Earlier this week, Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., a self-described moderate Republican eyeing New York’s governorship, faced a hostile crowd and witnessed firsthand how the public is souring on the Trump administration.
On Sunday, Lawler held the first of his series of in-person town halls. Though the representative has held call-in, virtual town halls previously, attendees who attempted to ask questions said that they were heavily screened and not representative of sentiment in the district.
I had attempted to register for the event well ahead of time. However, without an in-district address, I couldn’t do so online. At the same time, no one picked up the phone when I called each of Lawler’s three offices to attempt to register or seek admission as a member of the press.
Showing up to the event at Clarkstown South High School in West Nyack, a hamlet situated in Rockland County, I was denied entry by Lawler’s staff, who were even checking to ensure that those who successfully registered could provide proof they lived in the district. One teacher at the high school was asked to provide a utility bill with her name and address because she had left her driver’s license at home.
Speaking outside the high school where the event took place, many constituents who had come out told Salon that they were unhappy with Lawler. Even among those who did approve, many were concerned about his relationship with President Donald Trump’s administration.
Vincent Solar said he had voted for Lawler in 2024, when the lawmaker successfully pitched himself as a moderate, winning re-election over former Rep. Mondair Jones, D-N.Y., by about six points. He was at the town hall, he said, to see if the representative was “talking out of both sides of his mouth” and “to see if he represents us or if he represents the president.”
Solar said that he was most concerned about “Medicaid cuts, unelected officials having influence inside the administration and unqualified people in the cabinet." Above all, he added, "it’s the spineless Congress that’s the issue.”
Another constituent, Taylor Mandelbaum, said he was hoping to hear “Lawler get some questions that he doesn’t have a pre-scripted answer to.”
“A lot of his recent town halls — phone town halls — you only got 11 questions. I actually got a pre-screened for one of them, and they were asking pretty tough questions about what I was going to ask him,” Mandelbaum said.
Mandelbaum said that he didn’t vote for Lawler in the last election and that he was hoping to ask him about funding cuts to NOAA and the National Science Foundation.
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Brian Hall, another constituent, said he did not vote for Lawler but that he, in theory, “likes a lot of his policies and what he’s done," adding: “President Biden even said that Congressman Lawler was the type of Republican that he could do business with."
Hall said he was hoping to hear a response from Lawler to Trump’s deportations of legal U.S. residents, and refusal to bring back the wrongly expelled Kilmar Abrego Garcia, despite the Supreme Court ruling against the Trump administration unanimously. He also indicated that he was disappointed with Lawler’s behavior in relation to the press.
“I don't think he wants reporters such as yourself from Salon.com and CNN and MSNBC to be privy to unfavorable media coverage,” Hall said. “I think it is an overall affront and ongoing strategy of First Amendment rights, and I wish that the Congressman would allow the press inside.
At this point, a Lawler staffer who refused to give his last name but whom I later identified as Sean Glendening, chief counsel to the congressman, told me that I wasn’t allowed to talk to people who were walking into the public high school where the event was taking place. Glendening told me that if I did not remove myself from the premises, he would have to get security involved.
While Lawler's organization was selective in the press they allowed in, The New York Times reported that the town hall was characterized by "groans and mockery" of the representative, as Lawler repeatedly claimed that he didn't support slashing Medicaid, despite his voting for a budget framework that demands the committee that oversees Medicaid find $880 billion in cuts. The audience even laughed when he said that the United States is "strong and united."
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On my way out, I spoke with some of the remaining protesters at the event. While there had been hundreds ahead of the event, most went inside around the time the doors opened.
One protester, Merrill Tone, said her chief concern was about American democracy and that Lawler had “done a good job trying to portray himself as somebody that cares about people, and then he goes along with his party.”
“He wants to, you know, further his career so he’s going to back whatever horse is winning the race,” Tone said. “I'd be sorry to see him as governor if he's if he's keeping on the way he's keeping on now, with all of these being okay with all this stuff that's going on, because Congress should really step in. They let all these illegal things happen, and they have a voice and they're not speaking up, the Congress is doing nothing.”
Jacob Tananbaum, a resident of the district, told me that he was out protesting because Lawler “thinks of himself as a moderate, but he's been backing this regime of the Donald Trump.”
“I mean, you can't call yourself a moderate if you back something so extreme,” Tananbaum. “He’s no moderate. That's not who this person is. He’s standing behind this Trump administration.”
Lawler's icy reception comes as Republicans around the country are returning to districts where their politics — cutting Medicaid, praising Trump and supporting mass deportation — are becoming increasingly toxic. Even Republicans like Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., Nancy Mace, R-S.C., and Byron Donalds, R-Fla., are facing hostile crowds. Trump, meanwhile, has claimed without evidence that Democrats are "paying a fortune" to disrupt town halls.
In early March, the chief of the National Republican Congressional Committee, Rep. Richard Hudson, R-N.C., even directed his fellow representatives to stop holding in-person town halls because of how poorly the events were going for Republicans.
The turn against Republicans in their districts seems to be part of a broader souring on Trump and his allies, with the president's approval rating sinking to just 39% in April, according to a recent Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll, marking the lowest his approval has ever sunk, according to that pollster.
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