Incumbent Rep. Tom Suozzi on bid for reelection in 2026 midterms

Well, here we go. It is one of the hottest congressional races in the state. New York's third congressional district, which encompasses parts of Long Island and Queens. Democratic Representative Tom Suozzi running for reelection against former Republican State Assemblyman Michael LaPetri. Both are here today. But first up, Tom Suozzi, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you, Rosanna. All right. So why do you want to keep this job? Listen, I really feel like I've helped a lot of people in my life, and I like public service, and I'm good at it. And I want to solve some of the problems. I've seen of everybody just fighting with each other. I want people to work together to actually solve the very real problems we have in our country. People are worried about affordability, but immigration is still an issue. Big issues like AI, the munitions that we have, you know, do we have enough bombs? You know, what if they keep on bombing from Iran? What if Russia keeps bombing Ukraine? What if China attacks Taiwan? These are real serious issues. People have got to stop just fighting, fighting, fighting, and work together to actually solve the problems that affect real people's lives. What can we do about affordability? I mean, what really is within your power that you can do for your district? Well, there's four things right now that are happening that we have to address. Number one, everybody knows this. It's like, I just have to remind you, tariffs, okay? The tariffs are a problem. I'm okay with doing tariffs against China. I'm okay with tariffs to, like, protect industries like the steel industry. But Canada, what are we doing? Why are we beating up on Europe so badly? Why are we beating up on South Korea and Japan and Australia? Work with Congress. You've got to work with our allies. You can't just do it going alone. I'm going to do whatever I want to do. Work with us. Let's figure out how to extract ourselves from the situation, but actually keep people safe in the process. Number three, the debt. We've had debt for a long time, but the big, beautiful bill created more debt than the history of the United States of America. And when there's high debt, that causes upward pressure on interest rates. That makes it harder to buy a house, to lease a car, to pay your credit card bill, to borrow money for your business. and then health insurance premiums we've had high health insurance for a long time it's skyrocketing right now because we cut the premium tax credits for health insurance and we're going to see big problems when they cut Medicaid and Medicare if the Democrats win they're going to try and pull that back let's talk about the national debt just to follow up on that for a second because a lot of these the spending is on social programs things along those lines um is there anything that you'd be willing to cut back on when it comes to the Democrats and Republicans have got to make a deal Enough, again, fighting, fighting, fighting. Make a deal. I've been trained as a CPA and a lawyer. You don't have to be a CPA to know. There's only two things you can do. Raise revenues or cut expenses. That's it. You've got to do both. That's the only way you're going to get a deal. You have to raise revenues and you have to cut expenses, both things, and come together to do that. One of the other issues you mentioned, last year you were asked, is there one thing that the Trump administration has done well? And you said closing down the border, border security, things along those lines. Do you still feel that way in light of some of the aggressive tactics that we've seen from ICE, including a shooting right here in New York City? Well, there's no question that securing the border is good. There's no question you have to go after the violent criminals. There's no question you have to go after the cartels. Those are all good things. Let's make it permanent by actually passing a law instead of just executive order. But there's been too much overreach with, you know, you see the windows being broken and the guy dragged out and beaten up who's like a landscaper. But can you have both? I mean, don't... Yes, you can have both. You can be tough and safe and treat people like human beings. I mean, we've just gone. These guys in ICE, they're not even trained that much. They get 47 days training. FBI, ATF, DEA, New York City cops, Nassau County cops, six months training. Why are they only 47 days of training? This is a tough professional job. Let's try and treat it like the profession that it is. So if the Democrats win handily during this election cycle, would you be in favor of impeaching President Trump? I think it's a bad waste of time. I just said this recently. We've got to spend 75 percent of our time fixed, fixated on fixing the issues in the country. Affordability, immigration, climate, AI, munitions, 75 percent of our time, 25 percent of our time should be on like oversight. Did they really break the rules? Did Elon Musk really shut down the satellite for the Ukrainians? You know, did the guy really get his wedding paid for by a Russian guy? I mean, let's just like 75 percent address the real issues, not just like beating each other up all the time. Twenty five percent doing the job that Congress is supposed to do and the Senate's supposed to do, which is basic oversight. You've also been very critical of the DSA within your party. Lots going on with the DSA. They really have a groundswell going on. And then there's also talk about Ilhan Omar and possibly some kind of fraud there. Where do you stand on all that? Listen, I've had it with the far left. I've had it with the far right. I'm trying to start a center-left movement, like a traditional. I say I'm a new kind of old-fashioned Democrat, okay? You can, I have a thing called the Promise to America. I've got 1,500 people signed up so far. And it's very simple. It fits on an index card. We're capitalists, not socialists. We're for safety, not lawlessness. We're mainstream, not extreme. We're proud, not ashamed of America. Let's get back to the traditional values in my party to try and move our country forward. Rebuild the middle class. Be good for law enforcement. I got endorsed by the Nassau County Police Union. That doesn't happen with Democrats that much. So let's try and work together to actually address the problems in our country, make people's lives better, and get back to some traditional values and enough of the attack attack. We've got a lot of things on our agenda here, but we're supposed to keep the time even. So we should leave it there, Congressman. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Really appreciate it. Appreciate you coming on. All right. Now we're going to talk to his challenger. Did you see Mike Lepetri yet? I didn't see him here this morning. I've seen him a lot on the campaign trail. He's been nicer to me lately, I've noticed. Might be back in that green room. We'll see. We're going to talk to him in the next half an hour.