Mike Lawler Kicks Local Reporter Out of Town Hall, Bringing Back Anti-American Media Ban

Lohud: “Lawler, a frequent guest on cable television news shows, has a history of issues with the press at his Town Hall meetings”

Mike Lawler isn’t just hiding from accountability—he’s shoving it out the door.

On Sunday night, Lawler barred a local reporter from covering his town hall in Mahopac, bringing back his longtime habit of attacking the local press when things get tough.

The town hall itself was a raucous affair where “boos were more common than cheers” as constituents grilled Lawler on his support of the GOP tax scam that slashes Medicaid and SNAP while funding trillions in tax cuts for billionaires and big corporations.

Although the vulnerable New York Republican is a frequent flier on national cable news shows, Lawler has a long history of hiding from the Hudson Valley press, threatening local reporters “with expulsion if they recorded what Lawler had to say” and barring them from attending in-district events altogether.

Reminder: Lawler had a 64-year-old social worker forcibly removed by state troopers at his last town hall for asking what it would take for him to stand up to the Trump Administration.

DCCC Spokesperson Riya Vashi:
“Mike Lawler is a weak, dishonest D.C. politician who knows he can’t defend his record, and New Yorkers will see right through his desperate attempts to run from accountability. If Lawler had nothing to hide, he wouldn’t be shutting out the press.”

Lohud: Lawler talks Medicaid cuts, ICE, taxes after his staff bars lohud’s Wilson from Town Hall

• Out front [at Mahopac High School], on June 8, a handful of protesters denounced Lawler’s support for the House Republican budget bill, with its deep cuts to Medicaid and food assistance to pay for tax cuts for the wealthy. Putnam County deputy sheriffs huddled by the front door while private security guards checked bags at the door.
• I was greeted by a Lawler staffer who instructed me that my news gathering at Lawler’s Town Hall was restricted.
• Here I was, a member of the press who had obtained press credentials to a public event in a public building. It appeared to me that the government was restricting my First Amendment rights to gather the news. I objected.
• The staffer told me I had to leave because I had taken a picture of a Lawler staff member.
• “They think the press is the enemy of the people,” said Lisa Leontovich, of Lake Carmel, who carried a sign noting Lawler’s receipt of $1.7 million from a political action committee funded by Elon Musk. “That’s their MO.”
• Lawler, a frequent guest on cable television news shows, has a history of issues with the press at his Town Hall meetings.
• In 2023, Lawler banned the press from his Town Halls that summer and fall.
• That December, I attended Lawler’s Town Hall at Westlake High School in Mount Pleasant as a constituent of the 17th Congressional District. At the door, his press spokesman requested that I not report on what I heard. Lawler’s staff prohibited a Journal News photographer who accompanied me because he lived outside the district. I wrote about it anyway.
• The press policy at his May 4 Town Hall at Kennedy Catholic High School in Somers allowed journalists to record and photograph the event. But that night, attendees said Crowley singled out Rockland activist Emily Feiner, who was shouting at Lawler. Feiner was then carried out of the event by State Police in a photograph that went viral.
• What did Lawler say at Sunday’s Town Hall? … At the raucous meeting, Lawler defended President Trump’s June 14 military parade, opposed the use of masks by agents of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, known as ICE, and championed his fight to raise the cap on the deductibility of state and local taxes on federal tax returns.
• He also defended the deep cuts in Medicaid spending. He said that the House bill would bar hundreds of thousands of Medicaid recipients from registering in two states.
• A Garrison resident, who identified herself as a millionaire, told Lawler that he’d abdicated his responsibility by giving her a tax break in the House budget bill.
• “You are giving millionaires a tax break on the backs of my friends and neighbors,” she said. “I don’t need a tax break.” Lawler encouraged her to cut a check to the IRS.

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