Republicans say they’ll take on anti-Faso forces

KINGSTON, N.Y. » Ulster County Republicans vow to fight fire with fire by organizing rallies to support U.S. Rep. John Faso, R-Kinderhook, countering his opponents.

“It’s easy for us to sit back and try to relish in the victories that we’ve had,” Ulster County GOP Chairman Roger Rascoe told fellow Republicans who gathered Wednesday evening for a nominating convention for county and city of Kingston offices. “I find today to be a great day to be a Republican in Ulster County.”

Rascoe compared the Donald Trump presidency to Ronald Reagan’s successful “Morning in America” campaign theme that swept him into office in 1984.

At the local convention, Republicans created a committee to stage counterprotests against demonstrators who have been picketing Faso’s district office on Broadway in Midtown Kingston. The newly elected Faso has been regularly targeted by opponents, largely for backing the Republican health care bill and for refusing to hold town hallstyle meetings in his district.

Rascoe selected three town Republican chairmen to head the committee: Mike Dovich of Marlborough, Dan Aversano of Rochester and Tom Maerling of Wawarsing. They are charged, Republicans said, with organizing members to establish that Republicans won the election and support their congressman and president.

“John Faso has 166,171 reasons to vote the way he does. He is voting the way we asked him to vote, but the left continues to make noise, and the media is right with them,” Rasco said. “The liberal left can’t stand the fact that we won, and that he (Faso) won, and that President Trump won.”

Faso defeated Democrat Zephyr Teachout by more than 25,000 votes last year in the 19th Congressional District but ran far behind Teachout in Ulster County, where the Democrat garnered 45,541 votes to Faso’s 36,216. In the presidential race, Democrat Hillary Clinton carried Ulster County, 44,597 to 35,239.

Registered Democratic voters in Ulster County outnumber Republicans, 45,143 to 29,804. There also are 35,592 unaffiliated voters in the County.