Last week, the Siena Research Institute, in collaboration with WAMC, the Times Union, and WPTZ, published a poll showing Democrat Blake Gendebien up by 4% against his Republican opponent Anthony Constantino in the race to represent New York's 21st Congressional District. WAMC's Sam Dingman spoke with Southern Adirondack Bureau Chief Aaron Shellow-Lavine, who has spent the last few days catching up with some of the folks who contributed to that poll, on Northeast Notebook Live about what he heard from voters.
INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT
Editor's note: This conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.
Dingman: So Aaron, give us the broad strokes of this race. What is some relevant backstory, and where do things stand, leading up to this poll?
Shellow-Lavine: A little bit of background for our listeners who may not be within the 21st district, so they might not be getting all of the ads that I've been getting on every platform. Don't trust your algorithms, folks! We have Republican Anthony Constantino, who is the Trump-endorsed candidate. He was endorsed by Trump before June's primary, winning that primary pretty handily over his opponent Republican Assemblyman Robert Smullen, and then you've got Democrat Blake Gendebien, who is a dairy farmer out of Lisbon, New York — right in the heart of that district.
He has been the Democrat candidate essentially since way back when Elise Stefanik was initially tapped to serve in the UN for President Trump, when we thought there was going to have to be some sort of special election to fill her seat, and then that fell through, and now here we are. We're at a tight race. It's more competitive than it's been, seemingly in a while. Elise Stefanik, since winning this seat more than a decade ago, has won every race by double digits, so it's been a very securely Republican district for some time now.
Dingman: So this four-point advantage that the poll showed Gendebien having is fairly newsworthy, it would seem. Let's talk a little bit about what seems to be on voters' minds that might be contributing to this narrowing of the margins. What have you been hearing from folks you've been talking to?
Shellow-Lavine: The number one thing, as a surprise to nobody, is affordability. It just costs a lot of money to do a lot of anything in this part of New York, so you know, in talking to voters, that was the leadoff question: What is for you the thing that is top of mind? Affordability came up a lot.
For example, John Franklin, who is a former Democrat, he now identifies as an independent. He's sort of dissuaded with the Democratic Party at large. He's from Middleburgh, New York. He is planning on voting for Gendebien. He responded as such in the poll. Take a listen to you know what he had to say - the costs of living is just so high for him.
Franklin: You know, the affordability crisis is real. I don't know what Congress can do about that, but you know, Congress hasn't really done a whole lot. I'd be happy if they just stopped doing crazy things. That would be good enough for me. I just paid a $350 electric bill just for my barn yesterday, so it seems like there should be something going on with energy regulation that is not happening.
Shellow-Lavine: And then on the other end of things, you had Neil Latour from Plattsburgh, who plans on supporting Constantino. He sees the Republican as being able to deliver on the things that for him are [making things] really tough to make ends meet right now.
Latour: Right now, the gas prices are hurting us. You know, it's $4.35 I filled up today, so it was about 50 bucks in my out-of-pocket today for gas prices. But I think they'll go back down, you know, within the probably [next] 4, 5, 6 months - [I'll] wait for this Iran war to kind of finish up, hopefully soon.
Dingman: It's interesting to hear those two voters specifically talk about affordability, which has been a fairly centrist talking point this cycle. Both of those voters citing affordability as reasons behind their support, but coming down on different sides. That's interesting to me in particular, because I don't think of Constantino as seeking that centrist lane. Is that fair to say?
Shellow-Lavine: He's had sort of a — I guess, rowdy is maybe the right way to put it — campaign. Leading into the primary itself, there were a number of attacks made on Smullen, his opponent then. We're seeing a little bit of that now again with his now-Democrat opponent for the [election], Gendebien.
Even most recently, within the last couple of weeks, he's circled around calling Gendebien a litter bug after allegedly discovering that Gendebien had been allegedly dumping trash behind his Lisbon farm. Both the DEC and New York State Police have dropped their investigations and said that they didn't find anything to actually hold Gendebien accountable for. Kathy Brown, from Saratoga County, plans on voting for Constantino. Here's what she had to say.
Brown: I love the fact that he doesn't bring other people down, or he's not running a dirty campaign. He seems to be a very honest individual.
Shellow-Lavine: Checking the survey, those numbers - 45% of Republican respondents think that Constantino's campaign has been positive. 5% of Democrats agree with that summation. So there is just a huge difference in the way that voters are perceiving Constantino's campaign.
Dingman: Just as a quick reminder for listeners, Stefanik briefly sought the Republican nomination for governor. She ended up dropping out of that race. And President Trump has endorsed Bruce Blakeman, obviously, who is now facing Kathy Hochul. It's been a bit of a process to arrive at this point. And even though she's no longer running, would it be fair to say, Aaron, that she still kind of casts a shadow over the contest between Constantino and Gendebien?
Shellow-Lavine: I think the shadow of Stefanik is a very fair way to put this. I think Trump's endorsement carries so much weight. The Republicans who are supporting Constantino are so set in the fact that he is not only Trump's guy, but that Stefanik was Trump's woman, and Stefanik was doing a good job. Therefore, Constantino, being the next Trump pick, will do the same good job continuing forward.
Dingman: Transitive property, I suppose.
Shellow-Lavine: Exactly. Again, Neil Latour out of Plattsburgh saw that transitive property. It is sort of the continuing legacy. Reminder: Republican approval of Stefanik is at 75% within the district. Democrats' support is only at 12%. So, there's again that big difference that seems to just go right down the middle line. Take a listen to what Latour had to say.
Latour: I thought Stefanik was a good job, was a good pick, and I think he would follow her in her footsteps pretty well. So I was kind of sticking with him.
Shellow-Lavine: And then, really interestingly, just as a final note here, I think Franklin, again being the Gendebien supporter that he is, isn't a diehard Gendebien supporter as some of the Constantino supporters are. He sees Gendebien as run of the mill. He is boring, and that is good.
Franklin: I really did not like Elise Stefanik, and I thought that she was pretty much unbeatable. So I'm glad that she's out. I met with Gendebien, he seems like a nice guy, but basically Constantino seems like a lunatic. So I have no desire to vote for Constantino, and I hope that him being such a poor candidate gives Gendebien a really good chance to flip the seat.
