Bishop Has New Challenger
“We need to send a bulldog to Washington, not a lapdog, and not a lapdog for Nancy Pelosi’s misguided agenda,” Lee Zeldin said on Monday, announcing his candidacy for United States representative.
Mr. Zeldin, an attorney from Shirley and an Iraq war veteran, made his announcement at the American Legion Post in Amagansett before a small crowd of Republican supporters. He has yet to screen with the Suffolk County Republican Committee, but he said he feels confident he will get the nomination. In introducing him on Monday, Bill Gardiner, the East Hampton Town Republican leader, described him as “an energetic young fellow with a lot of promise.”
A newcomer to politics, Mr. Zeldin will run against the three-term incumbent, Tim Bishop of Southampton.
As his résumé shows, Mr. Zeldin, who is 27, is clearly a go-getter. A Long Island native, he earned his law degree in 2003 from the Albany Law School and passed the bar in January 2004. According to his biographical information, at 23 he was, at the time, the youngest attorney in the state. Upon graduating from law school, he received an Army R.O.T.C. commission as a second lieutenant and was assigned to the Army’s Military Intelligence Corps at Fort Huachuca, Ariz. He briefly served in the Judge Advocate General’s Corps before being assigned to the 82nd Airborne Division in Fort Bragg, N.C., where he became a federal prosecutor.
He was deployed to Iraq in the summer of 2006 and served on the front lines with an infantry battalion. When he returned to the states, he was a military magistrate with the 18th Airborne Corps at Fort Bragg. He moved back to New York and worked as counsel for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey until recently, when he took a position at the firm Raiser and Kenniff. He is married and has twin 1-year-old girls.
Mr. Zeldin said Monday that his campaign will focus on reducing the high cost of living on Long Island, supporting senior citizens, protecting military veterans, enhancing national security, and securing the borders. “It’s about time we had a leader with a voice on Capitol Hill that will stand up and shout when he realizes he’s being used as a puppet for his party,” Mr. Zeldin said. “This leadership vacuum is directly responsible for driving young families from the Island.”
Mr. Zeldin said Congress “must avoid tax increases in virtually all situations.” He would also address the problems with the alternative minimum tax. “It is unconscionable that the A.M.T. is not indexed to inflation and recent tax cuts. This lack of foresight adds an extra burden that was never intended to impact the middle class.”
Congress should address the “outlandish cost of prescription drugs,” he said. His proposals included giving the secretary of health and human services the ability to negotiate drug costs and allowing people to buy Food and Drug Administration-approved drugs from outside the country. As a veteran, he has strong feelings about the war in Iraq. He would push for more and better equipment and protection for soldiers in the field and improved mental health services for those returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. “Unfortunately, there are too many people in Congress who have politically aligned themselves so that if we win in Iraq, they lose at home,” he said.
In terms of national security, he would “seal our borders and deport the worst illegal aliens that continue committing crimes,” he said. “We must punish employers who hire illegal aliens and fail to pay the required taxes.”
Responding to a question from the audience, Mr. Zeldin said he would vote to make English the official language. “Illegal immigrants are destroying . . . our way of life,” said Herb McKay of Montauk. “If you stick to your principles, I think you can win.” “I’m not afraid of knocking on any door and talking about any issue,” Mr. Zeldin said. Later that day, Mr. Zeldin held an official opening of his campaign office in Shirley and a dinner at which former Republican Senator Alfonse D’Amato was the special guest.