By Carol Tannenhauser

Democratic Congressman Jerrold Nadler did not hold back at a public forum last Thursday night at Goddard Riverside Community Center, on Columbus Avenue between 88^th and 89^th Streets.

“Let me start by saying that, from my point of view, this president presents the greatest threat to constitutional liberty and the functioning of our government in living memory,” he said. “And look at what’s going on in Congress. The Republicans are either being silent or actively complicit in cover-ups. They’re trying to protect the president against any proper investigation of misconduct. They’re not doing the job of proper oversight of the president. That’s one major problem we have now.”

Another is keeping the government open by passing a budget.

“The issue of the government shutdown and the budget is not primarily about immigration,” said Nadler. “That’s a secondary issue that’s gotten caught up in it. The primary issue is that the Republicans have wanted for a long time to hold down non-defense discretionary expenditures — everything the government does other than defense and entitlement programs — education, housing, roads, infrastructure. They want to hold those down and increase defense spending tremendously.

“We reached a deal five or six years ago that we’d have parity,” he explained. “You couldn’t increase defense spending more than you increased non-defense discretionary spending and vice versa. The Democrats are insisting on maintaining that parity. The Republicans want to greatly increase defense spending and not greatly increase non-defense discretionary spending. Maintaining parity in order to protect non-defense discretionary spending is the key budget issue before us, and the Dreamers are getting hung up in there.”

And what about the Dreamers, those who were brought here illegally as children?

“Everybody agrees that we should legalize the status of the Dreamers,” Nadler said. “The president agrees — on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. On Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, he doesn’t agree. President Obama established the DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) program to protect these people, because he couldn’t get it through Congress. President Trump created a crisis by undoing it and establishing a March 5^th deadline. So, we have to legislatively fix this problem. Some Republicans and the president are trying to use it as leverage to get very harsh immigration provisions on other things. The fact is, there’s almost unanimous agreement on the Dreamers. We shouldn’t hold them hostage to the other things they want to do that I consider terrible or racist or just wrong.”

Which is similar to how he feels about the Republican tax bill:

“I call it the Republican tax scam. It’s about the worst thing I could imagine on many different levels. It will increase the deficit by between $1 and $1.5 trillion in the next 10 years. Eighty-three percent of the benefits are estimated to go to the richest 10% of the population. This is the largest upward redistribution of wealth we’ve seen in a long time.

“Already you’re hearing Speaker Ryan — I shouldn’t say ‘already;’ he’s been doing it since he graduated college — talking about the necessity of cutting entitlements, reducing Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. ‘We have no choice,’ he says. ‘We just don’t have the money!’

“A bill that’s going to increase inequality and be used as a justification for cutting entitlements and all the discretionary spending that we depend on…there’s no saving grace in this tax bill.”

Questions from the audience raised a number of other issues, including Russian hacking.

“In the 2018 elections, what safeguards are there that the Russians won’t hack us again?” a man asked.

“One of the major criticisms of the president I have,” Nadler responded, “is that, because he refuses to admit there was a Russian attack on our election last year, he is refusing to do anything to defend against an attack on the elections this year. One of the duties of the Commander in Chief is to protect the country, and that doesn’t mean just protect it against missiles or invading soldiers. It means protect our democratic process against an invasion of a different sort, a cyber invasion.”

“If they close down the government, why don’t they stop paying Congress?” a woman demanded. “They should put that in the law. If the government shuts down, nobody gets paid, even the president. Nobody!”

“I agree,” Nadler said.

“Do you think the Republicans are going to evolve to oppose Trump?

“No.”

Marijuana?

“I’ve supported legalization for 40 years.”

What about the deductibility of state and local taxes?

“We have always said that state and local taxes are tax deductible for two reasons: one, it’s unfair to pay taxes twice on the same income; two, it’s essential for states to retain their tax bases. By greatly reducing the deductibility of state and local taxes, you are putting pressure on the states to lower taxes and state and local services. If they don’t reduce their taxes, people will leave.”

Jerrold Nadler has represented New York’s 10^th Congressional District since 1992. Considered one of the most diverse districts in the nation, it encompasses most of the Upper West Side, Hell’s Kitchen, Chelsea, SoHo, Greenwich Village, TriBeCa, the Financial District, and Battery Park City, as well as parts of Brooklyn. He is the ranking member of the powerful House Judiciary Committee.

Congressman Nadler is set to hold a town hall meeting next month, though the exact date hasn’t been set.

Photos by Carol Tannenhauser.