Except for a race or two here and there that is still too close to call, the 2025 elections will soon be certified. On to some very serious and important politicking in New York State.
All four statewide offices – governor, lt. governor, attorney general and comptroller – will be on the ballot. For the first time in recent memory, candidates for governor and lt. governor will run as a ticket. Party conventions will be coming up near the end of February, with petitioning for all offices in the state beginning shortly after that.
State party conventions will designate their choices for the four offices and one or more other candidates could also be qualified for a primary, although that option is highly unlikely. Those who don’t qualify at the convention may choose to circulate petitions for the offices. The petition process requirement for statewide office is 15,000 valid signatures, with at least 100 or five percent of party enrolled voters from each of at least one-half of the 26 congressional districts in the state.
Governor
Democratic incumbent Kathy Hochul is well along with preparation for her re-election campaign. As of July 15th she had $17.5 million in her campaign treasury. She will have available to her the resources of the state party Committee. One of her top priorities will be the selection of her lt. governor running mate since the current lt. governor, Antonio Delgado, plans to run against her for the party nomination. While things might change it appears that there are no additional challengers in the offing.
Delgado is not particularly well known in the state so he has his work cut out for him. As of July 15th he had $82,674 in his campaign account. Delgado will be trying to replicate Zohran Mamdani’s campaign for mayor of New York City but Mamdani is expected to endorse Hochul for re-election. Delgado will also have to choose his lt. governor running mate.
Republicans are rallying around Congresswoman Elise Stefanik for governor. Stefanik recently created a state campaign account but she is expected to transfer all or most of her congressional campaign funds to her gubernatorial effort. As of September 30th she had $10.9 million available.
Recently re-elected Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman is assessing his chances for running for governor but it seems likely that the party leadership will lean hard on him to defer on that. He could wind up on the state ticket for another office, perhaps lt. governor.
Erie County Republican Chairman Michael Kracker will manage Stefanik’s campaign. I assume he will leave his state Senate job with Senator Rob Ortt to take on this big challenge.
While primaries are still something to contend with it is likely that we will see Hochul versus Stefanik in November. Neither candidate is what you might describe as shy. It will be a tough and nasty fight right through election day. You will be hearing as much or more about Mamdani and Donald Trump than you will about almost any particular issues. Hochul has a record to run on. What Stefanik will propose to do as governor is at this time anyone’s guess. Her well identified attack dog style of participating in congressional hearings will only go so far. Talking in detail about budgets, taxes, crime, education and other important matters are some things that the electorate will be wanting to hear about.
Attorney General
Incumbent Democratic Attorney General Latitia James will be running for her third term. She has a well-established record that she will run on. While in the office her work has spanned a wide variety of state subjects, there will also be much attention focused on her prosecution of Donald Trump.
As of July 15th James had $1.9 million in her campaign treasury. Reports are that since the Trump prosecution began contributions to her have grown considerably.
As part of his revenge tour Trump has ordered the Attorney General Pam Bondi to prosecute James for an issue related to a mortgage on some property she owns in Virginia. The Trump-appointed United States Attorney in Virginia originally conducted the investigation and found no crime that James could be prosecuted for.
Comptroller
Incumbent Democratic Comptroller Tom DiNapoli will be running for his sixth term in the office; he was appointed to the office originally by the state Legislature to fill a vacancy in 2007 and then was successfully elected and re-elected four times.
I have met and known several comptrollers over the past fifty years. There is a reason why incumbents have often had very long tenures in office. The office is responsible for monitoring state and local government spending, conducting audits, and managing the state retirement systems. Voters over the years have been happy with the how that work has been conducted, which explains why over at least the past seventy years incumbents running for re-election have always been re-elected.
There are a couple potential candidates who are circulating for attention as possible primary challengers to DiNapoli . They want to get the office more aggressively involved in public policy. We’ll see how that goes.
DiNapoli has not been seriously engaged in Trump-related issues except for reviewing how proposed and actual federal spending cuts will impact the state and local governments and school districts. I am sure that whoever the Republican candidate for comptroller is will, like the Democratic primary contenders, suggest that the comptroller’s office should be more aggressive about their constitutional duties.
As of July 15th DiNapoli had $618,914 in his campaign treasury. He has already signed up for participation in the state public campaign financing program, which will help grow his account.
Working Families and Conservative endorsements
For the most part Democratic candidates for statewide office usually carry the Working Families Party endorsements although Governor Hochul cannot take that for granted. There has often been a lot of dancing around on the subject of a gubernatorial endorsement by the party.
Republican statewide candidates, following a long tradition, will all carry the Conservative Party endorsements.
What comes next?
We will see campaign financial reports on January 15th which give us some measures of what resources the candidates will have for their campaigns. Party convention designations and petitioning for those who are not designated will occur in February.
And then we will be off to the races. For politicos in the state it will be quite a year. I wonder how that will translate to voters.
Bluesky @kenkruly
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