NEW YORK — Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik’s Friday morning campaign launch for governor came just days after one of her fiercest GOP rivals claimed victory in Long Island’s purple Nassau County.
Now that rival — Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman — is criticizing her nascent bid as he mulls jumping into the gubernatorial race himself.
“I have tremendous respect for Elise, however our party must nominate a candidate that has broad based appeal with independents and common sense Democrats,” Blakeman said in a statement. “The party must nominate the candidate with the best chance to defeat Kathy Hochul, and I have been urged by business, community and political leaders across the state to make the run and I am seriously considering it.”
His statement Friday is bad news for New York Republican Chair Ed Cox, who endorsed Stefanik in a statement soon after she officially entered the governor’s race. Cox declared in his endorsement there would not be a contested GOP primary.
Republican officials are desperate to avoid that scenario this year in what they view as a winnable race against Gov. Kathy Hochul, the Democratic incumbent who has middling approval numbers.
The primary fight three years ago between then-Rep. Lee Zeldin, ex-Trump aide Andrew Giuliani, former Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino and businessperson Harry Wilson was considered a wasteful exercise. Zeldin came within single digits of unseating Hochul that year — a relatively close margin in a deep blue state.
A 2026 primary stands to be even more damaging for Republicans ahead of what is shaping up to be a challenging midterm.
But Blakeman’s victory Tuesday boosts his argument that he can win over moderates.
It was a bad night for Republicans in urban, suburban and rural areas throughout the state. Town and county posts once viewed as reliably Republican fell to Democrats for the first time in decades. And even when Democrats didn’t win, they typically performed better than in the past — including candidates Stefanik campaigned for.
Meanwhile, Blakeman turned a 50.4-49.6 victory in 2021 into a 56-44 win this year. Historically, there haven’t been many paths for a Republican to win statewide without putting up numbers like that in Nassau.
In his statement Friday, Blakeman said he was “grateful that in Nassau County — with 110,000 more Democrats than Republicans — he “won re-election with a 36,000 vote margin, winning over 60% of independent voters and an unusually large percentage of Democrat voters.”
While Blakeman hails from the more moderate suburbs — an area packed with the swing voters often needed to win a statewide race — Stefanik’s upstate district is among the most MAGA in the state.
Blakeman’s support on vote-rich Long Island, which has been trending Republican, is only part of his political advantage. He is close with the New York Post, a deeply influential conservative tabloid that became Nassau County’s “official newspaper” last year.
Stefanik, a close ally of President Donald Trump, was originally the president’s pick to serve as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. Her nomination was pulled after Republicans feared her vacancy in the House would hamper their ability to pass key legislation.
A Stefanik campaign spokesperson told POLITICO the campaign has already raised about $2 million dollars in the hours since her launch. Her campaign’s chief strategist, Alex Degrasse, said in a statement that Stefanik “has never lost a race,” including primaries and general elections, and has “outrun President Trump’s margin consistently.”
“Elise Stefanik has a proven record of overwhelmingly winning Republicans, Independents, and Democrats from when she first flipped her district a decade ago that Republicans had struggled to win for years,” he said. “Elise has put up historic margins ever since as Democrats have spent close to $100 million to try to defeat her. Elise wins by large margins every time.”
Blakeman has run for statewide twice before. In 1998, he lost a race for state comptroller. In 2010, his U.S. Senate bid ended with a primary loss.
Hochul has already released a campaign video attacking Stefanik for her deep ties to Trump.
Since launching early Friday morning, Stefanik has spent much of her time presenting her selection as the GOP nominee as a foregone conclusion — a tactic employed by Zeldin in 2022.
She rolled out 45 endorsements from state legislators on Friday. Notably absent were any of the 20 Republican legislators from Long Island.
She also announced the support of county GOP chairs who represent 72 percent of the weighted vote at party conventions. But that isn’t quite enough to guarantee the party doesn’t give Blakeman the 25 percent he needs for an automatic spot on the primary ballot. And regardless of what party bosses decide, he could still force a primary by gathering petitions.
Nonetheless, Stefanik said this support was enough to make her the “presumptive Republican nominee.”
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