As Election Day approaches, New York's 21st Congressional District race continues to grab headlines. Vice President J.D. Vance is headed to the district on Monday to campaign for Republican Anthony Constantino as he seeks to retain the seat for the party that has held it for all but a few years since the Civil War. Also, a recent story by City & State New York calls into question Constantino's allegations that his opponent, Democrat Blake Gendebien, dumps dead cows on his St. Lawrence County farm.
Amidst it all, earlier today, President Donald Trump reaffirmed his support for Constantino on social media, writing in part: "Anthony Constantino has my Complete and Total Endorsement to be the next U.S. Representative from New York's 21st Congressional District."
WAMC's Sam Dingman spoke about where that race stands with Southern Adirondack Bureau Chief Aaron Shellow-Lavine, who's been covering the contest for months. Before they got to the latest news, the pair discussed how the comparatively mellow Gendebien's campaign is versus Constantino's...
INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT
Editor's note: This conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.
Shellow-Lavine: I think laid back, middle of the road. I think a large part of his strategy is just trying to play off of Constantino's, you know, brashness. We could say, I mean, Constantino is a loud candidate. He has made the race largely about sort of himself and his antics, which there are plenty of. I mean, you know, just over the last weekend, he showed up to, you know, a "debate" that Gendebien notably hasn't been to any of the debates that the candidates were supposed to go to. That's a whole different story. And so you had Constantino on stage next to a giant inflatable chicken who was sort of playing pre-recorded clips of Gendebien answering some questions. So I mean, that was within the past couple of days ... it's sort of a show, to be honest.
Dingman: But, in spite of all of those antics on Constantino's part, according to the most recent, I believe, polling we have on this race, Gendebien is ahead very slightly by I believe it was four points.
Shellow-Lavine: Reminder for our listeners: this is a district that is historically very, very red. Elise Stefanik, for the past number of elections, all of her re-elections, won by double digits. So I mean, this is a Republican district.
Dingman: So — perhaps owing to the fact that Gendebien is, I think we could say, doing better than many observers might have suspected going into this cycle — the biggest recent news in this race is that Vice President J.D. Vance is coming to a Constantino rally in Ogdensburg this weekend. In your mind, what is that signal, Aaron?
Shellow-Lavine: It could mean anything. It could mean, for example, that Republicans really think that Constantino is in need of a vice presidential stump this weekend to truly just get out all of the folks who look to him as a Trump candidate, which he is, which he has been the entire time. He has been Trump's pick, you know, since the primary days. Just to really nail home — maybe there are some folks who have tuned out because of all of the antics — to get JD Vance up here and say, you know, we need just this last final push, or maybe it's a victory lap. I mean, maybe it's truly an example where Republicans across the nation are feeling a little bit of a crunch. I mean, we're seeing a bit of — in a lot of polling from races across the country — that Democrats are up. Maybe again, like you said, a little bit more than expected at the beginning of the cycle. You know, if this is a race that the Republicans have in the bag, they might want a race that they can look at and say, "See, we knew we had it," you know, from the start.
Dingman: Right. Right. Although, I mean, I think it is very notable. We have seen J.D. Vance out on the stump as a surrogate in a lot of the big-ticket Senate races this cycle. It seems notable to me that he is coming out to campaign for a House candidate.
Shellow-Lavine: Right, and then for me as a reporter, something that we've been talking about a lot in our newsroom is the fact that Gendebien hasn't been getting a whole lot of sort of an equivalent Democratic support. You know, looking back in my reporting and following sort of just the tide of things up here in the North Country and sort of Southern Adirondacks, AOC [U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez] and [U.S. Rep.] Pat Ryan visited Glens Falls back in March. Gendebien wasn't at that event. And then, you know, really leading up to this conversation right now — just in the past 24 hours — we are starting to see, you know, the House Majority PAC [political action committee] and, you know, other sort of Democrat national campaign funds going to his campaign just, again, in this last week. But really, before that, Gendebien seemingly wasn't at the top of the priority list.
Dingman: Right. I mean, I wonder as we're having this conversation, and have wondered in following the coverage on this, whether the lack of high-profile appearances on the stump for Gendebien has to do with, you know, a lack of interest from the national party or a lack of interest on Gendebien's part — knowing that he's running for a seat that's currently held by a Republican, maybe not wanting to make too big a deal out of his notional support from the more progressive figures in the party,
Shellow-Lavine: Right. And ... I'm not even going to sit here and say that his politics align with the folks like Bernie Sanders. I also don't think it would be very useful for a Bernie Sanders-type to show up sort of in Ogdensburg to stump for a candidate like Gendebien. It's just not exactly aligned. He is approaching a very red district, I think, in a way that, you know, makes sense for a Democrat to be trying to win this seat.
Dingman: Speaking of, I don't know, closing arguments, I suppose, there has been another fairly dramatic development in this campaign that you've been following, Aaron. Tell us about it.
Shellow-Lavine: Very important to note, as J.D. Vance is coming to stump for Constantino this weekend. We are getting simultaneous breaking stories on the Constantino campaign. One of his big October surprises was alleging Gendebien has, you know, for a number of years, been dumping dead cows — he is a dairy farmer out in Lisbon — and, you know, other trash into the backyard of his farm. Gendebien has denied this. [New York State] DEC [Department of Environmental Conservation] said they had looked into it and closed, you know, investigations. Now, as has been reported again within the last 24-ish hours from City & State [New York], a really, really well-reported article. They were able to get texts between the apparent disgruntled employee that started the snowball within Constantino's campaign about this sort of dumping scandal.
Dingman: This is a disgruntled former Gendebien employee.
Shellow-Lavine: Yes, a disgruntled former farm employee and their partner have had a history with Gendebien. In 2024, when the employee was fired, their romantic partner and housemate texted Gendebien. You know, essentially, never text my partner again or we'll tell DEC that you're dumping cows. And then, as has been reported in the past day or so, on Sept. 21, Constantino's campaign paid essentially that couple, or one of the individuals within that couple, $28,000 as a government strategy consultant.
Dingman: Interesting, interesting. So, the implication, I suppose, being that Constantino would have given this couple $28,000 in exchange for advancing this narrative that Gendebien has been doing this illegal dumping.
Shellow-Lavine: And Constantino's response to, you know, at least his comment within the [City & State New York] article is, you know, he doesn't keep track of all of the money that he has spent in his campaign, which, you know, totals around $16 million of his own money. So, you know, it's a fractional amount, so on and so forth. But, you know, that is at least what he has to say about this development for the time being.
Dingman: Another fascinating and dramatic attempt at grabbing headlines from Constantino.
Shellow-Lavine: Much, much, much more to come. I would bet.
