The sudden warmer weather throughout the Lower Hudson Valley has apparently also heated up the political landscape.
Chris Day, son of newly-elected Republican Rockland County Executive Ed Day, just announced his bid to unseat longtime Democratic Congresswoman Nita Lowey, who currently represents the weird ribbon of New York’s 17th Congressional District. The district includes all of Rockland County, slices of Westchester County, including all of White Plains, and used to be the stomping ground of Representative Eliot Engel. Both Representatives Engel and Lowey were redistricted this past year into their current districts.
District 17 is split nearly evenly between Rockland and Westchester.
Race b/w @ChrisDayNY & @NitaLowey will b more competitive than expected; Day is smart, crisp communicator w solid story 2 tell. Stay tuned.
— Ryan Karben (@rkarben) February 23, 2014
Flush from the success of running his father’s campaign, Chris Day said he is using that experience as a springboard into further service. News of the the Day candidacy broke late Friday afternoon on Twitter via news commentator Yossi Gestetner. Day made his official announcement Saturday, February 22, with a video posted on YouTube and said he was “encouraged to run for Congress” and cited overdevelopment, taxes and high quality jobs as issues facing the District 17 constituency.
Day is a Republican.
Not yet 30 years old, Day is from New City, saw military service in Afghanistan and currently has high name recognition in his home county due to the Rockland County Executive campaign, where he was instrumental in broadcasting Ed Day’s savvy social media campaign. Lowey was first elected to Congress in 1988 and her tenure has included parts of Queens and the Bronx, as well as parts of the northern New York City suburbs. From 1993 until 2013, Lowey represented the 18th District which included most of Westchester County and parts of Rockland, with its center located in White Plains, NY.
Lowey is currently a ranking member of the House of Representatives Appropriations Committee.
The Chris Day candidacy poses a generational challenge to the Democrats, who gained a district advantage in the youthful NY State Senator David Carlucci, whose increasing district popularity and independent votes caused the powers in Albany to attempt to throttle him in 2013 via redistricting, which sliced his Rockland County representation in two.
Day faces an historical Democrat-leaning district, but his chosen issues should stir the teapot and include, according to the Rockland County Times, RLUIPA religious land use law, Common Core, health care, and HUD overreach, an issue associated with Westchester County Executive and NY gubernatorial candidate Rob Astorino.
