If nothing else, the Brooklyn GOP's recent major screwup with the Lester Chang candidacy is keeping things interesting in southwest Brooklyn

 
News  >>> Abbate keeps fund raising  ---  BUT  ---  he says that he's not running anymore !!!  ???

Lester Chang seems to be done as a candidate in Brooklyn  ---  but is he ?????

A couple of recent articles show what a mess Brooklyn GOP Chairman Ted Ghorra has made of things  ---  probably costing the GOP an assembly seat that it had apparently won in the 2022 election  ---  and helping Democrats to win even more offices in 2023

Here's the beef,  read 'em 'n' weep, or lol  ---  smoke 'em if yuh got 'em:  

"In an extremely rare move, the Democratic-led state Assembly is preparing to vote against seating the Republican winner of an Assembly race in Brooklyn, Lester Chang, because he may not have moved into the borough one year prior to the election as required by law....  Earlier this month,...  Chang defeated longtime Democratic incumbent Peter Abbate in Southern Brooklyn’s 49th District 52% to 47%...."  (See "Assembly prepared to vote against seating Brooklyn Republican over residency issue" by  Zach Fink, 11/30/2022,  Spectrum News-NY1/ Politics/ Brooklyn [https://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/politics/2022/11/30/brooklyn-republican-lester-chang-assembly-vote-unseat-special-election]). 

And this: 

"Outgoing Assembly Member Peter Abbate doesn’t think he’d run again for office, even if the Republican who beat him, Lester Chang, were barred from taking office because he might not have lived in Brooklyn for long enough. The Assembly is preparing to vote against seating Chang, NY1 reported Wednesday, which could lead to a special election.But that isn’t stopping Abbate from holding a fundraiser at the New York State Public Employee Conference convention in Puerto Rico this weekend – even though he already has nearly $1 million in his campaign account. Abbate, who chairs the Committee on Governmental Employees, explained to City & State he holds a fundraiser at the conference every year, and this was scheduled before he lost reelection. So he doesn’t expect much of a party this year. “I’ll sit around with two or three people and probably return the checks or give them to other candidates,” he said...." (See "Peter Abbate is fundraising – but doesn’t think he’ll run again" by Jeff Coltin, 12/1/2022, City & State  [https://www.cityandstateny.com/politics/2022/12/peter-abbate-fundraising-doesnt-think-hell-run-again/380340/].