Rep. Elise Stefanik announced Friday that she is suspending her campaign for New York governor and will not seek reelection to Congress, bowing out of the race in a surprise statement that said \u201cit is not an effective use of our time\u201d to stay in what was expected to be a bruising Republican primary. <\/p>\n
Stefanik, a Republican ally of President Donald Trump, said in a post on X that she was confident of her chances in the primary against Bruce Blakeman, a Republican county official in New York City\u2019s suburbs. But she said she wanted to spend more time with her young son and family.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have thought deeply about this and I know that as a mother, I will feel profound regret if I don\u2019t further focus on my young son\u2019s safety, growth, and happiness \u2014 particularly at his tender age,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
Stefanik has been an intense critic of incumbent Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul, who is also seeking reelection but faces a primary challenge from her own lieutenant governor, Antonio Delgado.<\/p>\n
The announcement marks an abrupt end, at least for now, for a once-promising career for Stefanik. She was the youngest woman ever elected to Congress when she won her first campaign in 2014 at just 30 years old, representing a new generation of Republicans making inroads in Washington. She ultimately rose to her party\u2019s leadership in the House when she became the chair of the House Republican Conference in 2021. <\/p>\n
First viewed as a moderate when she came to Washington, Stefanik became far more conservative as Trump began to dominate the party. Once someone who refused to say Trump\u2019s name, she became one of his top defenders during his first impeachment inquiry. She would go on to vote against certifying the 2020 election results, even after a violent mob stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6.<\/p>\n
Stefanik was expected to have a bitter Republican primary against Blakeman, who also counts himself as an ally of Trump. The president had so far seemed keen on avoiding picking a side in the race, telling reporters recently: \u201cHe\u2019s great, and she\u2019s great. They\u2019re both great people.\u201d <\/p>\n
Stefanik\u2019s decision follows a clash with Speaker Mike Johnson, whom she accused of lying before embarking on a series of media interviews criticizing him. In one with The Wall Street Journal, she called Johnson a \u201cpolitical novice\u201d and said he wouldn\u2019t be reelected speaker if the vote were held today.<\/p>\n
The tumultuous early December episode appeared to cool when Johnson said he and Stefanik had a \u201cgreat talk.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI called her and I said, \u2018Why wouldn\u2019t you just come to me, you know?\u2019\u201d Johnson said. \u201cSo we had some intense fellowship about that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Still, Stefanik, the chairwoman of the House Republican leadership, has not fully walked back her criticisms. A Dec. 2 social media post remains online in which, after a provision she championed was omitted from a defense authorization bill, Stefanik accused Johnson of falsely claiming he was unaware of it, calling it \u201cmore lies from the Speaker.\u201d<\/p>\n
State Republican Chairman Ed Cox said the party respected Stefanik\u2019s decision and thanked her for her efforts.<\/p>\n
\u201cBruce Blakeman has my endorsement and I urge our State Committee and party leaders to join me,\u201d Cox said in a prepared statement. \u201cBruce is a fighter who has proven he knows how to win in difficult political terrain.\u201d <\/p>\n
Associated Press writers Steven Sloan and Joey Cappelletti contributed from Washington.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rep. Elise Stefanik announced Friday that she is suspending her campaign for New York governor and will not…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":76015,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[9,11,10,49,51,50,87],"class_list":{"0":"post-76014","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-new-york","9":"tag-new-york-headlines","10":"tag-new-york-news","11":"tag-new-york-state","12":"tag-new-york-state-headlines","13":"tag-new-york-state-news","14":"tag-politics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=76014"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76014\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/76015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}