure Hudson Valley voters know he’s not fit for Congress,” a Black Caucus PAC spokesperson said.

The campaign is also working to connect Lawler to Peter Giunta, a member of the New York Young Republicans reportedly involved in the Telegram chats released by Politico earlier this week that included racist, antisemitic and homophobic comments, rape fantasies, and suggestions on how to drive their opponents to suicide.

“They referred to Black people as monkeys and ‘the watermelon people’ and mused about putting their political opponents in gas chambers. They talked about raping their enemies and driving them to suicide and lauded Republicans who they believed support slavery," according to the report.

Giunta has claimed that the chat and its release are “a highly-coordinated year-long character assassination." He apologized, saying, “I am so sorry to those offended by the insensitive and inexcusable language found within the more than 28,000 messages of a private group chat that I created during my campaign to lead the Young Republicans.”

'Just so you know': MAGA rep schooled live on CNN as he tries to dismiss scandal

MAGA Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) wasn't convinced of the merits of appointing a special counsel to investigate the elusive Jeffrey Epstein files when asked about conservative activist Laura Loomer's suggestion on Monday.

Loomer, who appears to have President Donald Trump's ear when it comes to firing "disloyal" White House staffers, has been calling for Attorney General Pam Bondi's ouster over her bungling of the Epstein issue.

Lawler told CNN's John Berman Monday, "I'm not exactly one to subscribe to conspiracy theories. So from my vantage point, if somebody committed a crime, if somebody affiliated with Jeffrey Epstein committed a crime, they should be prosecuted. In the absence of that, frankly, this seems like a colossal waste of time and effort, and frankly, a lot of nonsense."

Lawler added, "There are a lot of issues facing this country right now — a dead pedophile ain't one of them. And from my vantage point, you know, the world is a lot better off with Jeffrey Epstein no longer part of it."

But Berman pushed back."You say there's a lot of nonsense," he said. "A lot of nonsense from whom? Explain to me what you think the nonsense is here."

Lawler said he didn't understand why the news media was "continuing to cover" Epstein in comments that were reminiscent of President Donald Trump's frustration that the topic was still being discussed. Biographer Michael Wolff has claimed that the FBI may have photos of Epstein and Trump together with young girls, prompting both MAGA and Democrats alike to call for full transparency.

"At the end of the day, if there are people who were part of any crimes, then they should be prosecuted. But in the absence of that, what exactly are we looking to do?" Lawler asked.

Berman went on to explain why the story was still important.

"Just so you know, it's being covered because the deputy director of the FBI is said to have taken off work on Friday to protest the justice department's own handling of this. And there have been shouting matches reported inside the White House on this. So, whether or not you think it's important, apparently there are people who are quite agitated about it."

Watch the clip below via CNN.

Latest GOP town hall devolves into 'shouts, groans and mockery' as voters flout 'rules'

Self-described moderate Republican Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) had his hands full during a Sunday night town hall in his suburban Hudson Valley swing district, according to reporting inThe New York Times and a variety of videos posted to social media.

Local police expected more than 1,200 constituents to jam the high school auditorium where Lawler was speaking in Rockland County, but first they had to follow Lawler's rules as posted outside the venue: participants were required to provide proof of residency for New York's 17th district; were warned against shouting, screaming, or yelling; and were forbidden from making "audio or video recordings."

But the rowdy constituents ignored those last two directives, as evidenced by cell phone video posted to X.

Also read: 'This is our shot': Dems believe MTG's new job gives 'golden opportunity' to destroy GOP

In one video, a constituent asked, "What are you doing to stand in opposition to this administration, and what specifically are you doing that warrants the label 'moderate'"?

The question drew whoops and applause from the audience. When Lawler began to answer, saying, "Again, my record speaks for itself. I've been rated the fourth most bipartisan for a reason," the audience laughed and groaned.

In another clip, constituents chanted, "blah, blah, blah" as Lawler tried to justify President Donald Trump's tariffs that have caused the upending of the stock markets.

The article described "shouts, groans and mockery."

Times reporter Nicholas Fandos wrote that, "The congressman got a rare round of applause when he defended the use of vaccines and criticized Mr. Trump’s health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has cast doubt on the efficacy of vaccination."

But overall, the town hall was both "combative and catty" and looked less like "the kind of respectful town-hall conversation Americans venerate than a shouting match where both sides accuse the other of acting in bad faith," Fandos wrote.

He added that, "For much of the night, acrimony carried the room. Attendees provoked confrontations with fellow attendees, with Mr. Lawler’s staff members and with the police. No one was satisfied, including supporters of the congressman who mostly watched in silence."

Read The New York Times article here,

'You are making that assumption!' GOP lawmaker put on the spot over Trump's change of tune

Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) wasn't buying CNN anchor Pamela Brown's assertion Friday that Donald Trump "changed his tune" on tariffs once the stock market started to tank.

Over the past weeks, Trump has imposed 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico, then granted temporary reprieves, announced an exemption for car manufacturers, activated the tariffs, then announced Thursday that he was pausing tariffs on Mexico for one month "as an accommodation, and out of respect for, President Sheinbaum."

All of the chaos and uncertainty has made investors nervous, causing stock indices to fluctuate wildly, reported The New York Times.

"Tariffs are an effective short term negotiating tool, and I think the president delaying on auto manufacturers is not an issue if it's covered under the terms of the US-Mexico-Canada trade deal, that's fine," Lawler said.

ALSO READ: 'Absolutely unconscionable': Ex-Republican demands Trump removed from office after fight

Brown interjected, "I also want to make sure that I'm able to respond to to what you said with the facts, you know, because in terms of the Mexico and Canada tariffs, the only thing that changed was the stock markets went down. There was clearly a big reaction to that. Donald Trump saw that and changed his tune...Businesses don't like this uncertainty. They don't like the back and forth. And that's kind of what we're seeing play out in the in the economy right now."

"Look, the stock market is going to fluctuate day to day. If we're making decisions based on, you know, a one-day analysis of the stock market, that's certainly not a way to to govern," Brown said.

"So, should he have not done what he did? Because it seemed to be in reaction to the stock market."

"You're surmising — no, you're making that assumption. Did you speak to him directly? Did he tell you that's why he did that? I don't think so," Lawler asserted.

"Certainly, we have reporting that that certainly factored into the decision making," Brown said.

Watch the clip below via CNN or click the link.

Republican calls House speaker vote 'theater of the absurd'

A GOP lawmaker called Friday's House Speaker vote — in which two Republicans were finally convinced to change their ballots but a third still held out — "the theater of the absurd."

Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) posted his congratulations to Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) on X for keeping the speakership before Lawler appeared with CNN's Jake Tapper.

"What was going on behind the scenes?" Tapper asked. "You had six people refusing to vote, then they voted for Johnson. Three people voting against him, then two of them flipping their votes. Did you talk to any of them?"

Tapper was referring to Reps. Ralph Norman (R-SC) and Keith Self (R-TX), as well as the lone hold-out, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), who made his anti-Johnson position known in interviews before the vote.

Lawler answered, "Throughout the last few days? Certainly. But look, Jake, it's the theater of the absurd. But I'm glad, obviously, that we were able to get this done in one round on one day and get Mike Johnson elected speaker so that we can actually get to work."

ALSO READ: Revealed: The secret Republican plot to disenfranchise millions of voters

Lawler continued, "There is so much to do on behalf of the American people, especially once President Trump is sworn in and we've got to hit the ground running. And, obviously, the certification of the presidential election is on Monday — we wouldn't have been able to do that without a speaker. So, to get this wrapped up today, I think, was an important step. And we move forward and get about the business of the American people."

House Republicans begin the new session of Congress with a very narrow margin — 219 to 215 to begin, with the assumption they'll lose two more representatives shortly to Trump cabinet appointments. Rep. Michael Waltz (R-FL) has been tapped to fill a national security adviser position, and Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) is Trump's pick for ambassador to the United Nations.

Watch the clip below or at this link.

CNN's Wolf Blitzer corners GOP lawmaker for blaming Trump shooting on Biden

A Hudson Valley Republican tried to tell CNN's Wolf Blitzer on Monday that President Joe Biden and his allies share some responsibility in their "rhetoric" for the shooting that took place at former President Donald Trump's rally in Pennsylvania — and Blitzer quickly reminded him that no one yet knows the shooter's motive.

It started with Blitzer confronting Rep. Mike Lawler about Trump's newly-minted running mate, Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH), proclaiming that the Biden campaign's criticisms of Trump as a threat to democracy "led directly" to the shooting. "Now that Vance is officially the vice presidential nominee for your party ... do you want to see him tone down that kind of rhetoric?" asked Blitzer.

"The rhetoric across the board obviously needs to come down," said Lawler. "But for the grace of God, Donald Trump would have been assassinated on Saturday. We're talking about a millimeter's difference between whether or not that bullet went through his ear or his head. And I think, obviously, the rhetoric that has been used to say that Donald Trump is a fascist, that he's a threat to democracy, is destructive to our country."

"Don't you think the FBI, the Secret Service, should be allowed to conduct their investigation into this shooter's motive before someone, a senator in the United States Senate, goes out and blames the Biden campaign?" Blitzer pushed back.

"Look, of course the investigation will determine what the motive is and the investigation will uncover all of the facts, including how in God's name the shooter got up on a roof with a clear line of sight to the former president," said Lawler. "And certainly I think there is a feeling across the country that when you say things like that Donald Trump is going to destroy our democracy, or that he is a fascist, that does not help. It does not help the dialogue."

"So you want both Trump and Vance to tone down their rhetoric as well against Democrats?" Blitzer asked.

"I want everybody to focus on the American people and not turn this into a battle of personalities," said Lawler.

Watch the video below or at the link here.

Wolf Blitzer pushes Mike Lawler for blaming Trump attack on Bidenwww.youtube.com