GLASSBORO, N.J. – On Wednesday, March 1, New Jersey State Senator Mike Testa (R) came to speak at an event hosted by the Rowan University College Republicans. 

Testa is a Republican who represents the first district of New Jersey in the State Senate. This covers Cape May County and parts of Cumberland County and Atlantic County. He is on three committees which include the Joint Committee on the Judiciary, Public Schools and the Budget and Appropriations committee.

Testa talked about a variety of different political issues on which he gave his views on. He shared how his career developed and opened the floor up for questions. The question period started off with a discussion about transgender athletes in high school sports.

He sponsored a bill called the “Fairness in Women’s Sports Act” which would require, “participation in school-sanctioned sports be based on biological sex at birth.”

“Biological females shouldn’t be allowed to compete against biological males,” Testa said.

He brought up collegiate trans swimmer Lia Thomas to further discuss his point, stating that “You can’t run away from DNA.”

He then moved on to “woke” culture and what he called the, “Twittersphere” where he talked about people on social media creating dangerous narratives without having thorough knowledge on the subject. 

One point Testa was passionate about was the recent rise of antisemitism. He made reference to NBA star Kyrie Irving’s controversial posting of a movie that pushes antisemitic rhetoric. Testa said that his grandparents met while in a concentration camp. 

During his time he also discussed a bill he sponsored that revolves around health care called, “Michelle’s Law,” as well as COVID-19 and vaccines, the New Jersey budget, media literacy, Gov. Murphy’s new electric vehicle plan and drugs. 

Finally, Testa was asked about his opinion on if Central Jersey existed. Testa answered that he did believe in Central Jersey and he was met with a roaring round of applause from the crowd. The question seemed to be satirical, but nonetheless, the audience was enthused. 

The event was attended primarily by members of the Rowan University College Republicans organization and was organized by the organization as well.

“There is a lot of work that goes into it. But here it’s always easy to work with a politician like him, Ed Durr, even Bill Spadea that we had, they’re always really easy to work with,” said Rowan University College Republicans President Eric Holmes said,

The event lasted two hours and ended with Testa taking pictures with members of the audience. 

“I mean, this past week has been really stressful just trying to get like questions made and all the logistics and all that and really worried about the turnout but it’s been really inspiring to see so many people here in the event, so many people interested in his speech,” vice president of the club, Vikas Addanki, said. “It was great to see how long he talked for. I did not expect it to go that long. And it was great to see how engaged he was and how interactive he was with everyone.”

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