Nicole Malliotakis, Staten Island Representative Interview

Nicole Malliotakis joins Mendte in the Morning to talk about Trump’s address to Congress from the perspective of someone that was in the room.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome back. What a privilege it is, What an honor
it is to be in the House chamber when the
President addresses a joint session of Congress. Representative Nicole Maleotakis,
of course, was there. She represents New York's eleventh Congressional district,
which is Staten Island and southern Brooklyn. Good morning, congress Woman,

(00:23):
Thank you so much for joining us today.

Speaker 2 (00:26):
Great to be with you. Larry.

Speaker 1 (00:28):
So what a night that was. It went long, But
you know, I'm just going to make this an open
ended question. What were your impressions? What did you take
away from last night?

Speaker 2 (00:40):
Well, you know, I told the President after the speech
that I thought he did a great job, that I
was very proud of him. I think he highlighted all
the successes he has had in just the first forty days,
the fact that he has brought home hostages American citizens
who were stuck in Venezuela, who were in Russia bell
Ruse held by Hamas. He has also brought in one

(01:04):
point seven trillion dollars in private investment to bring home
our supply chain manufacturing here in the United States, and
he has secured the border. When Joe Biden said that
he needed legislation to secure the border, which was completely untrue.
And you remember we always had this discussion that he
did it by executive order. He dismantled our border, while

(01:25):
President Trump came in and fixed it immediately. And he
supported thousands of criminals from our country, particularly ones in
New York City, gang members, drug traffickers, people who even
a murderer. I mean these this is these are real
accomplishments that affect everyday Americans. And I'm very proud of
the speech he gave last night. He gave us a

(01:46):
lot of hope for the future, particularly the fact that
not only getting our economy back on track, restoring American
ship building, which is so incredibly important for our naval fleet,
but you know, you know, also the tax cuts that
he wants to provide for middle class families and senior citizens,
which have been a priority of mine as a member
of the House Ways and Means Committee.

Speaker 1 (02:08):
The conduct of the Democrats in that room I thought
was abhoran. I thought it was beyond the pale, especially
when they wouldn't stand for things that everybody should before
a cancer survivor a child be getting an honorary membership
into the Secret Service, if you can't stand for that,

(02:28):
I mean, there's a point where you start to worry
about the future of the Democratic Party. What was your
take on that, Well, how did you feel about it?

Speaker 2 (02:36):
I thought it was horrible And not only would they
not stand for that little child who had brain cancer
and wanted to be an honorary member of the police force,
but they would not stand at the announcement that they
caught the main terrorist behind the attack at Abby Gate
in Afghanistan that killed thirteen American soldiers. They wouldn't stand

(02:58):
for the mothers were even mothers who lost their daughters
because of illegal immigrants that, by the way, were let
in by their policies, the Democrats' policies. They wouldn't wouldn't
clapped for them either. It was horrific because I remember
Joe Biden coming to the chamber and you know what,
when he said something a few times that he says
something that we agreed with, we did applaud him. We
did applaud him. And it's the right thing to do

(03:21):
when it is something that is so nonpartisan, like supporting
people against criminals, supporting young children who you know how
sadly had a horrific disease, but has a hopefully a
bright future, wanting to serve this country in law enforcement.
And you know the fact that they couldn't they couldn't
stand or clap for the capture of a terrorist who

(03:44):
killed thirteen American soldiers in Afghanistan. I think that was
the worst. That was actually the worst part of the
whole situation.

Speaker 1 (03:51):
It was worse, but it was bad. But I don't
know what their point was because I know they were
trying to make Donald Trump look bad and show that
they're resisting him. But just resisting Donald Trump is what
lost them the last election. That's not a policy, and
so losers, that's what it is. It is, but it

(04:13):
hurts them. I don't think they understand it. And that's
what you know. I'm concerned about the Democratic Party in
the direction they're going. I mean, they're never gonna win
election again if they keep acting childish like this, and
if they can't acknowledge a child that has brain cancer,
if they can't acknowledge successes as you pointed out, if
they can't acknowledge when a terrorist is captured that killed Americans,

(04:38):
they're lost in the midterms. I think you're gonna have
an easy time because this is this is who they
are now.

Speaker 2 (04:48):
I hope, well, I would say that I hope that
we not only win because the way they behave and
how they've been the policies have been terrible for the country,
but that will win because we'll deliver results for the
American people. And if the first forty days this is
an example, I think it's going to be an amazing
two years and we're going to accomplish a lot of
good for the American people. I mean, look the fact

(05:08):
that this president took so seriously to get people who
are foreign criminals and gang members off our streets, to
bring home American hostage that have been rotting in jail
cells and other countries, and the other president did nothing
about it. I mean, it's amazing what he's been able
to do. But more importantly, I think we're going to
get the economy back on track. We're going to further

(05:31):
secure the border, We're going to jumpstart American energy production.
You know, we're going to do a lot of good things.
And the money that we're going to be saving from
cutting fraud, waste, and abuse, unnecessary overhead and bloated bureaucracy,
it's going to go back to the taxpayer in the
form of these tax cuts that we're hoping to implement
to reduce taxes on the tipped workers, the seniors, restore

(05:52):
some salts for New Yorkers who are getting crushed by
the Democrats on the local level with high property taxes
and personal income tax I think it's going to be
there's a lot of potential here if Republicans stick together,
and hopefully we will deliver and we will be re
elected on merit.

Speaker 1 (06:10):
One last thing I wanted to talk to you about.
Mayor Adams is going to be on Capitol Hill today's
testifying before the Oversight Committee about sanctuary cities. How do
you expect that to go?

Speaker 2 (06:22):
Well, Look, I think the mayor has a lot of
explaining to do, particularly why he felt he was obligated
to house people in the country illegally and luxury hotel
rooms at taxpayer expense. And he also asked to explain
why he did not cooperate with Ice to deport serious
criminals because the twenty fourteen law, which he always points

(06:43):
to as it's tying his hands, it did allow for
violent offenders to be detained and deported, and that's those
are the only people that the Biden administration actually issued
detainer request there were very few. Under President Trump, there
are probably about fifteen hundred for criminals, and under this
past administration about one hundred or so that they had
requested just the worst of the worst that they were

(07:03):
looking to detain, and the city still did not comply.
So unfortunately, I'm not a member of that committee, so
won't be able to participate in that hearing. But I've
been very outspoken on this issue, and I hope that
we'll see more cooperation from Mayor Adams now that we
have a president who actually wants to get rid of
these gang members and terrible people who are committing crimes

(07:23):
and wreaking havoc. We've seen a vast improvement just over
the last month now that President Trump is in office.
The mayor has also committed to restore ice at Rikers Island.
This is important because then people can be detained at
that time, not released back onto our streets, as we've
seen happen for example with Lake and Riley's murderer was
arrested and then released because of the bail law and

(07:46):
the sanctuary policies of New York Democrats and went to
Georgia and murdered Lake and Riley one hundred percent preventable.
So having ice at rikers will help prevent that from
happening in the future, but would also keep law enforcements
safe because once they're back on the streets, much harder
for law enforcement, puts them in grave danger to go

(08:06):
out and try to find that individual.

Speaker 1 (08:08):
Yeah. No, I saw Tom Holman there last night. He's
a national hero right now. Representative Nicole maliatakas US representative
for New York's eleven the congressional district, which is Staten
Island and southern Brooklyn. Nicole, always good to talk to you.
Talk to you again next week. Thank you, take care,
Thank you very much.