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On Thursday morning, Elise Stefanik was preparing herself to finally take the reins as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. By Thursday night, she was back in her office in the House of Representatives, as the White House withdrew her nomination. The GOP controls the House by a slim 218-215 margin, which leaves almost no breathing room passing legislation if a vote goes along party lines. Pundits feel the move was made strictly to preserve that razor-thin edge and not because Stefanik did anything to fall out of favor with President Trump; even so, Stefanik had to have been blindsided by the sudden withdrawal.
Rob Astorino, who hosts “The Rob Astorino Show” Saturdays at 4pm on WOR, got to know Stefanik in 2014, when he was campaigning to be the Westchester County Executive and she was running for her first term in Congress. He feels terrible for his colleague but, as he mentioned on 710 WOR’s Mendte in the Morning program, Astorino wonders why nobody heeded his warning in November.
“This would have been perfect for her as ambassador,” Astorino told host Larry Mendte. “But when this was happening in November, when Donald Trump was picking members of Congress… I’m doing the math and I’m like, I hope they’re doing the math, because we’re close to losing the House! But more than that, what happens is, you now have to raise gazillions of dollars and defend seats that probably you’d win, but who wants to take a chance when it’s a three, four, five vote margin?”
In fact, Astorino contends that Republicans may still be losers due to upcoming special elections, like the one they face for the Wisconsin State Supreme Court on Tuesday: “$100 million has been poured into this one race in Wisconsin, and Elon Musk and Donald Trump are (essentially) on the ballot. That’s what Democrats are doing everywhere, and they are energized right now and Republicans are not.”
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