Former conservative lawyer George Conway, a staunch critic of President Donald Trump, announced Tuesday that he is running for the New York congressional seat held by Rep. Jerry Nadler, who is retiring when his current term ends early next year, after the midterm elections in November.
“I’m running for Congress in NY-12, my home. We have a demented, criminal president running the country like a mob operation — government by the boss, for the boss,” Conway posted on X along with a roughly two-minute video. Nadler holds New York’s 12th Congressional seat.
In Tuesday’s campaign launch, Conway outlined his vision for taking on Trump directly, saying he has “been fighting Trump for years, and nothing will stop me.” The announcement comes on the fifth anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack in Washington, D.C., where a mob of violent pro-Trump protesters stormed the U.S. Capitol.
Conway, who was once married to Kellyanne Conway, one of Trump’s 2016 campaign managers, has become a vocal critic of the president. Despite his then-wife’s position in the White House, Conway in 2019 co-founded the Lincoln Project, which states that its mission is to “protect” the country from Trump and “those who identify (publicly or privately) as MAGA supporters.”
“Just when you think it can’t get any worse, it does. It has to stop. We must make it stop,” Conway said. “We have a corrupt president, a mendacious president, a criminal president.”
He slammed Trump for his immigration crackdown, arguing that the president is breaking international law, later adding that Trump is running the federal government “like a mob protection racket.” In his second term, Trump has taken a hard-line approach to immigration, including arrests and mass deportations.
In an appeal to voters, Conway highlighted the issue of affordability, offering a split screen between the American people and Trump, calling the economy “great for him,” while “for everyone else, groceries, health care, prices skyrocketing and millions losing coverage.”
Conway, who is from Boston, moved to New York City in 1988 after receiving his law degree at Yale Law School. He served as a defense attorney and appellate lawyer in New York for more than three decades.
Conway’s decision to throw his name into the Democratic primary adds to the growing list of candidates looking to fill Nadler’s vacant seat, including New York state Reps. Micah Lasher and Alex Bores, as well as Jack Schlossberg, a grandson of President John F. Kennedy.
Ebony Davis is a breaking news reporter for MS NOW.