SOMERS, N.Y. - A meet-the-candidate town hall for Cait Conley, the Democratic candidate for New York’s 17th Congressional District, took on a rally-like atmosphere as more than 100 local residents packed Heritage Hills’ Heritage Room on Oct. 5 to hear her speak.
This was Conley’s fourth appearance at Heritage Hills during her campaign against Republican incumbent Mike Lawler.
Apologizing for her brief delay while acknowledging the large crowd, she jokingly explained, “Sorry I’m late. I couldn’t find a parking space.”
Local resident Ken Benjamin, leader of Heritage Hills’ weekly current events discussion group and moderator of the event, introduced Conley, sharing her biographical credentials.
They included graduating in the top 2% of her West Point class, earning master’s degrees from MIT and Harvard, serving 16 years of active military duty, including six combat-zone deployments, and receiving three Bronze Stars.
Following her military service, she served as director of counterterrorism in the Biden administration and, most recently, as senior adviser to the director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.
Noting the audience’s enthusiastic response to the introduction, Benjamin quipped, “I am seeing you have lots of fans here.”
Conley’s introductory remarks stressed her fourth-generation Hudson Valley roots. She described her family as “super blue collar,” which she said taught her the value of every dollar.
Summarizing her campaign, she stated, “This is not about Republicans versus Democrats or Right versus Left, but about right versus wrong. That’s why I’m in this fight.”
She argued that “the system is rigged against working people. But good news – we can fix it.”
She later spoke about what she saw as a “moral virus” in the presidency and asserted that “The moral trajectory we are on is not American.”
Conley repeatedly linked her opponent, Republican Rep. Mike Lawler, to President Donald Trump, citing VoteHub.com as she asserted that he voted with the president 100% of the time. She also branded Lawler “a talented liar.”
(Lawler was rated in 2024 as the fourth-most bipartisan member of the U.S. House during the 118th Congress in the Bipartisan Index created by the Lugar Center and the McCourt School of Public Policy. It should be noted, however, that this rating covers the period before President Trump returned to office in 2025.)
Conley cited the cost of living and affordability as her top priorities for the 17th District.
She asserted that working families should not have to choose between “filling up the gas tank versus filling up the grocery cart” and that seniors shouldn’t have to “ration their drug prescriptions.”
Her proposed solutions included undoing Trump’s tariffs, which she said are “killing small business,” costing the average family $4,200 a year and contributing to rising home construction costs.
She also proposed a new benefit for public service employees, such as police officers, firefighters and nurses, comparable to VA benefits that enable veterans to purchase homes with lower down payments without having to pay for private mortgage insurance.
Conley went on to call for capping interest rates on student loans, perhaps at 2%, and reining in utility monopolies, particularly by banning the pass-through of discretionary expenses, such as the use of private aircraft, to customers.
Much of the meet-the-candidate session was devoted to preselected questions and topics from designated local residents, with Conley’s responses summarized below.
AI and Data Centers
Responding to charges that she is serving the interests of the tech community, Conley asserted that more data centers are needed, but they must be built in appropriate locations, have the support of the communities where they will be located and be responsible for their own electricity, water and other infrastructure needs.
She expressed pride in her work with tech companies, touched on their importance in areas such as drone defense and described her technological knowledge and experience as important assets needed in Congress, where she quipped that too many members can’t even master their flip phones.
SALT Deductions
Conley lambasted the $10,000 SALT deduction cap instituted during the first Trump administration, describing it as punishment targeting Democratic-led states.
Criticizing Lawler’s promotion of his efforts to increase the cap to $40,000, she argued that there should be no cap at all, as was the case before 2017, calling any cap an enabler of double taxation.
Campaign Funding
Conley criticized her Republican opponent for accepting campaign contributions from corporate and AI political action committees (PACs). She also criticized the broader influence of dark money from super PACs.
She claimed that Lawler received $1.7 million from Elon Musk in 2024 and then voted for the “One Big Beautiful Bill” in 2025, which she said provided Musk with significant investment tax incentives.
She also claimed that Lawler has received $8.8 million in campaign funds from a Trump super PAC.
In addition, Conley called for legislation to override the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision and ban stock trading by members of Congress, the president and other senior government officials. She also advocated congressional term limits.
Defense Secretary Hegseth
Conley offered an impassioned plea to remove Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth from office.
She criticized his decision to reduce the number of generals and admirals by 20%, asserting that he was firing military leaders for doing the right things and making America less safe.
Conley cited recent war games in which Ukrainian drones were able to destroy U.S. military equipment, as well as recent evidence of Chinese drone spying, as proof of what she described as the inadequacy of today’s American military in an increasingly dangerous world.
Israel
Conley stated that the United States must help push for peace in the Middle East and asserted the need for a two-state solution.
She went on to criticize the Netanyahu administration while supporting Israel’s right to exist, including providing necessary military aid.
She also vigorously opposed rising antisemitism.
Iran
Conley expressed the view that action against Iran is appropriate because the country must never be allowed to possess nuclear weapons. However, she sharply criticized Trump’s approach.
She explained that previous administrations shared the view that Iran must be prevented from developing nuclear weapons but had consistently rejected an approach like Trump’s, anticipating that Iran would block the Strait of Hormuz and potentially fuel an increase in Islamic extremism.
Instead, she called for continued, precisely targeted attacks on known nuclear development sites, along with economic pressure to force the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz.
Climate Change
Conley described the climate change crisis as real and no longer a matter of debate.
She asserted that climate change has cost lives while also expressing her belief that technology will help provide solutions.
She urged investment incentives for readily available, low-cost green energy sources such as solar and wind, criticizing the Trump administration for ending tax incentives for those sources that had been initiated by the Biden administration.
She was particularly critical of the decision to halt development of the Long Island offshore wind project.
Democratic Party’s Direction
Conley said hyperpartisanship is a problem and that real solutions are not found at the extremes of the political spectrum.
She stated, “I’m not a member of DSA. I started as an MP.”
However, she added that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has gone too far in its actions.
She asserted that Democrats can be a party focused on finding solutions and pledged to work across the aisle when doing so would be productive.
Conley said she believes that to make change possible, “we need to change the people.”
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