ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) - A New York Republican has announced she plans to unseat the Democrat who won her congressional seat in a Trump-friendly swing district.
Former U.S. Rep. Claudia Tenney said this week that she will seek her party’s nomination to challenge Rep. Anthony Brindisi, who represents the 22nd congressional district that Donald Trump won in his 2016 presidential victory.
Brindisi, 40, narrowly beat Tenney, a Trump ally, last year in a campaign in which he called for civility and bipartisanship.
Republicans outnumber Democrats in the district, which includes dairy farms and struggling former manufacturing towns such as Binghamton and Utica.
Trump swept the district in 2016, while Brindisi narrowly beat Tenney in 2018.
Tenney is claiming that Brindisi is too aligned with liberal lawmakers who want to resist the president’s agenda.
“It’s time we sent a strong advocate to Congress who is focused on real results, not a politician who is ineffective and who tests the political winds before acting on behalf of our region,” said Tenney, 58, in a statement.
Brindisi’s campaign, meanwhile, defends the congressman as “pragmatic” and bipartisan.
Democrats complained when Tenney’s staff sent out a memo attempting to link her Italian-American opponent to the mafia because of his father’s legal work for organized crime figures years ago.
Tenney also called her alma mater, Colgate University, which is in the district, a “left-wing crazy school.”
Tenney at the time said an adversarial media was blowing her comments out of proportion.
Other Republicans running include a Broome County district attorney.
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