The Erie County Democratic Executive Committee voted to run its chairman, Jeremy Zellner, in the special election to fill the vacancy in the 61st State Senate seat.

BUFFALO, N.Y. — Erie County Democratic Committee Chairman will be the endorsed candidate in the the special election to fill the state senate seat vacated by Sean Ryan when he was sworn in as Buffalo Mayor. 

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Zellner previously announced his intention to run for that office, but the Executive Committee made it official on Wednesday night, 7 days after Governor Hochul announced the special election. 

“I’m overwhelmed,” Zellner said after the vote. “I’m incredibly proud to receive the party’s nomination. I’ve lived, born and raised in this district, lived here my whole life, and it’s just an honor to have the nomination, and now it’s time to go make our case to the voters. We have a sprint here, 27 days to have this election and get out and make our case. And we’ve got to we’ve got to get moving immediately.”

Zellner will square off against Amherst business owner Dan Gagliardo, who the Erie Co. GOP selected earlier this week as their candidate.

Not all Democrats were thrilled with the process to select Zellner, however.

Former Mayoral candidate in the 2021 election, India Walton, called the process “wildly unethical.”

“We are here because we are Democratic voters, and I think that the process, both for Democrats and Republicans, is very flawed, skewed,” Walton said. “The timeline is too short, the financial obligations are too great, and it doesn’t allow for people who deserve and who want to participate in this process to participate.”

Paul Wolf, an attorney and election reform advocate, wants state election laws changed to allow for a more open process during special elections.

“In a democracy, anyone has the right to run for public office, that’s how an election should be,” Wolf said. “The way this election works, a special election is the only candidates who can run are those that are hand picked by the party bosses, and that’s not democracy.”

Zellner, however defends the transparency of the process and insists that he recused himself from the nomination process. 

“Our party had a meeting tonight with nearly 100 people who voted on this and vetted can’t any candidate that wanted to come was offered that opportunity,” Zellner said. “I think our process has been very transparent, and I think we probably have the most transparent process of any of the parties.”

As for the race itself, the special election will be held on Tuesday, February 3. 

Affordability is top issue for Zellner.

“Affordability, there’s no question,” Zellner said. “I think we need to really look at taxing those ultra rich people in our state that are not paying their fair share, and we need to look at a lot of other things, so it’s affordability.”