October 19, 2009

by Michael Patrick Leahy

6:00 am EDT 

When John McHugh, Republican Congressman from New York’s 23rd District, accepted President Obama’s nomination to become the Secretary of the Army on June 2, no one could have predicted that less than three weeks before the special election to replace him on November 3 a Democrat would be leading in the polls. But that’s exactly what has happened. A Siena Institute Poll released on October 15 shows Democrat Bill Owens leading in this rural upstate district with 33 % of the vote, followed by Republican Dede Scozzafava with 29%, and Conservative Doug Hoffman with 23%. If Owens wins in November 3 it will mark the first time a Democrat has represented the district since the Civil War. 

This debacle has occurred despite the most open and transparent process for the selection of a Congressional candidate in a special election in the history of the New York State Republican Party. The nomination of Scozzafava was orchestrated by two powerful liberal members of the local Republican Party organization, and was aided and abetted by several politically inexperienced local county leaders who failed to grasp the tactical significance of shunning the Conservative Party and did not fully understand the details of their nominee’s record, or her potential vulnerabilities. On July 22nd, the Republican Party nominated Scozzafava, an Assemblywoman whose liberal views on many issues do not reflect the views of the majority of the district’s Republicans. This nomination was tainted by a breach of trust carried out by a key party insider, liberal Republican Assemblywoman Janet Duprey, who also serves as the chairman of the Clinton County Republican Committee.

When McHugh made his announcement, the eleven Republican county chairmen in the 23rd Congressional District were faced with a special challenge. What process would they use to fairly select a nominee to run for his empty seat, and how much time did they have to do it? State law allowed the Governor to establish the date of a special election. No one knew when that would be, though many suspected it would be on the November 3 date the governor ultimately chose. McHugh wouldn’t resign his seat until confirmed by Congress, and no one knew for sure how long that process would take.

Jim Ellis, Franklin County Chairman, decided to take the lead and propose a process for selecting a candidate. He had the recent NY 20 election as an example (where county chairmen without a lot of input chose Jim Tedisco, who lost a special election), and thought he had a way to do it better.

The idea was to open up the process. It wasn't as open as a tea party, perhaps, but it was far more open than anything the New York State Republican Party (or the New York State Democratic Party) had ever seen in similiar circumstances. Four regional meetings would be held for invited attendees, which included committeemen on the local county committee, local Republican officials, and state party officials who resided in the county. Any candidate who wanted to address the group could do so. Let them say their piece, get a consensus, communicate that consensus to the party chairmen, then let the party chairmen convene and select the nominee, based on a majority vote. Each county chairman received a weighted vote based on the percentage of the district’s Republicans who resided in their district. Franklin County, for instance, received a 6% weighted vote, while more populous Oswego County received a 19% weighted vote. 

All five of the county chairmen interviewed for this article consider this "openness" to be a signal accomplishment, though several expressed the opinion that despite the "openness", the outcome did not reflect the will of the majority of the Republicans in the district. It's perhaps an insight into the "group think" of the Republican Establishment in New York State that in the age of the Tea Party Movement not a single county chairman considered an obvious process that would have been far more inclusive and would not have created the public impression that the nomination was obtained based on insider dealing. An Iowa style caucus, in which all registered Republicans in the district were invited to participate, instead of invitation only candidate forums made available exclusively to the regular participants in Republican Party politics would certainly have resulted in a process that was not vulnerable to claims of breach of trust or cronyism. And in all likelihood that process would have resulted in a nominee who enjoyed the support of both the Republican and the Conservative parties.

According to New York Conservative Party Chairman Mike Long, it is this insular and myopic view of the world which characterizes the history and behavior of the Republican Party in New York State, and continues to fuel the existence and growth of the Conservative Party. In an exclusive interview with The TCOT Report, Long put it this way:

"I hear this all the time from politicians from the Republican Party who come to us to receive the endorsement of the Conservative Party as well. When they go before the Republicans, they say, all they hear is things like 'who are your friends', 'how much money can you bring to the table,' and 'what other resources can you bring so we know you can win.' They're just never asked by the Republican leadership their position on the issues. When they come to us, it's always about where they stand on the issues." 

Long is a man to whom political positions matter greatly. "The only reason the Conservative Party exists," he said "is that the Republican Party in this state cares only about winning, and not about principle." His withdrawal of the Conservative Party line endorsement from Assemblywoman Scozzafavva in her 2004, 2006, and 2008 races is a clear example of this commitment to principle. First elected to serve in the Assembly to represent St. Lawrence and Jefferson Counties in 1998, Scozzafava's increasingly leftward voting trend concerned Long greatly. When in 2004 Scozzafavva sought out and accepted the endorsement of the ACORN affilliated Working Families Party, Long had seen and heard enough. He withdrew the Conservative Party's endorsement from her, and vowed to never support her again in any election.

"The Working Families Party is nothing but a front group for ACORN. For goodness sake, they office out of the same building in Brooklyn !"

"Scozzafavva is pro gay-marriage, pro abortion, and supported by an ACORN affiliated and directed political party. All three of these disqualify her from receiving our support. I've told Dede this, and every Republican leader in the 23rd Congressional District knows this. I'll give you a couple of other examples of how bad her record of liberal activism is. In this most recent session of the Assembly, on the votes she cast in the Assembly, we gave her a 15% rating. The very liberal Speaker of the Assembly, who comes from the most liberal part of Manhattan has a 10% rating. She's hardly any different from him!"

New York is one of the few states where minor parties can play a role in election outcomes. This is due to a peculiarity of New York election law, which allows vote totals from two different party endorsements to be added cumulatively to a candidate's total. The Conservative Parties is the most prominent minority party in the state, but other fringe parties, such as the Working Families Party, can also play a role in elections. In contested elections in swing districts, these minor party endorsements matter. The extra 5% or 10% from a Conservative line on the ballot for the same candidate can push that candidate's vote total from a losing 41% or 46% to a winning 51%. 

Reports of Scozzafava's recent statements on switching parties didn't help public perceptions of her either. Something happened on a vote, the report goes, and she got mad, publicly threatening to switch from the Republican Party to the Democratic Party. Scozzafava quickly retracted her party switch threat, but the damage was done. Rumors abound that should she win the special election as a Republican she might switch to the Democratic party in the 2010 election, especially since she is certain to face Republican primary opposition should she win. Last week, the Weekly Standard ran a story which stated that she would not confirm she would run in 2010 as a Republican. Hours after the story was posted, her campaign spokesman stated that she would, indeed run as a Republican in 2010 should she win, but the candidate herself has not yet made such a public statement.

Conservative Party Chairman Long recounts a stunning meeting he had with Scozzafava in July of this year, after she had announced her candidacy, but before she had received the nomination.

"I was approached by someone in Dede Scozzafava's sphere who said she wanted to meet with me. I said this is going nowhere, but they persisted, so I agreed to meet with Dede in Lake Placid. At the meeting, which took place just a few weeks before the Republican County Chairmen met in Potsdam to select their nominee, she told me that the Democrats had been talking to her about running in the special election as a Democrat. 'Wouldn't you rather be with the winner?' she asked me. I came away from that meeting convinced that she was completely devoid of any principle." 

Republican committee men from three counties (Clinton, Essex, and Franklin) met in Plattsburgh, New York on July 16th to hear from the nine candidates seeking the nomination. Earlier, three other candidate forums had been conducted throughout the district, one in Speculator (for Fulton and Hamilton counties), one in Governeur (for St. Lawrence, Lewis, and Jefferson counties), and one in Sylvan Beach (for Oneida, Oswego, and Madison Counties). Each meeting was held with good participation, and attendance ranged from 50 to over 100.

After the July 16th candidate forum in Plattsburgh, the clear consensus from Clinton County committee members in attendance was in support of Paul Maroun, the ideologically conservative candidate with a long record of local government service from nearby Franklin County. Assemblywoman Duprey herself acknowledges this.

“The Clinton County committee members who attended the Plattsburgh event voted for the candidate they supported. Paul Maroun received the majority of the votes. Dede and Matt Doheny also received some votes.”

Doheny was a Jefferson County native who had worked on Wall Street for awhile before returning home, was an Alleghany College and Cornell Law School grad who was as ideologically conservative as Maroun with one major exception. Maroun was pro-life, and Doheny was pro-abortion. 

Unlike her fellow county chairmen in Jefferson and St. Lawrence County who communicated with every committee member in their respective counties, including those who did not attend the regional candidate forums as well as those that did, Duprey took no further steps to ascertain the candidate support preference of those Clinton County committee members who did not attend the Plattsburgh candidate forum. 

In Jefferson County, Chairman Sandra Corey sent ballots by mail to the 180 committee men that comprise the County Committee. She received back 130 responses, the majority of which were cast in favor of Dede Scozzafava, with local candidate Matt Doheny also receiving a good number of votes. In St. Lawrence County, Chairman Nancy Martin personally phoned every single committee member, and received a majority response in favor of local candidate Scozzafava.

When asked for specific details of the Clinton County committee member vote in an exclusive interview with The TCOT Report, Duprey stated that she ripped up the results after the July 16th Plattsburgh candidate forum where the vote was taken, and couldn’t recall specific breakdowns between Maroun, Scozzafava and Doheny. When further asked for the names of the Clinton County attendees of the Plattsburgh candidate forum who had supported Scozzafava, she refused to do so. 

The consensus of support for Maroun was communicated directly to Chairman Duprey by numerous participants. The language was strong and clear—Clinton County Republicans were behind Paul Maroun. But when Duprey arrived at the decisive meeting of county chairmen held in Potsdam the next week, she ignored the wishes of her fellow Clinton County Republicans and cast the deciding vote of the second ballot in favor of Scozzafava, her friend and colleague in the Assembly.

Duprey’s conduct was a slap in the face at the concepts of transparency and openness that many of the other county chairmen had tried to institute in a deliberative process to select the nominee. And it fueled the anger of many members of the Tea Party Movement in the area, who are now backing the Conservative candidate, Doug Hoffman, who was one of nine candidates, including Scozzafava and Maroun, who had sought the nomination and participated in the candidate selection process.

The lack of transparency in this process, the “insider’s back room dealing” that had the nomination wired for Scozzafava against the consensus will of the rank and file Republicans of the district, lead to the pending electoral disaster in which the Democrat, Bill Owens, an attorney from Plattsburgh, is now poised to defeat both the Republican Scozzafava, and the Conservative nominee, Doug Hoffman.

It is precisely this sort of tone deafness to the wishes of the majority of the conservative electorate that has fueled the outrage of the Tea Party Movement towards the Republican Party establishment. That outrage is mirrored in the 23rd Congressional District, where Upstate New York Tea Party leader Mark L. Barie, of Rouses Point, a Clinton County village on the Canadian border, has personally endorsed Doug Hoffman, the Conservative Party candidate. 

On July 22nd, nine of the eleven county chairmen gathered at a popular restaurant in Potsdam, New York to select the nominee. Oneida County Chairman George Joseph had given his proxy to Franklin County Chairman Jim Ellis, and Maggie Luck attended for Fulton County Chairman Susan McNeil, who was in contact with her by phone throughout the entire process.

After some preliminary discussion, the first round balloting began. The counties were called in alphabetical order. When all eleven counties votes were counted using the population weighted formula, the liberal Scozzafavva had 45% of the vote, with Doheny and Maroun close behind at 28% and 27% of the vote respectively. 

After the first round ballot, many of the chairmen in attendance settled in for a long day. Though the liberal Scozzafava was only five percent shy of a majority, the two conservative candidates split fifty-five per cent of the vote.

During the discussion period between ballots, Franklin County Chairman Jim Ellis made an impassioned plea articulating why voting for Dede would imperil the outcome of the election. “Everyone knew that the Conservative Party would never support Dede. In this district, the Republican needs the Conservative line to have the best chance of victory. McHugh had it. All eight of the other candidates would have received the Conservative Line. Only Dede would not get it. And I told the other county chairmen they were making a serious mistake not taking this into account. If the Conservatives ran a candidate, it would cut into the Republicans vote.” Ellis’ arguments fell on deaf ears. Duprey, Corey, Dancks, and McNeil all acknowledge they didn’t anticipate that the inevitable Conservative challenge to Dede would cause much harm. In the case of Dancks and McNeil, inexperience in politics could be a possible excuse for their terrible miscalculation. Dancks had assumed the County chair position only days after McHugh’s announcement in June, and McNeil had been in the position for only a few months. But Corey had served as county chair for four years, and Duprey had spent a lifetime in politics, serving as Clinton County Treasurer from 1986 to 2004, and in the Assembly from 2004. Duprey’s failure to recognize the strategic risk posed by the predictable Conservative challenge to Scozzafava was inexplicable. 

When the second ballot began, Clinton County, being first alphabetically, was called first. Several of the attendees were shocked when Duprey switched her vote from the conservative Paul Maroun, who enjoyed broad support in Clinton County, to her friend and colleague, the liberal Dede Scozzafava. 

"How could Janet vote for Scozzafava when everything they heard from Clinton County was strong support for Maroun, and little support for Scozzafava?" they wondered. 

Everyone in the room did the math instantly. With Clinton County's switch, Scozzafava was over the top. Once the numbers became clear, the remaining party chairmen reluctantly followed suit, knowing that they had just nominated a candidate who would ignite a civil war among Republicans in the district. In a tribute to party discipline, though clearly not to political common sense, all eleven county chairmen ended up publicly supporting Scozzafava as the nominee. Many of them would soon come to regret that decision.

The impression that the entire county chairman nomination meeting was stage managed in secret by Duprey and Scozzafava was re-enforced when the nomination was secured. As the county chairmen walked out of the restaurant that day, there was Scozzafava, with the cameras of the local Watertown television station waiting to break the news that she was the nominee. 

In an exclusive interview with the TCOT Report, Duprey justified her quick switch from Maroun to Scozzafava in the second ballot, saying “it was clear Dede was the winner. She had just a whisker below 50%. She was at 49%, maybe more. Everyone wants a winner. Had the circumstances been reversed, I would have voted for Paul in the second ballot.”

But many of the other county chairmen have a very different recollection of the events between the first and second ballot. They find Duprey's characterization that Scozzafava was the clear winner with 45% of the weighted vote (not the 49% Duprey recalls) while two conservative candidates combined for 55% as laughable. Had the conservative votes consolidated around one candidate prior to Duprey's surprise vote switch, the nominee would have been either Maroun or Doheny. 

And if either Doheny or Maroun had been the nominee, Conservative State Party Chairman Mike Long had made it clear either one would have received the Conservative nomination as well, virtually assuring a Republican victory in the special election. 

But this logical argument, did not resonate with either Duprey, Martin, Corey, or Dancks. In retrospect this lack of awareness of the Conservative threat that accompanied a Scozzafava nomination seems unfathomable.

Several county chairmen also seemed to be oblivious to parts of Scozzafava’s record, or the potential vulnerability that record presented. The Working Families Party affiliation did not register, nor did her “RINO” publicly announced support for Obama’s stimulus package.

Conservative opponent Hoffman’s web site highlights Scozzafava’s support for Obama’s stimulus package. When asked if they could either confirm or deny if this claim was factual, neither Chairman Corey of Jefferson County or Chairman Dancks of Madison County were knowledgeable of their candidate’s position on that issue. Clinton County’s Duprey, in an exclusive interview, acknowledged that Scozzafava had in fact publicly indicated support of Obama’s stimulus package “but only,” Duprey said “as it relates to public infrastructure projects.” Duprey elaborated “I think that’s a very conservative position, one that all conservative across the country would agree with.” 

Clearly, conservatives around the blogosphere, ranging from Erick Erickson at Red State to Michelle Malkin have a very different definition of conservativism than Duprey does. Arguably, every single Republican member of the House of Representatives also has a different definition of conservatism, since they unanimously voted against the Obama Stimulus Bill when it passed the House in February. 

When news of the Scozzafava nomination spread throughout the Republicans in the 23rd District, the reaction varied from lukewarm enthusiasm to outright disdain. One of those deeply troubled by the nomination was Saranac Lake accountant Doug Hoffman. Hoffman had been one of the nine candidates who had sought the Republican nomination, and he had not fared well in the process. Though intelligent, well respected, and an uncompromising ideological conservative, Hoffman wasn't much of a stump speaker. He was new to the political process, and his lack of polish showed.

Despite having signed a pledge to support the eventual nominee to emerge from the process, Hoffman considered the possibility of asking for the Conservative Party's endorsement to run against Scozzafavva, making it a three way race. When Paul Maroun declined Mike Long's offer to run on the Conservative line, Hoffman approached Long and asked for the nod. Happy to have a credible candidate, Long agreed, and a three way race was on.

The Democrats, for their part, took notice of the Republicans and their poor choice as nominee. With a three way race, the Democrat had a chance. Responding to the opportunity, a credible candidate, well respected Plattsburgh attorney Bill Owens stepped forward. With a credible candidate, a split between the Republicans and Conservatives, the Democratic Party money began pouring in. All the usual liberal suspects, including the infamous SEIU, which threw in $100,000 last week, lined up to throw cash behind Owens.

Meanwhile, Scozzafava's fundraising lagged, and Hoffman's climbed, as both the Club for Growth and former Republican Senator from Tennessee Fred Thompson endorsed him. 

Susan McNeil, the newly named Republican Chairman in Fulton County started hearing complaints from Republicans in her county about Scozzafava's liberal views soon after she was nominated. In an exclusive interview with The TCOT Report over the weekend, she articulated this dissatisfaction:

"I have had constituents tell me they are disappointed with some of her decisions."

Scozzafava's defenders seem incapable of understanding the nationwide opposition to her from the Tea Party Movement and conservatives within the Republican Party. A broad array of conservative new media leaders have documented countless instances of Scozzafava's left wing policies, ranging from support of the Obama stimulus package to support of "card-check" legislation to any number of social issues. Mysteriously, these issues appear not to count as "real" tests of conservativism to Scozzafava's apologists.

Sandy Corey, who last month resigned as Jefferson County Chairman, seems to know little about Scozzafava's liberal record. In an exclusive interview with the TCOT Report, she excused Scozzafava's support of card-check legislation.

"I agree with secret ballots, but you know we don't have to agree with our candidates on every position," she said.

When asked to explain why Conservative candidate Hoffman's support has surged to 23%, she responded that "it's only because of all the lies the Conservative Party has been telling about Dede's record on taxes. I am disappointed in Mike Long and the Conservative Party for being such liars."

Corey's support for Scozzafava, it appears, is based almost exclusively on her admiration of Scozzafava's personal qualities. It certainly can't be based on her support of Scozzafava on the issues, because she disagrees with her on one key issue, and appears unaware of her positions on most other issues.

Corey's attitude appears to be shared by Republican Congressman Pete Sessions, who represents a very conservative district in Dallas, Texas, and chairs the National Republican Congressional Committee(the NRCC), the Republican National Committee, and former Republican Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich.

Within the past month, the NRCC has both endorsed Scozzafava and provided hundreds of thousands of dollars of cash to her campaign. Michael Steele and the RNC, which had equivocated in their support of Scozzafava, last week endorsed her and donated $85,000 to her campaign. And on Thursday, Gingrich endorsed her.

Gingrich's endorsement ignited a fierce backlash from the blogosphere. Red State's Erickson pronounced him done as a legitimate candidate for the 2012 Presidential nomination as a consequence. And the Tea Party Movement, which embraced his early participation in the April 15 Tax Day Tea Party, skewered him for his support of a candidate who embodied every aspect of political life the movement abhors.

For her part, the woman who engineered this epic Republican political fiasco, Assemblywoman Janet Duprey, remains unbowed and unrepentant in her conservative apostasy. Nor does she make any excuses for the blatant cronyism she exercised in supporting her friend and ideological compatriot in the New York State Assembly in her bid to win a seat in Congress.

To the outside observer, while Duprey's actions are both legal and within the rules of the Republican Party, they exemplify the kind of cronyism and insider dealing that makes the every day Americans who comprise the Tea Party Movement furious and disgusted with elected political officials of both parties.

At the very least, Duprey left herself open to charges of cronyism by not acting more transparently and inclusively in the decision making process to determine the candidate for whom she would vote. While it is not against any law or party rule for one individual to simultaneously hold an elective position in the State Assembly and the Republican Party Chairmanship in a county (at least one other politician in New York holds both positions simultaneously), it clearly concentrates power in the hands of one individual in a way that creates the opportunity for the abuse of power.

Duprey claims that she reluctantly accepted the County Chairman position early in 2009 when it became vacant, and no other qualified candidate emerged. While this may be accurate, it is hard to imaginge that within a county that has a population of close to 80,000 there existed not one qualified Republican who would have been willing to assume the Chairmanship when the news that a special election was in the wings became public in June.

Such considerations of propriety apparently still fail to register with Assemblywoman Duprey. Remaining true to form for those who have risen within the Republican Party power structure in New York State, Duprey closed out her exclusive interview with The TCOT Report by focusing on the issue that really matters most to her.

"Dede is a winner. She will win this special election. She will end up with a little over 50% of the vote. The other two candidates will split the rest."

It remains for the voters of the 23rd Congressional District to determine if they agree with Assemblywoman Duprey's hand picked candidate and the methods the two of them use to succeed in the political arena.

The answer will be revealed for the entire country to see on election day, two weeks and a day from today, on November 3. 



Author's Note:
I grew up in the 23rd Congressional District. I was born in Oswego, attended elementary school at St. John's Academy in Plattsburgh and Dannemora Public School (both in Clinton County), and attended Stockbridge Valley High School in Madison County. 

Michael Patrick Leahy is the publisher of The TCOT Report and author of the new book Rules for Conservative Radicals. You can reach him at michaelpatrickleahy@gmail.com.