Mike Lawler to attend Biden trip to his district amid debt ceiling fight
Ryan King
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Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) is planning on appearing alongside President Joe Biden during his venture into the congressman’s district on Wednesday.
Lawler decided to accept a White House invitation for Biden’s stop at Westchester Community College, where Biden is expected to rail against the GOP on the debt limit. Biden’s trip is widely seen as a dig at Lawler, one of the most vulnerable congressional Republicans, as the debt limit battle rages.
“He is attending,” a spokesperson for Lawler told the Washington Examiner.
Biden will stop by the Westchester County region to give a speech about the brewing crisis and to attend multiple fundraisers elsewhere in New York. This includes one hosted by former Blackstone executive Tony James and another by George Logothetis, the executive chairman of Libra Group, CNBC reported.
His speech is expected to rip into the spending cuts that Republicans have sought in exchange for lifting the debt ceiling.
“On Wed @JoeBiden comes to the Hudson Valley to lie about the debt ceiling debate and do nothing to address our migrant crisis, while NYers struggle under record inflation, skyrocketing energy costs, & high taxes — he’ll then hold a fundraiser,” the congressman tweeted ahead of the showdown.
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White House press secretary Karine Jean Pierre teased Biden’s speech but demurred on reaction to Lawler’s accepting of the invite. She stressed that Biden “loves to travel across the country to different districts” and “different states.”
“I’m going to let the congressman speak for himself,” she said during a press briefing. “The president’s going to drive home the impact of these current discussions that we’re having [on] the economy, how it affects real hardworking Americans. That’s what you’re going to hear.”
The trip will come on the heels of Biden’s Tuesday meeting with members of the “big four” in which the president is set to discuss the debt ceiling. Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) have long been at loggerheads over how to lift the nation’s borrowing authority.
Lawler has backed McCarthy, supporting passage of his Limit, Save, Grow Act to lift the debt limit by $1.5 trillion or until March 31, 2024, whichever comes first, in exchange for a suite of spending cuts. Biden has rejected that plan and called for a stand-alone bill without any strings attached.
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Lawler managed to flip New York’s 17th District last election cycle in a breakthrough victory for the GOP. Biden previously won it in 2020. Since then, Democrats have been keen on winning it back, with party operatives mounting ad campaigns and a redistricting court fight in hopes of reclaiming his seat.
On Tuesday, Lawler also drew a prominent challenger for his congressional seat from Liz Gereghty, the sister of Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D-MI).