Astorino Creates Another Party…Again
By Dan Murphy
Westchester Democrats will be voting next month to select their county chairman, and decide whether to re-elect long serving County Dem Chair Reginald LaFayette, or choose between one of two candidates: Greenburgh Democratic Chair Suzanne Berger, or Mt. Kisco Chair Bill Serratore.
Berger got out of the gate early, but recently Serratore has been collecting endorsements, including most of the Nothern Westchester Democratic Committees that join together to form a coaltion to make sure their interests are heard.
Serratore recently received the endorsement from State Senator Peter Harckham. “I hope you will join me in supporting Bill Serattore. As a tacticiain, Bill understands the importance of combining the activisit progressive movement with sound financial resources. Sometimes local committees need support from the county committee, and as an executive Bill understands acocuntablility and transparency are important.
“Bill understand the great diversity of Westchester and he is committed to nurturing talent so we put forth candidates that Westchester really looks like,” said Senator Harckham.
Sen. Harckham is in the toughest election of his career this November, facing off against republican Rob Astorino, the former Westchester CountyExecutive. In his 2014 race for Governor, Astorino created a new party line to run on. The Stop Common Core Party, was used by Astorino to allow voters to express their disastisfaction with New York’s new state educational tests, but also to give independent and moderate democratic voters a line to vote on if they refused to vote republican or conservative.
This year, Astorino will try the same tactic, and has created the “Rebuild Our State” ballot line. More than 5,000 Westchester, Putnam, and Dutchess County residents — of all political parties — signed the petition to create the “Rebuild Our State” line.
“The Rebuild Our State ballot line will let voters deliver a rifle-shot message to Albany politicians in November: Stop chasing families and jobs out of the state with the worst taxes and business regulations in America,” the former county executive said. “We have a moral imperative to replace the hundreds of thousands of jobs permanently lost due to Covid, but New York can only achieve that if it gets out of its own way. Clear job-growth policy choices are available, but we must have brave, common-sense legislators in office to drive them through the Albany morass.”
Mr. Astorino announced his new ballot line days after New York was ranked the state with the “Worst Economic Outlook in America” by the American Legislative Exchange Council.
Astorino was joined in Northern Westchester by supporters and elected officials including Assemblyman Kevin Byrne, who represents Northern Westchester and Putnam County in the 94th District.
Byrne currently serves as the last republican state representative from Westchester. Astorino hopes to change that, and double the number of republican members of the state delegation, from 1 to 2.
Byrne is being challenged by democrat Stephanie Keegan on November 3. More on this race in the weeks to come.
