In New York Hudson Valley House Race, GOP Seeks to Refocus Voters on Inflation, Crime, and the Border

Nearly 2,500 candidates ran in 600-plus 2022 midterm congressional primaries nationwide between March and September, with about 950 advancing to November’s general elections for 435 House seats.

No one anywhere had a better primary day than Rep. Pat Ryan (D-N.Y.), who won two elections on Aug. 23, becoming the newest incumbent in Congress in one district while being nominated to run in another.

Ryan, the former Ulster County executive, is hoping that momentum carries into his race against Republican state Assemblyman Colin Schmitt (R-New Windsor) in Congressional District 18 (CD 18), one of three Hudson Valley districts now occupied by Democrats that the GOP hopes to flip in the midterms to retake the House.

Ryan outpolled two rivals to win the Democratic primary in CD 18 to face Schmitt, who was unchallenged in his party preliminary. CD 18 is currently represented by Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (D-N.Y.), who is seeking reelection in neighboring CD 17 rather than in the district he’s served for five two-year terms.

Rep. Pat Ryan (D-N.Y.), who won an August special election in New York’s Congressional District 19, speaks with voters in Clinton, N.Y., on Sept. 17, 2022, while campaigning for reelection in November in another congressional district. (Courtesy Pat Ryan for Congress)

But while Democrats in CD 18 on Aug. 23 were nominating Ryan to run for the congressional seat being vacated by Maloney, voters in CD 19 were electing him to serve the final four months of Rep. Antonio Delgado’s (D-N.Y.) tenure in CD 19. Delgado resigned in May to become lieutenant governor. 

Ryan assumed the CD 19 seat Sept. 13 after scoring an upset special election victory by 2.4 percentage points over Dutchess County Executive Marc Molinaro, the GOP’s 2018 gubernatorial candidate, in a closely-watched battle that buoyed Democrats’ hopes of blunting, if

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