US Rep. Ayanna Pressley and 5th Suffolk District state Rep. Chris Worrell hosted a “Coffee with the Congresswoman” event at First Parish Dorchester last Tuesday (April 23) where Pressley shared information about some of the projects she has taken on over her past five years in Congress.

After she was greeted with a standing ovation, Pressley talked about her work on the House Committee of Financial Services holding some of the biggest banks in the country accountable for their promises in 2020 to commit $32.5 billion to “advance racial equity” in the wake of the Black Lives Matter protests. She said she was pleasantly surprised to see that they were making some progress.

“Because banks have played a role in creating the racial wealth gap, I want to hold them accountable for being just as the harm was, in being just as precise in the healing,” she said.

One of the main issues Pressley has focused on is housing, calling it “the first, second, and third priority.” For a number of reasons, one being the partisanship of the House of Representatives in this current session, Pressley said they have only been able to hold two hearings to date on affordable housing.

Pressley used the occasion to note that she was one of the first members of Congress to call for a ceasefire in Gaza and to reiterate her call for instituting a redesignation of temporary protected status to Haitians and provide humanitarian aid to the island nation during this period of political turmoil.

“If you believe Black lives matter, Haitian lives matter, too,” Pressley said.

She answered several constituents’ questions and promised that she or her staff would follow up with ones she couldn’t address at the event.

“They’ve taken away a lot of my in-district time because of the unpredictability and chaos in Congress right now,” the congresswoman said. “But just know, you have my attention.”