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Congressman Nick LaLota (R-NY) sided with Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT) over his exchange with Rep. George Santos (R-NY) just before President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address.

Lalota, whose congressional district neighbors Santos’ district, joined CNN’s Kaitlan Collins on Wednesday to discuss the drama from last night’s festivities. While Biden notably had to deal with hecklers during the speech, a great deal of public interest continues to swirl around Romney’s exchange with Santos, where he chewed out the congressman for his brazenness while Santos remains under scrutiny for his many lies and accusations of fraud.

Collins asked Lalota if Romney was “right” about Santos, and the freshman rep strongly agreed with Romney.

I’ve been clear on George Santos for months now. He does not deserve to be in Congress. He has lied time and again. He has shown no remorse. He broke the public trust. This is an institution that should be filled with folks that have strong ideologies, want to fight for the ideologies, want to get results. He’s all about the rhetoric, he’s all about the drama, and he’s fallen far below the standard we all should hold ourselves to.

Collins then asked Lalota for his thoughts about Romney’s belief that Santos should’ve just faded into the background last night.

“He’s a sociopath, George Santos,” said Lalota.

“He looks for that attention. Even the negative attention drives him. It’s become an embarrassment and a distraction to the Republicans in the House. We want to focus on our commitment to America. We want to talk about putting our economy back on the right track, securing our border, holding the administration accountable…These are the things Republicans want to govern on, and every time I have to come to something like this and talk about George Santos, I can’t talk about what Republicans ought to be doing instead.”

Watch above via CNN.

Tags: George Santos, Kaitlan Collins, Mitt Romney, Nick LaLota