BY: Keith S. Shikowitz: Editor in Chief/Investigative Reporter
The Conservative Party has been on that has endorsed candidates from a number of political parties over the years. This year they are endorsing strictly Republican candidates for state and federal offices. People like Nassau County Executive, Bruce Blakeman for Governor, Todd Hood for Lieutenant Governor, Saritha Kamatarini for Attorney General, Joe Hernandez for Comptroller, Bill Weber for 38th Senate District, and Mike Lawler for 17th Congressional District and others across the state. This endorsement is very important and has often been the deciding factor in local elections.
Jerry Cassar, NYS Conservative Party Chairman emceed the event and the first speaker he introduced was Rockland County Executive Ed Day.
New York State Senator Bill Weber, running for reelection for his third term in the Senate came up next.
“Hi everyone, I’m State Senator Bill Weber. I represent most of Rockland except Stony Point. I wish I had Stony Point, but it’s great to be here today. Welcome to Rockland, Jerry. Jerry Cassar is a great leader in the Conservative Party at the state level, and we have Sam and Demitri Naemit. I see Sam here as well, great leaders here in the Rockland County Conservative Party, a party that really supports their candidates, have supported me in my Senate endeavors and really helped me get across the finish line and I can, I love their continued support.”
Weber pointed out that they are going to need everybody to turn out for the vote, whether it’s for his race, Bruce Blakeman’s, who I know was due to arrive, and Congressman Mike Lawler’s as well and a lot of the other assembly and down ballot races.
“We’re going to need everybody to turn out Conservative Party, Republican Party, moderate Democrats. We need everybody to come out to vote for normal candidates and the slate that we’re putting up here in Rockland County. Our trusted candidates, they’re like I say, normal candidates that really have the best interests of our district and our state, at hand, and we need, and I need a partner in state government in Bruce Blakeman, because I could do a lot of things, great things for Rockland County, having a governor that really cares about Rockland, that doesn’t just use it as a cut through, and then coupled with our County Executive Ed Day, we really could do something special.”
“It starts with not only re-electing myself, Congressman Lawler, electing more Republicans and conservatives throughout the state in the Senate and Assembly, but we need a governor that cares about this state, and Bruce Blakeman, I know, is that great candidate. I look forward to great victories in November with your support, and we’ll do great.” He concluded.
Don Mazzullo got up and explained the desperate situation New York State is in with the Democratic on party rule in Albany.
“You know, you’re always going to hear, and you heard from me as I traveled this state that this is the most important election we have, and every year it seems like that is. Once again we’re faced with that. We’re faced with a situation where we need to win back the state of New York. It’s so important to do that after one party rule for so long, and we have some people who are ready to step up and do what we need to do in New York.
I think it’s so important to understand and I know Nassau County Executive Blakeman, who will be your next governor understands how important it is to be part of the Conservative Party. As a Republican, we don’t win without the Conservative Party and Chairman, as you know with the numbers here we got over 327,242 votes.”
Kassar thanked, Day, Weber and Mazzullo and got down to the business of the convention. He told the audience that Congressman Lawler was on his way to address the group. He welcomed everyone to the Conservative Party Convention and got through all of the technical and legal points which have to be covered so that this nomination, these nominations and designations stand, which he did.
“I honestly can say I’ve been in a lot of these over the years and I see some good tickets and some not as good, and this year we got a great ticket, very diverse ticket to run around the state with and make you please. It’s going to be a very, very difficult year because the change in the election laws which cause outside the city of New York for every local election that was run last year to be run again with maybe the exception of two or three counties. Our support and commitment to our ticket is very clear regardless of the technical aspect of this meeting. I know where the party stands and how pleased they are about what we’re doing.”
According to Kssar, New York State is beyond its crossroads. This is reflected by the annual migration of our former fellow New Yorkers to other states. Lots of people, big numbers, and the losses, I think you all know, are not due to the weather. If that was the case, there’d be nobody left in the state right now. Rather the policies that make New York a very difficult place to live, work, and raise a family.
“As the Conservative Party embarks on finalizing a state ticket today, it’s noteworthy that every statewide office and the Democratic control of the legislature. Every statewide office that’s democratic, they’re all democratically controlled and the democratically controlled legislature has done its part to collapse the once heralded Empire State. It’s been going on for a number of years now and it’s been effective, but if the Democrats want to claim effectiveness, they can claim the effectiveness of destroying our state. Our attorney general and comptroller candidates will give remarks that create a clear distinction between them and their opponents, and Bruce Blakeman’s tenure as Nassau County Executive is in stark contrast to hopeless race to the bottom and one that she’s actually winning.”
“Can I say really how many hundreds of thousands of votes that we will bring to these candidates this year. We are really hitting new highs. I mean, we’ve been averaging now statewide over 300,000 votes. You know, 12 years ago we were averaging around 250,000 votes. So, we’ve seen increases in enrollment. You know that the rule now is it’s 130,000 votes to stay, a legal party in this state, which really every party except us, the Democrats, Republicans, and Working Families Party, were not able to make and they disappeared. That’s not for me what it’s about. For me it’s about getting the hundreds of thousands of votes that put our candidates over and of course keep us on Row C.
He then went into the generic business of the convention, the invocation, the Pledge of Allegiance, declaring the parliamentarian, and the reports of the credentials committee
Congressman Lawler came in to address the crowd. “Thank you Chairman Kassar. Happy Valentines Day to everybody. There’s nothing I would rather do than spend my Valentine’s Day with Jerry Kassar. It’s great to be here with you and welcome to Stony Point in NY 17th Congressional District and I’m excited to have our statewide ticket here today and look forward to a string campaign over the next 10 months as we work to defeat Kathy Hochul and Tish James and Tom Danapoli, in November. Obviously, this district that you’re in today is, is really been key, in so many ways. In 2022, when we defeated Sean Patrick Maloney, we not only defeated the chair of the DCCC, we ended Nancy Pelosi’s reign as Speaker of the House and that really was vital. This district proved in 2024 that it was important once again.”
He explained that his was one of only 3 seats in the entire country in which a Republican won a seat that Kamala Harris won as well. Those three seats, his, Brian Fitzpatrick’s, and Don Bacon’s were the difference between having a Republican majority or not, and getting to pass our tax bill, which by the way, when you all go to file your taxes this year, New York is going to see the single largest tax cut in the entire country.
He added that lifting the cap on SALT, and, creating a new senior tax deduction which he says Jerry Kassar will benefit from greatly, We will do very well in New York. The average New Yorker is going to see a $4000 tax cut, which is significant and at a time in which New York is leading in all the wrong categories.
“We have the highest tax burden, the worst business climate. We lead the nation in outmigration, and now we have a socialist 30 miles south running the largest city in the world. It is imperative this year that we work as a united ticket, that we work up and down ballot to win, this November, that we elect Bruce Blakeman, our next governor, and defeat the single worst governor in America, Kathy Hochul. It’s imperative that we defeat Tish James, who is by far the worst attorney General in the country.”
Kassar moved on to the first order of business, which was the nomination and designation of a candidate for Attorney General. He called upon Donald Missoula to do the honors.
Chris Kendall was called upon to second the nomination. He began by quoting US Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart’s 1964 statement on the topic of pornography, “It’s hard to define, but I know it when I see it.” He then paraphrased this quote on the topic of leadership. “Leadership. It’s hard to define, but I know it when I see it.”
“Saritha Kamatarini is a natural leader. Within 10 minutes of meeting her, I knew she was a natural leader.
Becoming a US attorney is a highly competitive job sought after by the best and the brightest of young attorneys. The normal guidelines to be accepted as a US attorney in our office is at least 5 to 7 years of experience after law school, good experience. Saritha was taken after 4. That is almost unheard of. She’s an outstanding trial attorney, which is a skill that can only be forged by years of hard work, learning to think on her feet, thinking three steps ahead out every time you speak, and having the skill of quickly being able to read people. Those are all skills that she will need as a New York attorney General.”
He explained that there are only 3 US attorneys that have ever received 3 Attorney General awards while in service. One of them is Mike Garcia from here in New York. There’s another lady who achieved it, and the third person is Saritha which is almost unheard of.
He then compared her opponent’s abilities to Kamatarini’s. “If her opponent spent the rest of her life trying to be a trial lawyer or tried to become the caliber of person that Saritha is, she couldn’t do it in a lifetime.”
“Saritha has the greatest qualities of an attorney general candidate in at least 40 years in this state, and that’s how long I’ve been watching it. We just don’t get that caliber of attorneys like this for attorney general very often. Is that what impressed me, made me decide that that this is the person who should lead our ticket for attorney general? No, that’s not it. That should be enough, but when I talked to Saritha about her candidacy, I looked at all the alternatives that she could be doing, making a lot more money, doing a lot more enjoyable things. What she said was, ‘We need to restore the Attorney General’s office to be that of law abiding, even-handed administration of justice, and we must end this lawfare on both sides that is tearing this country apart.’ That is leadership.
After all of the nominating, seconding and voting took place, Kassar declared Saritha Kamatarini the nominee and designee of the Conservative Party for Attorney General of New York State.
Kamatarini began in typical fashion by thanking the people for their gracious words of nomination and accepted the nomination for Attorney General.
“Chairman Kassar has been extraordinarily welcoming since the first days that I met him in Bay Ridge, extraordinarily, down to earth, and I really appreciate this reception. I accept your nomination for Attorney General. I see some new faces here and I know I’m a new face to the party, and I wanted to take a few minutes to tell you a little bit more about myself and why I’m running. Some of you know I was born in Brooklyn, and when 9/11 happened, it broke my heart. (it was fitting that a picture of the firefighters raising the American flag at the scene was behind her on the right) I decided I wanted to come back and be a federal prosecutor in Brooklyn to go after the people who attacked us that day, to prosecute terrorists. That’s what I did with my career.”
She said that she put away an al-Qaeda bomb maker who tried to wipe out a US military base in Afghanistan. Further explaining how that came about. The military was able to find the bomb before it went off, unwrap it, and on the brown packing tape around the bomb, they lifted fingerprints, the fingerprints of a US citizen who was brought back to court in the United States, who we took to trial and convicted at trial.
“I brought a case against the head of the ISIS sniper unit; a man caught on the battlefield in Syria again by the amazing military. Another US citizen brought back to face justice here and now serving a life sentence, and I prosecuted Mexico’s FBI director who took millions of dollars in bribes from the Sinaloa Cartel and gave that Cartel the protection it needed to become the largest drug trafficking organization in the world, the same drug trafficking organization that introduced fentanyl to this country across the southwest border and the fentanyl that has now killed hundreds of thousands of Americans.”
While she was spending her life dedicated to public service and public safety, and while she was chasing terrorists across the Middle East, she saw public safety completely deteriorate here in New York. She pointed to the fact that everyday New Yorkers were being stabbed at random on the street and people are being burned alive in the subway, and homeless Americans were freezing to death on the sidewalks and in every county of this state, repeat offenders are being let out over and over again.
Everyone thinks as they watch the news that these things only happen to others. Kamatarini nixed that impression, “These things don’t just happen to other people. A member of my family was assaulted while taking my kids to school. One of my friends had a stray bullet come through her bedroom and fly over her head while she was sleeping. For the last 5 years, those of us in the law enforcement community have somehow been treated as the bad guys, while the criminals are treated as victims and everyone else is left to fend for themselves. Well, I’m tired of it. New Yorkers are tired of it. More than a million people have left the state in the last 5 years. Fewer people, more crime. It doesn’t make any sense. Enough is enough.”
Joe Hernandez running for NYS Comptroller was the next candidate to be nominated
“Oh my God, what an honor. Thank you, Chairman, and thank you for those amazing, introductory words. I’m humbled to be here with you this morning. You see, actually my life trajectory was, I was going to be a shoe shiner in Cuba, but I ended up here in this great society as your candidate as your nominee.
He began by explaining about his background and how he came to be here in the USA. He came here at the age of 7. His dad was a political prisoner. He knows a communist when he sees a communist, and he can tell us that Zohran Mamdani is a communist, and we’ve got to stop that.
“It was, 6 of us, 4 siblings and my parents, and we came here legally, I should say, by the way, because I think people, people believe that the that the Conservative Party is not about immigration. We are just about legal immigration and that that’s the only thing we ask that you come here legally and that you abide by our laws and that you don’t abuse our system.”
He continued the biographical portion of his speech. “We came here and my father washed dishes. My mother cleaned houses, to put food on our table. They taught us a couple of very important lessons. The first one was to work hard because there’s no such thing as a free lunch. Although, again, some Democrats will lead you to believe that that is the case, but that’s not real. Then they taught us to get educated because education was an important part of getting out of the situation we found ourselves in. I did. I got educated, became a scientist, and worked on Wall Street and I had the pleasure of doing this career which I love, and I’m hanging my hat off for a little bit to serve my great country. The 3rd and 4th things my parents taught me was to love this country and to love it unconditionally.”
His father, he passed away, but he said he was a patriot of patriots. He flew the American flag every day in the morning before school. “We’d get out there to fly the American flag, and, and as, as the sun was setting, he would bring the flag back down always ensuring that it never touched the ground and as a kid I never really appreciated that, but he would remind us that this country is a very, very special place and we have to protect it and we have to fight it. The fourth lesson he taught us was that at some point in your life you have to get back to this great society that gave us so much.”
Bruce Blakeman and Todd Hood were put up as one ticket as is done with the President and Vice – President instead of individually as has been done in the past. Hood spoke first.
“I do not take this lightly. It’s a great endorsement. My name’s Todd Hood. I’m the Sheriff in Madison County.
I’ve, I’ve been in law enforcement, my whole adult life. This is what I do. I’ve seen what’s happened in New York State over the past, 7 or 8 years with bail reform, I take this opportunity with honor and I take it seriously.
We have a lot of stuff to fix in New York State with regards to accountability in our law enforcement. I am going to stay the course for you. I’ve been a cop for more than 30 years. Every day I see the consequences of Kathy Hochul’s failed leadership. I’ve stood with families after violent attacks and violent crimes, sat with parents who lost a child, buried fellow officers who gave their lives protecting others. I keep asking, how did it come to this?”
He explained that under Kathy Hochul, New York is less safe and less affordable. Crime is up, costs are up, and repeat offenders are back on the streets again and again because her policies protect criminals instead of communities. Let me be clear, repeat offenders should repeat prison, not repeat arrest. When you side with criminals, you get more crime. When you side with police, you get safer streets, right? Common sense.
Blakeman received a very special endorsement via video from President Donald Trump.
“A very special hello to New York, a place I love, and I’m thrilled to give Bruce Blakeman my complete and total endorsement for governor of New York State. As you know, Albany is a total mess, and Bruce Blakeman will make New York safe and strong and honest and prosperous again. As Nassau County Executive, Bruce stood shoulder to shoulder with the men and women of law enforcement, giving them the resources and support they needed to do their jobs and do them properly. Under his great leadership, Nassau County hired hundreds of new police officers and became the safest county in America. That’s a big statement.”
“As Governor Bruce will fight hard to grow the economy, cut taxes, job-killing regulations, protect New York industry and bring businesses and great paying jobs back to the Empire State. He will defend your Second Amendment, give your beautiful veterans, and they are the best, the respect that they deserve and cut through ridiculous energy restrictions so that you will pay less for gas, heat, and electricity, and he will restore law and order to every part of New York. Be sure to get out and vote in November so we can save New York State. I’ll be working very hard with Bruce. We’ll do a great job. You know, Bruce has a fantastic record of winning. As a Republican, he won Nassau County by a landslide, and that’s something that never happened before. He is a winner. He’s going to win the state and turn it around. Thank you very much.”
Blakeman was the final speaker of the convention. He thanked a number of people who have supported and aided him over the years he has been in politics. He mentioned Joe Hernandez who’s going to make us a great state comptroller and Saritha Kamatarini, who will be an outstanding Attorney General and that might disqualify her.” Taking a shot at James, he said, “She hasn’t committed fraud on her mortgage application.”
He then heaped praise on our local representatives, “You have a real fighter here in the House of Representatives. He’s a guy I’ve known for a long time. He had an outstanding career in the state legislature. Now he’s really, really supporting all the policies that we believe in down in Washington. That’s Congressman Mike Lawler. You also had here earlier, Senator Bill Weber, who is another outstanding fighter. We need to get him more senators, so we get the majority back in the New York State Senate.”
“As I stand here, this is very humbling. I want you to know that I’m very, very honored to receive this nomination. I have always run with the Conservative Party banner in all of my races, and it’s just a great thing to know that I have solid people who share American values supporting this ticket.”
He gave his bio explaining that both of his parents were WWII veterans. His mother had actually joined the US Army. According to his father she didn’t want to be left out of a good fight. “That’s what was instilled in me at a very young age, public service, service to our communities, service to our state, service to America. I have 3 sisters and a brother. My brother served in the Bush White House. My sister Linda is a registered nurse. My sister Karen ran a building supply business in Suffolk County. My sister Kathy had a construction company that she ran.”
“We all have the same commitment, and that’s the way I’ve tried to raise my children. That’s the kind of atmosphere that I want to create for my grandchildren as well.
“Todd was talking about cashless bail, the revolving door of criminality in this state. It’s got to end. You talk to business owners; they’ve had the same people come in and shoplift in their stores 7 or 8 times. The police come.
They’re not even allowed to arrest them. They have to give them an appearance ticket. There’s no consequences, so why would they stop? We’ve got to end these policies. Kathy Hochul is the most pro-criminal governor in the United States of America. How about caring about our citizens, about our taxpayers, and not giving money away to migrants, and making life better for criminals. The last two are what Kathy Hochul is about, giving that money away and favoring criminals over citizens and victims.”
“I’ve traveled the state. I go around it and I talk to people. The common theme is they’re miserable under Kathy Hochul’s leadership, or I should say lack of leadership. They are miserable because, again, we are overtaxed, we are overregulated. Jobs have left; people have left. I want to bring those jobs back, and I want to keep the jobs that are here. That gets back to your kids and your grandchildren. We need to provide a future for them. We need to fight for them. Our parents and our grandparents fought for us. Just like my parents fought in World War II. They fought for us because they wanted a better life for us. Now we’ve got to get in the game and fight for them.”
Blakeman knew he was talking to the faithful here, but he added that they have to recruit more people who think like us, and they’re out there. They need to make sure that those people get in this fight. Adding that this is a desperate battle to save our state and save our country.
“In conclusion, there are people that will try to tell you that this is such a blue state. How are you going to win?
My county is blue. There’s 110,000 more Democrats in my county than Republicans. We had a policy when I came into office of making sure that we fulfilled all of our promises, and we did. I didn’t raise taxes one penny.
In 4 years. I hired more cops and more corrections officers. We made our county the safest county in America.
We lowered our poverty rate to the lowest in New York State, and our demographics are the same as the state. We are a mirror image of the state. So, if you say or anybody else says that it can’t be done, that’s not true. We are going to win. We’re going to win because we’re going to talk about issues. We’re going to talk about 2nd Amendment rights, and you are going to have a governor and a lieutenant governor that are going to make sure that your 2nd Amendment rights are respected because that’s part of the Constitution. You’re going to have a governor, a lieutenant governor who will cut taxes for middle-class families, cut our energy costs in half.”
He told people to look at their utility bill and pointed out that 2/3 of your utility bill is taxes, delivery charges and mandates that are part of Kathy Hochul’s green energy scam. When he becomes governor, that ends. He will cut your energy bill in half. He will make sure that we make this state more affordable.
“We will create jobs and prosperity. You won’t have to visit your grandchildren in Texas or Florida or North Carolina or South Carolina. They’ll want to stay here because they’ll get good paying jobs with good benefits.
They’ll be able to afford the necessities in life and also have money left over for the simple luxuries like taking your kids on vacation or buying your daughter a prom dress. It will be a totally different New York because we will put New York first. We will be a governor and lieutenant governor, an attorney general and a comptroller that care about New Yorkers and their families, and we will make people happy again in this state.”
He again thanked President Donald J. Trump for that beautiful, beautiful endorsement. He said they talk frequently, and this is exactly what they talked about. He loves New York State. He is a New Yorker, and he is sad at the condition this state has become under Kathy Hochul, but they’re going to turn that around with your help.
“I am deeply, deeply grateful for your endorsement, and may I say to each and every one of you, may God bless you and your families, and may God bless the United States. Thank you all.”
Kassar went on to conclude the general business of the convention in order to keep within the regulations and rules applying to the activity.