Barely a week after George Santos was expelled from the House, the disgraced Republican’s 3rd District (Long Island-Queens) is already the site of an intense campaign by both parties.
With the special election date set at Feb. 13, each major party is in the process of selecting nominees for what is sure to be a nationally watched and, given the wafer-thin split between the parties in the House, costly contest.
Last week, Democrats from the two counties in the district settled on former Rep. Tom Suozzi as their nominee. A former Nassau County executive who held the 3rd District seat from 2016 to 2022, Suozzi stepped down last year to make an unsuccessful bid for the Democratic nomination for governor.
Two Republicans are vying for nomination in the special election and GOP leaders from the two counties in the 3rd District are expected to settle on one of them Friday.
Mike Sapraicone, a former New York City police detective who launched a major security firm, was already in the race before Santos left on a vow of providing “honesty” to the 3rd District’s representation.
Sapraicone, 68, already has the endorsement of former Sen. Alfonse D'Amato, R-N.Y., and has raised $500,000 ($300,000 his own money) for the campaign.
The other major contender is Mazi Melesa Pilip, an Ethiopian-born Jew and Nassau County legislator.
Pilip, 43, has one of the most intriguing resumes of any candidate for office this year: she did service as a paratrooper in the Israeli army, has a degree in occupational therapy from the University of Haifa, and, with her cardiologist-husband, has seven children.
Pilip and Sapraicone are considered strong candidates, and whichever one of them emerges on top in the GOP caucus is sure to have the endorsement of the New York Conservative Party, which holds the third ballot line (Row C) and whose votes for a candidate are added on to the vote he or she receives on the Republican line.
In 2022, it was the Conservative Party line that gave the votes required for victory for the five new GOP House members elected from the Empire State (including Santos) and thus gave national Republicans the votes they needed for a majority.
Of Pilip and Sapraicone, Conservative Party Chair Gerard Kassar told Newsmax, “I like her and I like him. Either will be an outstanding candidate and either will get the Conservative Party line.”
Kassar added that the 3rd District’s lines changed the year Suozzi stepped down and “there are parts of the 3rd who never heard of him. No one hear is writing this one off — not by a long shot.”
John Gizzi is chief political columnist and White House correspondent for Newsmax. For more of his reports, Go Here Now.
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