Frank Lucas holds townhall at Redlands Community College

By Jacob Sturm
news@mustangpaper.com

For an hour, Congressman Frank Lucas offered Canadian County citizens insight on the
happenings in Washington D.C. and fielded questions from an organized Townhall at Redlands Community College in El Reno.

Lucas, who currently represents Mustang along with communities in western and northern
Oklahoma, talked about the political representation in Congress. Lucas is part of the House
Majority due to having five more Republicans in the House than Democrats.

In this session of Congress, Lucas serves in the Financial Services committee as the Senior
Republican. One of the most significant things the committee has dealt with is the failure of
multiple banks.

“We will, over the course of Spring, have lots of hearings looking at how this happened,” Lucas said. “Where are the regulators who are supposed to be looking over their shoulders? What kind of a business model do they have to cause this sort of collapse?”

Lucas said there will be a special assessment starting in May that will replenish the money that was taken out of the FDIC reserve fund. That leads to questions on if FDIC will prorate that money, or if small banks will be paying the same as larger banks on the coasts.

He said he didn’t know if it was fair for smaller banks to be paying for the mistakes of the
institutions on the coasts.

Another focus will be bringing some order and structure to cryptocurrency through a bill from another member of the committee.

Lucas then shifted the discussion to the Farm Bill in the works. He mentioned the COVID
pandemic and the war in Ukraine have been making the inputs prices go through the roof. He
mentioned fuel, buying parts, fertilizer and more as examples.

Lucas is also chairman of the Science, Space and Technology Committee. He mentioned the
National Weather Service as part of the discussion surrounding his work within the committee.

“Weather forecasting should be about the weather, not whose politics are in charge today,”
Lucas said. “…Along with that we’re making decisions, that being this Congress, about the next generation with the radar.”

Lucas stressed the Chinese Communist Party’s involvement with space activities, saying they
mean to put people on the moon and Mars. He stressed that America cannot let them control
things off world.

The debt ceiling issue also came up during the townhall. Lucas said it’s an issue in progress
between President Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. That could mean coming to an
agreement on spending limits for the next several years.

“We cannot continue to spend the way spending has gone the last three-to-four years,” Lucas
said.

Lucas said he thinks the greatest threats to Americans way of life were the national debt and
the “aggressive nature of Chinese Communist Party leadership.”

Questions about foreign land ownership concerns were asked to Lucas during the event. He
said foreign land ownership is not against federal law, even though it is against state law. He
mentioned foreign owners of land will come in and set up LLC’s, making it challenging for state officials to crack down on.

One thing Lucas mentioned on the subject is that land ownership must be reported to the
secretary of agriculture in Washington D.C. once a year. Lucas said he is demanding more
details in the reports, so they can work with the state.

Lucas also addressed a plethora of questions related to immigration, navigable waters issues,
Title IX concerns, additional agriculture details and more.

Now, it’s just a matter of seeing what comes of those discussions as Lucas continues his
townhalls around the state.