After Big Losses, a N.Y. House Republican Clashes With Her Party

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/20/nyregion/elise-stefanik-republican-women.html

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She arrived in Washington as a rising star, the youngest woman ever elected to Congress, and she quickly won leadership positions and garnered effusive praise from her party leaders.

Now, not even four years later, Representative Elise Stefanik, a Republican from New York’s North Country, is already undergoing a reset.

She no longer holds the distinction of being the youngest woman elected to Congress; Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat elected in November, eclipsed her record by several months.

This month, Ms. Stefanik, the first woman to serve as head of recruitment for the National Republican Congressional Committee, stepped down from the post.

And though Ms. Stefanik, 34, easily captured a third term in New York’s 21st District, her greater challenge may be trying to remain relevant in a state where her party has lost favor, and in a House where her party has lost power.

It did not take long for Ms. Stefanik to signal a new strategy, one that has taken her outside the existing Republican Party infrastructure.

Last week, Ms. Stefanik circulated a letter to her Republican House colleagues urging them to press party leaders for a postelection autopsy to assess the Republicans’ poor performance in the midterms.

The letter, also signed by Representatives Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, Carlos Curbelo of Florida and Kevin Yoder of Kansas, suggested that the party needed to “formally analyze what went wrong, what lessons were learned — including those learned from the successful efforts of our Democratic counterparts.”

“We have to take the time to do a deep dive and get to the why,” Ms. Stefanik said in an interview, emphasizing that the report should address policy proposals and campaign strategy, including fund-raising and the use of data. “This is not a time to stick our heads in the sand.”

She added: “When you have setbacks, it’s important to take note of that and learn the lessons and try to improve moving forward.”

Ms. Stefanik said this month that she was expanding her leadership political action committee, E-PAC, and refocusing it to help Republican women win their primaries. Ms. Stefanik said she recruited more than 100 women to run this year, and only one won a seat in Congress; she said she grew frustrated by the party’s reluctance to back the new candidates she had helped recruit.

“These were women who had the courage to raise their hand and run and step into the arena, and I want to focus on making sure they have that support early on,” Ms. Stefanik said. “I also want to lead by example to my colleagues who care about our conference and making sure the House G.O.P. is more reflective of the American public as a whole.”

The move to refocus her leadership PAC — combined with her decision to leave the N.R.C.C.’s recruitment position — has left her at odds with Republican leadership.

“If that’s what Elise wants to do, then that’s her call, her right,” Representative Tom Emmer, a Republican from Minnesota, told Roll Call about Ms. Stefanik’s new PAC. “But I think that’s a mistake.”

Ms. Stefanik shot back on Twitter.

“NEWSFLASH,” she wrote. “I wasn’t asking for permission.”

But some Republicans lauded Ms. Stefanik’s willingness to buck the party’s leadership.

“Elise Stefanik is taking a stake in a party that needs new ownership and that’s a great thing,” said William F. B. O’Reilly, a longtime Republican operative in New York. “It needs people who don’t ask permission. It needs people who are willing to be bulls in the china shop.”

There will only be 13 female Republicans in the House in the next Congress, down from 23. Only one woman, Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming, holds a top House leadership position.

Across the aisle, 35 of the new female members of the House are Democrats compared with only two Republicans, and nine of the Democrats are under the age of 40. Among them is Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, who, in similar ways to Ms. Stefanik, has been tabbed as a rising star in her party.

“We need Elise Stefanik to speak out on our behalf because as a young women in Congress who is a Republican, she is seriously outnumbered and that makes her role more and more difficult,” said Jennifer Nassour, the former head of the Republican Party in Massachusetts.

“She is taking the frustration of many women in the party and she is putting it into action and holding the party leaders’ feet to the fire in making them take a close look at what’s going on on the Republican side,” Ms. Nassour added. “I commend her for that because she is really taking a step out there, and not everyone wants to take that leap of faith.”

Amid her political maneuvering, Ms. Stefanik is also embarking on a literal move: She and her husband, Matthew Manda, recently bought a new home in Schuylerville, N.Y., roughly 100 miles south of her previous address in Willsboro, N.Y.

Though a move often does not draw much speculation, her new residence sits near the edge of her congressional district, which could subject her to the perils of redistricting after the 2020 census is completed.

Until 2012, parts of Saratoga County, where her new home is, was part of the 20th Congressional District, which is currently represented by Paul Tonko, a Democrat.

Ms. Stefanik’s focus on national campaigns may also signal her political calculus for the future. A Republican has not won a statewide race in New York since 2002, when George E. Pataki was elected to his third term as governor, and the last Republican senator from New York, Alfonse D’Amato, lost re-election in 1998.

“I think the play is within the House, within the party,” Mr. O’Reilly said about Ms. Stefanik’s political future. “It’s national. It’s not a New York thing.”

As she heads back to Washington in a new role, however, Ms. Stefanik unsurprisingly demurred on her political future.

“I would have never predicted that I would have run for Congress two years before I did,” she said. “I am not sure what the future holds.”