{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://vasquez.house.gov/media/press-releases/rep-gabe-vasquez-meets-las-cruces-seniors-tackle-rising-costs-and-protect", "Rep. Gabe Vasquez Meets With Las Cruces Seniors to Tackle Rising Costs and Protect Social Security", "2025-10-27", "2025", "2025-10", "Democrat", "House", "NM", "Gabe Vasquez", "V000136", "vasquez.house.gov", "vasquez", "https://vasquez.house.gov/media/press-releases", "scraper", "WASHINGTON, D.C. \u2013 On Saturday, October 25, 2025, U.S. Representative Gabe Vasquez (NM-02) met with local seniors at a Las Cruces grocery store to hear directly about how the rising costs of groceries, housing, and health care are impacting their daily lives.\n\nVasquez spoke with Las Cruces residents Karen and Jack Zilbert about the difficult choices many seniors face just to make ends meet, from deciding which prescriptions to refill to stretching their grocery budgets each week. As they walked the aisles of a local grocery store together, the couple pointed out how prices on everyday essentials have climbed and shared their worries about how rising costs are squeezing seniors across New Mexico.\n\n\u201cSeniors like Karen and Jack are making tough decisions about what they can afford at the grocery store, and like many New Mexicans they\u2019re rationing week by week. It\u2019s unacceptable that this administration is focused on giving tax cuts to the rich while seniors and middle-class families struggle,\u201d said Vasquez. \u201cIn the wealthiest nation in the world, folks like Karen and Jack who have worked hard all their lives deserve to age with dignity, stability, and peace of mind, without having to choose between food and health care.\u201d\n\nVasquez remains committed to standing up for New Mexico seniors by protecting their benefits and lowering everyday costs:\n\nProtecting Social Security\n\nChampioned the Social Security Fairness Act, which is now law, to ensure retired public servants receive the full benefits they\u2019ve earned.\n\nCalled on Speaker Johnson to block any legislation that would cut Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid benefits on behalf of millions of Americans who depend on these programs.\n\nOpposed staffing cuts at the Social Security Administration, which have led to increased wait times and put local offices at risk of closing.\n\nCombating Rising Health Care Costs\n\nCo-sponsored the Protecting Health Care and Lowering Costs Act and the Bipartisan Premium Tax Credit Extension Act to extend ACA enhanced premium tax credits and keep health care costs from skyrocketing for seniors across New Mexico.\n\nVoted against the Republican tax law that made it harder for seniors to qualify for Medicaid through increased work requirements, severely restricted payments to providers and medical facilities \u2014 leading to 1 in 4 nursing homes closing \u2014 and degraded Medicare\u2019s ability to negotiate lower drug prices, causing increased prescription drug costs for seniors.\n\nFought to cap the cost of insulin at $35/month for folks with private insurance, Medicare Part D, or Medicare Advantage.\n\nPromoting Affordable Housing\n\nIntroduced the Keep Mobile Homes Affordable Act to crack down on corporate investors who raise rents and price out seniors living on fixed incomes.\n\nChampioned the HOME Act to make it illegal during a housing emergency to sell or rent homes for unreasonably high prices, ensuring New Mexicans on fixed incomes can afford a safe place to live.\n\nEnsuring Access to Affordable, High-Quality Food\n\nVoted to protect SNAP benefits and introduced the Healthy Foods for Native Seniors Act to expand access to nutritious foods in Tribal communities.\n\n###", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T19:32:54Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://vasquez.house.gov/media/press-releases/rep-gabe-vasquez-meets-las-cruces-seniors-tackle-rising-costs-and-protect"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.9709433652460575, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}