![\"letters-to-the-editor.image_\"](\"http:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/letters-to-the-editor.image_.jpg\")
<\/a>Career politicians and insiders have mastered the art of saying the diametric opposite of the truth long enough and loud enough until the people become so disenchanted they don\u2019t know what to believe.\nThat\u2019s precisely what\u2019s happening in the 22nd Congressional district race to Claudia Tenney, a stalwart conservative and small manufacturing business owner who has fought against tax increases, regulations, and corruption tirelessly for years.<\/p>\n
We should know because we\u2019ve been in the trenches alongside Claudia from Day One. We have endorsed her for her excellent record in the Assembly in every primary and general election.<\/p>\n
Claudia\u2019s conservative credentials are outstanding. She earned the 2011 Conservative of the Year Award from the New York State Conservative Party in her first year in the state Assembly because she fearlessly fought the tax-and-spend Cuomo budgets and the tyrannical reign of convicted felon, then-Assembly speaker Sheldon Silver.<\/p>\n
As early as 2012 (only a little more than a year into the job), she called on Silver to resign for his cover-up and illegal payouts over sexual harassment committed by another member of the assembly, the first elected official to do so.<\/p>\n
Since then, she has fought Silver and his cronies every step of the way on taxes, spending, and most especially corruption \u2013 introducing serious ethics reform legislation that would end career politician syndrome by cutting legislative pay and pensions.<\/p>\n
As for the attack that Claudia votes with Silver?\u00a0 A lie.\u00a0 Claudia is in the bottom five out of all 150 members of the Assembly when it comes to voting with Silver.<\/p>\n
Claudia went even further and stood up to her own party bosses in Albany by voting against over-spending budgets and tax increases.<\/p>\n
When the corruption got so bad even Cuomo had to give lip-service to ethics reform, Claudia stood on the Assembly floor and voted for anti-corruption federal prosecutor Preet Bharara to be Speaker of the Assembly, much to the consternation of the GOP leadership.<\/p>\n
Moreover, Claudia stands up for what\u2019s right for the people when it is needed, not when it is popular or convenient. She was the strongest voice against the unconstitutional SAFE Act in 2013 and beyond \u2013 standing arm in arm with Remington Arms and its employees against Cuomo and his cowardly GOP enablers. That\u2019s why she\u2019s endorsed by Remington\u2019s employees for Congress.<\/p>\n
She has introduced pro-life legislation in the State Assembly.<\/p>\n
She has stood up against corruption and cronyism like StartUp NY time after time.\u00a0 Her opposition to Cuomo even got her a threat to be removed from the governor\u2019s mansion for wearing her pink Remington hat.<\/p>\n
To no one\u2019s surprise, this has earned her plenty of enemies in Albany, at home and from those who like the system just the way it is.\u00a0 Corrupt and self-serving insiders like Ray Halbritter, who is behind Grow the Economy PAC, are funding a million dollar smear campaign against Claudia.<\/p>\n
Their repeated false attack on Claudia: she missed votes.\u00a0 The truth?\u00a0 Claudia has one of the best attendance records in Albany. \u00a0\u00a0The smear merchants are not giving you the full story. Claudia wasn\u2019t able to cast in person ballots during her mother\u2019s illness, death, and funeral, and when her son graduated from the US Naval Academy.\u00a0 That’s less than four percent of the thousands of bills that are considered in a single term. As with all Assembly members, Claudia was able to make up those votes on paper ballots.<\/p>\n
One of her opponents who has given tens of thousands of dollars to the insider politicians including $11,500 to Governor Cuomo, received millions in state contracts, and spent tens of thousands lobbying for contracts in Albany.\u00a0 He says he\u2019s the outsider. That\u2019s laughable.<\/p>\n
Both of her opponents have sided with corrupt Ray Halbritter and his Cuomo cronies to double-down on the lies about Claudia.<\/p>\n
DC doesn\u2019t need any more crooks and liars in Congress.\u00a0 Instead, we need a proven conservative fighter for us in Washington.<\/p>\n
Claudia Tenney, a small manufacturing business owner and a single mother who raised a Marine Corps officer, has always had our back.\u00a0 That is why she is just the kind of fighter New York\u2019s 22nd District deserves<\/p>\n
Michael Long,\u00a0New York State Conservative Party Chairman<\/p>\n
Shaun Marie Levine,\u00a0New York State Conservative Party Executive Director<\/p>\n
Christopher Kendall,\u00a0Madison County Conservative Party Chairman, New York State Conservative Party Executive Committee Member<\/p>\n
Rev. Jason J. McGuire,\u00a0Executive Director of New Yorkers for Constitutional Freedoms PAC, New York State Conservative Party Executive Committee Member<\/p>\n
Todd Collins,\u00a0Oneida County Conservative Party Chairman<\/p>\n
Ronald Greenleaf,\u00a0Oswego County Conservative Party Chairman<\/p>\n
Marilyn R. Williams,\u00a0Herkimer County\u00a0Conservative Party\u00a0Chair<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
To the Editor: Career politicians and insiders have mastered the art of saying the diametric opposite of the truth long enough and loud enough until the people become so disenchanted they don\u2019t know what to believe. That\u2019s precisely what\u2019s happening in the 22nd Congressional district race to Claudia Tenney, a stalwart conservative and small manufacturing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":58702,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23678,23808,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-69726","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-letterstotheeditor","category-opinion","category-top-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=69726"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69726\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/58702"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=69726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=69726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=69726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}