Man With Bad Case of LDE Wants to Run The Democratic Party
Orange County's State Senator, James G. Skoufis, wants to run the National Democratic Party. Here's why that's a disaster waiting to happen for you and everyone you love.
I was enjoying my vacation.
We were supposed to return on Monday, but then … Something amazing happened.
Yes. “Political Outsider” — and former Woodbury Town Board member, New York State Assemblyman, and current New York State Senator — James G. Skoufis wants to run the National Democratic Party.
No. This is not a joke. This is real.
I mean, very little about James G. Skoufis is real.
For example, Mr. James Skoufis recently told the local Monroe newspaper, The Photo-News, the following just before the election a few weeks ago:
“We must do more to keep big money and influence out of politics; to that end, I would love to see my bill prohibiting candidates from taking corporate campaign contributions signed into law. With or without the law in place, I’ll continue to refuse these kinds of contributions, as I have for several years.” (Emphasis Added.) (Source)
None of that is true. In 2024 alone …
Skoufis took in $34,719.53 from LLCs (corporations) and LLPs (law firms.)
He also took in $136,400 from Political Action Committees.
That is $171,119.53 Skoufis took this year, which he has NOT refused.
Don’t let this guy fool you.
Most voters in the national election cycle voted for Trump because, while they may not necessarily like Donald Trump, they know what they’re getting with him, and that he’s going to do exactly what he says he’s going to do.
For better or worse. (I argue worse, but hey, I guess we’re all going to find out real soon now, won’t we?)
The Republicans are who they are, also for better or worse, and people like that. What you see is what you get with them.
In 2016 and 2024, the Democrat's national political platform can best be described as more “Whoa, look out for that fucking guy” (Trump) and less “Here’s what I’m going to do for you, and this is our vision for America.”
(And I’m saying that as someone who voted for Harris.)
Don’t believe me? Consider this: Medicare does not cover hearing aids and dental coverage specifically because of Joe Manchin and Kristen Sinema.
Both are Democrats who helped to stop Democratic legislation from getting passed.
Think about that for a moment.
Why on Earth would you, a voter, vote for the Democrats when, in the moments they DO have power, they always seem to find a way to ratfuck you?
That’s why so many people came out for Trump this November. (Well, that and a worldwide trend to vote out incumbents due to anger about inflation.)
You mean to tell me James G. Skoufis is the solution to THAT problem? He’s going to fix the prices at the grocery store? He didn’t do it here in Orange County. Where’s the big angry press conference outside the Monroe Shoprite?
Skoufis couldn’t even be bothered to act on a New York State Comptroller’s Audit of Orange County, in which Orange County did not dispute the findings that it could be doing more to keep the prices under control.
Where’s State Senator Skoufis on that one? Oh right. He’s too busy posting on Russian Disinformation Superspreader, Twitter, about how he won his district by 14%.
All without mentioning his support of Tim Mitts, a felon who ran on the Conservative Party line and siphoned votes from Skoufis’s Republican challenger. (It’s been alleged, but I can’t prove it, that Skoufis funded and provided other support for Mitts campaign. The sources are people who have direct contact with Mr. Skoufis. Mr. Skoufis has a standing policy not to reply to any inquiry from The Monroe Gazette. For example, he has not responded to the claim that Skoufis is now supporting his 2024 Republican New York State Senate opponent, Dorey Houle, for Monroe Town Supervisor in exchange for Houle not running against Skoufis for a third time.)
James G. Skoufis: Embarrassingly Full of Shit
So right off the bat, you have Mr. Skoufis bullshitting everyone, but now he’s doing it on the national stage. (Honestly, this is all part of his plan to run for Congress when Pat Ryan runs for Governor, but that’s a story for another post.)
We probably should have seen this coming, given this very misleading tweet.
You know why Skoufis won his district by 14%? It’s not because he’s some political genius. He’s not. He caved in to all of Hanhallah’s demands, and they came out and endorsed him. It’s very straightforward.
See? Why post a thread on Elon’s hate machine when a single sentence can do the trick?
It’s not rocket science, James. You’re just another sellout politician who will say and do anything it takes to get elected. You are not the change we are looking for. In fact, you’re part of the disease killing the Democratic party, and it’s my sincere hope that the party does some serious introspection and starts kicking assholes like you out of it.
Sounds harsh, right? Well, consider this:
This is Mr. Skoufis’s “Mission Accomplished” moment. George W. Bush would be proud.
That man Skoufis is shaking hands with in the picture above? He’s the de facto co-mayor of South Blooming Grove and big Skoufis donor. We’ve previously covered Mr. Ekstein’s harebrained schemes here.
Isaac Ekstein also gave Skoufis $15,000 for his 2022 NYS Senate Campaign. He is currently overseeing a municipal water crisis that has seen his village spend at least $1M on trucking in water to compensate for not having enough water for its residents. A crisis Mr. Ekstein and Mr. Stern both made 10x worse with their rampant, unpermitted building in South Blooming Grove.
This is a water crisis that Senator Skoufis refuses to acknowledge — he can’t be bothered to come to speak to any South Blooming Grove resident at a municipal meeting and ignores them online when asked to comment — and he is now actively working with Joel Stern and Ekstein to give them everything they want.
Despite all the criminal behavior swirling around both men.
Seriously. Remember that left turn lane that Joel Stern put in illegally? You know, that one the New York State Department of Transportation had to go and rip up at the expense of South Blooming Grove residents?
Skoufis went to bat for Stern with the Department of Transportation, and guess who’s getting their left turn lane now? (Note the shout-out to Skoufis in the article.)
Worth noting: The real estate developer, Bernard Jacobowitz, who would directly benefit from that left turn lane donated $5,000 to Skoufis’s Skoufis for Senate Pac just prior to this year’s election.
Jacobowitz is also one of the original litigants against the Village of South Blooming Grove to have it dissolved. Once that lawsuit failed, the litigants formed the company Keen Equities. That’s the company behind the Clovewood project which Mr. Skoufis was a big critic of … until he received $70,000 in a single day during his last run for the New York State Senate.
Good company for the “Political Outsider” to keep, you know? Two people charged in multiple lawsuits currently filed, multiple lawsuits still to come, and the guys funding those schmucks.
Also, one more thing on Mr. Skoufis’s recent re-election: The person running against Skoufis, Dorey Houle, was less qualified for the job than a wet paper bag.
She was also a bigot who ran racist ads and verifiably withheld information to her constituents in Monroe about both a poisonous gas being released on a local playground and an oil spill impacting the drinking supply of over 20,000 people.
It’s easy to look like a political genius when you’re up against such a high-quality opponent.
So, I don’t know what Skoufis put in this thread on Twitter, but it doesn’t matter. None of it is true.
Here’s The Truth About James Skoufis
Orange County has a couple of very large religious groups up here with a ton of money.
One is over in Port Jervis, and if you’re familiar with The Epoch Times you already know all about the Falun Gong. They are cuckoo for coco puffs. They’re also very big supporters (and big donors) of Mr. Skoufis.
The other large group is over in what’s called, in Yiddish, the City of Kiryas Joel, and that’s how I choose to refer to it in solidarity with my Haredi brothers and sisters.
Kiryas Joel is made up (mostly) of members of the Satmar religious dynasty.
And Mr. Skoufis — along with recently re-elected Congressman Pat Ryan — decided to help drive a stake in the heart of any hope of making sure Satmar children receive a proper secular education at their local yeshivas.
In fact, advertising that ran in Yiddish language papers stressed that Mr. Skoufis would fight for “Yeshiva independence” from New York State’s education requirements.
Many advocates, as well as people concerned with the health and safety of children everywhere, have been fighting for these equivalency requirements for YEARS.
Mr. Skoufis — and Mr. Ryan — decided to say fuck them kids and do Hanhallah’s bidding. (Hanhallah means leadership in Yiddish and refers to Grand Rebbe Aaron Teitelbaum, Grand Rebbe Zalman Teitelbaum, both leaders of the Satmar.)
Hanhallah does not want to educate their kids because … Well, to be blunt, it’s a hell of a lot harder to dictate how someone chooses to live their life the better educated they are.
That’s why this video from Skoufis today is amazing. Here’s a guy who sold out a bunch of kids in order to further his own political career telling you he’s got a strategy to save America from Donald Trump.
There is nothing special or unique about this guy; he reeks of Little Dick Energy.
This video above is like watching an evil version of the Tom Hanks classic, “Big.”
But Here’s Why Skoufis Would Be a Disaster For The Dems
First, in Skoufis’s announcement, he’s trying to do that thing a lot of corporate Democratic idiots are doing, where they think the secret to beating Trump is to move to the right.
This is the part of the Democratic party that I hate. It’s the elitist, corporate assholes who just want to get and keep power, and do the absolute minimum for the people who voted for them. Joe Manchin. Kristen Sinema. Pat Ryan. James G. Skoufis.
Moving to the Right is not the solution.
So, if by some fluke Skoufis did become Chair of the National Democratic Party, that’s what you’d get. More corporate money. More PAC money. More conservative politics.
Put simply: No vision. No plan. No change. No hope.
It’s just more of the same old shit in a brand-new package.
Second, and way more importantly, I want you to consider the world we live in.
The worst effects of Climate Change are about to become permanent. In 2024, Senator Skoufis oversaw the Jennings Creek Fire, and in 2023, he oversaw historic flooding across his district. You just saw how well he handled that fire: As a prop.
Skoufis didn’t start the fire, he didn’t flood the Hudson Valley, but he’s supervised an unmitigated environmental disaster in his own backyard, and did nothing, twice.
First, as mentioned, in the Village of South Blooming Grove, and second, he’s been completely silent about the failing infrastructure of Orange County Sewer District 1, a sewage treatment plant that empties into the Ramapo River, which provides water to over two million people in New York and New Jersey.
And I don’t know if you’re paying attention, but there’s a looming global freshwater crisis, as well as one right here in America, that we need to contend with. Mr. Skoufis ain’t exactly minding the water supply for his constituents and their friends and neighbors. How can you trust him to handle this problem, and the rest of Climate Change’s evils at the national level? You can’t.
Here’s another point, and I want you all to hear me on this:
60% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck. That’s more than half of us.
So, while Skoufis is swimming in corporate money, the majority of us can’t make ends meet. Most of us are lucky if we have $1,000 (or more) in savings.
If you’re in your 40s like I am, statistically, the majority of us are trapped taking care of our kids and our elderly parents. A situation that will only grow worse for every younger generation.
Why? In 2030, people 65+ are going to be the majority of the American population.
On average, people in their 40s are on the hook for an additional $7,000-$8,000 a year in extra expenses, resulting in being “Sandwiched” between their parents and their kids. We don’t have money for many, many reasons, but a new and worsening one is that our extra money is paying the bills of our kids and parents.
And our parents are struggling right now.
Many Americans 65+ often have to choose between paying for food, paying for rent, and paying for badly needed prescription medication.
This is, to be blunt, a goddamn emergency. Moving to the right ain’t going to fix that. We already have a Conservative Party.
Why do we need another one?
What we need is a political revolution within the Democratic Party.
One where we kick out all the corporate assholes like Skoufis, and one where we put a stake in the ground.
One that loudly and proudly says, “We’re the party of Medicare for All.”
Even if that is very hard to pull off, it tells people where we’re going. It’s no different than what Trump does successfully. You can hate that guy — I do — but you know what he wants and what his vision for America is. He wants to take this country back to the days before FDR where you were, in the words of George Carlin, shit out of luck and jolly well fucked when it came to counting on the federal government for anything.
James G. Skoufis does not offer this vision. Neither do the Corporate Democrats.
And by the way, before someone goes, “Well, BJ, aren’t these policies super LIBERAL?” No. Most Americans of both political parties support Medicare for All.
These are not LIBERAL positions, these are popular positions. 63% of Americans support Medicare for All.
63%!
Perhaps not coincidentally, it’s about the same number of Americans living paycheck to pay check.
Now, if it’s me running for Chair — I’m not — I’d take things a step further.
I’d also argue for an expanded Social Security program that basically gives everyone over 18 a check for $2,000 a month. Some of you may know this as Universal Basic Income, but I like to just call it what it is: Promises made, promises kept. This was something both FDR and Martin Luther King were all working toward.
Don’t take my word for it. Just ask FDR.
If the Democrats are looking to change directions, they shouldn’t look to people like James G. Skoufis, who just want to move us to the Right for their own selfish gain and nothing else.
All they need to do is look to the past for their new way forward. I’ll let the man himself take it away, from way back in 1944 during the State of the Union address: