Rep. Mike Lawler questioned whether an elected county official in New York is really an American citizen during a public meeting.
José Alvarado, the vice chair of Westchester County’s Board of Legislators, had asked the Republican congressman what documentation he expects people to produce if confronted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement amid President Donald Trump’s attempted crackdown on illegal immigration in the state.
“I’m speaking to you, Mr. Lawler—somebody that looks like me, right, is approached by ICE. What would your immediate expectation would be for me to do?” Alvarado, the first Latino county legislator to be elected in Westchester, asked Lawler. “What should I carry on me to demonstrate that this immigrant is the vice chairman of this board?”
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Lawler answered the Democrat by saying that, in such a scenario, Alvarado should cooperate. He then openly speculated about Alvarado’s citizenship status.
“Like every other person that is engaged by law enforcement, if you are asked for information, cooperate,” Lawler said, before adding: “I wouldn’t expect you as a—I don’t know, I assume you’re a citizen. Maybe you’re not. Maybe you are…”
Lawler’s comment was met with laughter by some of the people at the meeting, with one person audibly calling the remark “unbelievable.” One attendee could also be seen wincing and putting a hand over their face in apparent embarrassment.
“This is the point that I’m making,” Alvarado said. “Do you walk around with your birth certificate? I don’t, and I am a citizen—otherwise I wouldn’t be duly elected to serve this board.”
He added that he “didn’t realize” that Lawler “didn’t know that in order to be elected, you have to be a citizen.”
Later, Lawler said he understood that “to hold office, you have to be a citizen.”
“My point to you was, like everyone else who is a citizen, if you are encountered by law enforcement and they ask you for documentation, you provide it. That’s it,” Lawler said.
Nate Soule, a spokesperson for Lawler, told NBC News in a statement that the congressman was “simply making the point that people in this country, legally and obeying the law, have nothing to fear from ICE.”
“The reality is that Democrats can’t win this argument on the merits, so all they have left is character assassination and lies,” Soule added. “The Democrats’ defense of sanctuary city, county, and state policies was roundly rejected in the last election—including by the Hispanic community, who overwhelmingly moved toward Republicans.”
Rep. Nydia Velazquez, a Democrat representing New York’s 7th District, also slammed the incident as “unbelievable.”
“Questioning a Latino lawmaker’s citizenship? That’s not just ignorance—it’s straight-up xenophobia,” Velazquez wrote in a post on X. “Rep. Lawler must apologize.”
In October, images emerged allegedly showing Lawler in blackface while dressed as Michael Jackson for a Halloween costume in 2006. Lawler did not dispute the authenticity of the photos but told The New York Times he’d intended the costume to be “the sincerest form of flattery,” adding: “The ugly practice of blackface was the furthest thing from my mind.”
He also apologized to “anyone who takes offense” at the images.
