>
Democrat Pat Ryan beats Republican Marc Molinaro in special Congressional election to post major upset victory for Biden’s party: Voters weigh in on abortion rights vs. economy in midterm bellwether race
- New York had a special election on Tuesday to decide who will serve the remainder of Lt. Governor Antonio Delgado’s House of Representatives term
- Both Marc Molinaro and Pat Ryan are county executives in the Empire State
- A July poll had Molinaro up by 10 points but one from this month saw the Republican candidate’s lead shrink to just three percent
- Ryan has largely run his campaign off of outrage at the Supreme Court overturning abortion rights granted in Roe v. Wade
- Molinaro has focused his energy on voter dissatisfaction with the economy
- Ryan also won his primary to run for next year’s Congress in November
<!–
<!–
<!–<!–
<!–
<!–
<!–
In a major upset victory for President Joe Biden’s party, New York Democratic official Pat Ryan narrowly beat Republican Marc Molinaro in a race that remained in a dead heat nearly until midnight on Wednesday.
Multiple outlets including the New York Times and NBC News called the race for Ryan with more than 95 percent of the votes counted – and less than 3,000 votes between the two candidates.
Ryan will now serve the remainder of former Democrat Rep. Antonio Delgado’s term, until the end of the year. Delgado left the House of Representatives to serve as New York Gov. Kathy Hochul’s lieutenant.
The Ulster County Executive had a wide lead immediately after polls closed, but Dutchess County Executive Molinaro significantly narrowed the gap as mail-in and early ballots – usually majority Democrat – were overtaken by Election Day voters who primarily skew Republican.
The special election for New York’s 19th Congressional District had for weeks been viewed as a likely Republican victory, with polls even days before Election Day projecting Molinaro in the lead.
The Hudson Valley race was also being watched as a possible bellwether for November’s midterm elections – where likewise Republicans had been expected to win the majority in the House.
But projections were upended after the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade in June sent an unprecedented shockwave through midterm voters across the nation.
The Democratic executive of Ulster County, Pat Ryan, has largely focused his campaign on the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade an the subsequent rollback of abortion rights seen across the country
Ryan ran his campaign largely on the rollback of abortion rights, while Molinaro focused on the economic burden everyday Americans are feeling under record inflation and a sinking stock market.
It comes as Democrats nationwide are seeing a new hope in an election year that was widely expected to bring a ‘red tsunami’ to Congress.
Voters in deep-red Kansas bucked expectations when they turned out in droves last month to reject a proposal that would have stripped abortion protections out of their state constitution.
Now, election watchers on both sides of the aisle got their first glimpse into how that translates into picking a Congressional representative.
And the 19th is a true ‘swing district,’ having gone for Barack Obama in 2012, Donald Trump in 2016 and then Biden in 2020.
But a growing number of public opinion polls show that the Supreme Court overturning Roe may be a significant enough factor to shake up this year’s races.
An Ipsos/USA Today poll released earlier this month suggests 7 in 10 US voters want to vote on a similar ballot measure to the one in Kansas.
And 54 percent said they would vote to protect the right to an abortion.
Dutchess County executive Marc Molinaro has insisted in multiple public comments that Americans are mainly concerned with the economy
Ryan told Reuters before Election Day that ‘the ground is literally shifting’ because of the Roe decision.
‘This has fundamentally re-energized – certainly in this district and this community – not just Democrats, but a wide swath of folks,’ the Democrat said.
Molinaro insisted to the outlet that everyday Americans were primarily concerned about the state of their finances.
‘These are families, and these are communities, that are working too hard and getting too little in return…that’s what’s on their minds,’ he said.
The Republican’s claim is also backed up by public surveys, with more than two-thirds of respondents to an early August ABC News/Ipsos poll believing the US economy is getting worse.
Just 37 percent of people who were surveyed said they approve of Biden’s handling of the economy.
The outlook brightened somewhat in a new NBC News poll released on Sunday, though his approval rating on the economy is still under water at 40 percent.
While it could be an early sign for what’s to come, the election results won’t be a definitive victory for either side looking toward next year.
The state’s newly-redrawn Congressional map will force Ryan to run in the nearby 18th district in November, after also winning that primary race on Tuesday night.
While Molinaro’s home will also technically be outside the bounds of the new 19th district, he’s setting up to run for the same seat again later this year.