Siena NY-21 “Poll” Response
MEMORANDUM
TO: Interested Parties
FROM: Alex DeGrasse, President, North Country Strategies LLC
DATE: October 9, 2026
RE: The Times Union/WPTZ/WAMC Siena Poll of NY-21 Is Not a Credible Survey
The Times Union/Siena poll of NY-21 is not a credible survey. It is another scam poll by a pollster with a long history heavily favoring Democrat candidates, includes a name not on the ballot, removes 10% of Republican and 9% of Independent respondents to the Democrats’ 2% and none of the numbers match reality including our opponents own polling which they released last night to his donors. By every metric, this is an unscientific poll.
The numbers: The ballot is wrong. The certified November ballot has two names: Anthony Constantino and Blake Gendebien. Siena read respondents a third name, Christopher Schmidt, who failed to qualify for a ballot line and is running as a write-in, and credited him with 5 percent. There is another Communist write in candidate who is not named but this one is. Ask yourself why? This is the second media poll in this race to test a ballot that does not exist. In Siena’s own sample, 49 percent “identify” Republican, Constantino is at only 65 percent of these “identified” Republicans. Many of the voters parked with Schmidt a
candidate who is not on the ballot and does not exist.
The sample is wrong. Siena has Elise Stefanik at 49 percent favorable in a district she carried 62 to 38, where every district poll has her between 56 and 62. It has Bruce Blakeman beating Kathy Hochul by 15. Every poll we have taken in this district has Blakeman winning by more than 20 or at 20, and Hochul lost it by 23 in 2022. It has President Trump at 52 percent unfavorable in a district he carried by double digits.
Follow the money. If this race were real, national Democrats would be dumping money into it. They are not. Gendebien reported roughly $500,000 in the bank on October 1st and we assume he is holding tons of bills which he has done every quarter while losing cash on hand over the last year. This is a horrible number one month out. Other than putting money on TV his campaign is doing nothing, we are winning every other advertising space and burying him for being a Hochul puppet. His campaign is begging for cash on fundraising calls where the callers admit he has been losing ground and is down on their latest polling call which we are happy to release to the world.
Refused/Don’t Know. In any serious polling, refusals are not counted. 10% of Republicans and 9% of Independents refused to answer the poll while only 2% of Democrats did. This unequally affects the weighted distribution of the poll, and it is why on any serious poll you will not see refusals counted.
History. Siena’s October 2020 poll of NY-22 (Sept. 27 to Oct. 4, 383 likely voters, ±5.0) had Brindisi leading Tenney 48 to 39, a 9 point Democratic lead. It was the only public poll of the race. Tenney won.
We could write an entire poll on how bad the Siena statewide poll is year over year as well.
Anthony Constantino is winning NY-21 despite everyone in the media trying to prevent that at all costs.
