Grisanti Defiant After Losing Conservative Party Backing

Republican Sen. Mark Grisanti is “not surprised” that he lost the support of the Erie County Conservative Party last night, saying in a statement that a “political deal was cut.”

“We are not surprised or shocked that a political deal was cut. It is my intention to continue to focus all my efforts on creating jobs and opportunities here in Western New York. We will continue to put people first and not politics.”

There’s no explicit pledge here that he’s running for a second term.

Grisanti received 4,368 votes from the Conservative line in 2010. Grisanti would have lost to Sen. Antoine Thompson by roughly 2,000 votes without the line.

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This entry was posted by Nick Reisman on February 24, 2012 at 12:18 pm, and is filed under 2012, Republicans, State Senate. Follow any responses to this post through RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

Sheldon Skelos

….and Tim Kennedy would have also lost if Jack Quinn had the Conservative line as he won the election by 2,500 votes based on the major party lines, but the 4,000 votes on the Conservative line gave Kennedy a 1,500 vote win.
Chinwan

Maybe he should beat them up.
Really?!

“Grisanti would have lost to Sen. Antoine Thompson by roughly 2,000 votes without the line.”

Its really hard to tell how many voters were voting for the candidate himself and were using the opportunity that he was on the Conservative’s line to make a point but would have voted for him on the GOP line had he not received the Conservative line, and how many people would have voted for the Conservative no matter who the candidate was. People can analyze and speculate but one cannot say with certainty who would have won and who would have lost.
Really?!

Paladino should have killed the Conservative line when he had the chance. No one forced him to take their endorsement. Mr. Long was so adamant about Lazio the entire length of the campaign until he realized his party’s line was about to become extinct, and Paladino wanted the few votes the line would get him. If anyone would have been thinking strategically back then in September and October of 2010 the GOP could have killed the Conservative party and saved themselves a whole lot of agony now.

Rick Lazio running on the Conservative line would have pulled in maybe 10,000 votes and the Conservative party would no longer be relevant. (Similar to what Andrew Cuomo did to the Liberal line in 2002.) How hard does the NY GOP try to miss an opportunity?!
Anonymous

Note to Senate Republican leadership: This is the first unpleasant political consequence that has resulted from your refusal to stand up for conservative principles regarding same-sex marriage (not that you haven’t betrayed your base many times before). Many more unpleasant political consequences will follow. Lessons to learn: (a) wealthy out-of-state donors do not determine the candidate decisions made by local party committees, Conservative or Republican, in upstate New York; (b) wealthy downstate donors do not determine the candidate decisions made by local party committees, Conservative or Republican, in upstate New York; (c) left-wing special interest groups are not much help with local party committees, either. You made your bed. Now lie down and get comfortable.
Anonymous

Actually, I take it back. The first unpleasant political consequence was the statewide Conservative Party declaring that all of the same-sex marriage turncoats would lose Conservative Party endorsement if their districts crossed county lines. The question was whether Grisanti (whose district does not) would suffer the same fate. We now have the answer. So this is the second negative political consequence.
Anonymous

@Really: Thank God for the Conservative Party and Chairman Long. If there is some way to manage it, I would love to see them take over Row B.
Anonymous

Next stop on the maybe-voting-for-same-sex-marriage-wasn’t-such-a-good-idea train: Sen. James Alesi.
Anonymous

The Tim Kennedy endorsement was a very foolish mistake made by the Conservative Party out in Erie County. It appears that they have learned their lesson.

Grisanti Defiant After Losing Conservative Party Backing

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