Voter’s guide to the 2020 election

For the 59th time in American history, a president will be chosen Tuesday.

Historically, participation in the process has been spotty, with slightly more than half of the eligible voters typically taking part in recent presidential elections.

Robert Mata spoke softly, but his patriotism shouted loudly.

The 97-year-old World War II veteran, who fought in Europe against the Nazis, drove his truck to the West Seneca Community Center on the morning of Saturday, Oct. 24. It was the first day of early voting in New York, and Mata wasn’t going to miss it.

WASHINGTON – Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer's name isn't on any ballot on Tuesday – but his future is.

And it won't be decided in his home state of New York. Instead, it will be decided in Senate races across America, from Maine to Montana to Alaska, from the Carolinas to Georgia to Arizona.

WASHINGTON – For Western New Yorkers, the presidential campaign is both omnipresent and far away. It is jamming the airwaves and Twitter feeds and conversations even more so than usual, even though neither President Trump nor Joe Biden have campaigned in Buffalo.

The campaign is omnipresent, in part, because the Republican president and his Democratic rival offer radically different visions that could, over the next four years, reshape metro Buffalo, as well as the nation.

WASHINGTON – After virtual conventions and, for the Democrats, a largely virtual campaign, the 2020 election is about to get intensely real.

And it may stay that way for days or weeks before it's over.

Listen to these conservatives.

We’re talking about three committed, lifelong conservatives who still believe in fiscal responsibility, whose devotion to the American idea transcends partisanship and who understand the need for change.

Amid the tree-lined developments and busy strip malls of several Buffalo suburbs lie the glaring uncertainties of the 2020 presidential election.

Sure, Democratic dominance causes just about every political observer to color Erie County and New York State blue for the contest pitting Joe Biden against President Trump.

ALBANY – Why wait?

So said the 2.5 million New Yorkers who chose to take advantage of the state’s fledgling early voting laws to cast their ballots in person ahead of Tuesday's election for president, members of Congress, state lawmakers and other offices up for grabs across the Empire State.

What happens when you send everyone a ballot to vote in an election? 

Turns out, more people vote.

There was a third-party candidate standing on the stage when Rep. Chris Jacobs and Democrat Nate McMurray debated last week – and to hear that third-party candidate tell it, that's the way it ought to be in pretty much all American political campaigns.

"I'd like to see a country where you have multiple parties working together for the common good, because the two-party system is failing pretty heavily right now," said Duane Whitmer, a Hamburg accountant and the Libertarian Party candidate in the race for Congress in New York's 27th District.

Nate McMurray approaches his third election night as a congressional candidate as the same proud progressive who lost his first two such campaigns.

He’s an advocate of Medicare for All running to represent the state’s most conservative district. He’s a gun control supporter who has challenged, rather than placated, the gun owners of rural Western New York. And just as conservatives there and elsewhere celebrate their new majority on the U.S. Supreme Court, McMurray says Democrats should think about packing the court with progressives.

WASHINGTON – After three months in Congress, Rep. Chris Jacobs is shaping up to be largely what he promised to be: a soft-spoken defender of Trump's policies.

In a recent debate and in interviews with The Buffalo News, the Orchard Park Republican uttered not a single harshly critical word about the president. On the House floor, he's strayed only occasionally from the party line. And while he's done only one debate since his July swearing-in, he's used the time running up to the Nov. 3 election traveling the many parts of New York's conservative 27th District .

ERIE, Pa. – It was no coincidence that Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden chose a union training center in suburban Erie on Saturday evening to tout his job creation and economic development plan.

The "other" Erie County – the one just over the border in northwestern Pennsylvania – ranks as a key battleground for both Biden and President Trump. It may also paint the most accurate picture of the deep political divide dominating the 2020 presidential election.

Nate McMurray was ruminating with reporters about a whole lot of things Wednesday morning in the gymnasium of St. Joseph’s Collegiate Institute.

The Democratic candidate for the 27th Congressional District had just squared off with Republican incumbent Chris Jacobs and Libertarian Duane Whitmer at St. Joe’s annual debate when he began answering some questions and ducking others.

It encompasses a vast swath of upstate New York stretching from two Great Lakes shorelines to the Finger Lakes, with some communities counting more cattle than people.

And though the 27th Congressional District is usually associated with metropolitan Buffalo and Rochester, at best it claims only the big cities' outer suburbs. The rest is marked by some of New York State's most fertile farmlands, especially for dairy.

For more than an hour on Wednesday, the trio of contenders for New York's 27th Congressional District fielded tough questions from a panel during the St. Joseph's Collegiate Institute annual debate – each sticking to party positions less than two weeks before Election Day.

It was only after the debate, when Republican Chris Jacobs questioned opponent Nate McMurray's  lawsuit against the company owned by the incumbent's family that the affair took on a new tone. Jacobs labeled it "ironic" that McMurray is suing Delaware North Cos. – the Democrat's former employer – two week before the election.

WASHINGTON – Democrat Nate McMurray entered the home stretch of his third congressional campaign with a financial edge over his opponent, Republican Rep. Chris Jacobs of Orchard Park.

But McMurray, a former Grand Island town supervisor, also leads all local congressional candidates in a more ignoble contest. He received more letters from the Federal Election Commission about sloppy campaign filings than any other candidate.

In August 2018, when local Republicans were scrambling to find a candidate to replace the newly indicted Rep. Chris Collins, then-State Sen. Chris Jacobs’ phone rang.

"My cousin called me and said: 'I think you should look at this,' " Jacobs, a Republican real estate developer who first explored a race for Congress a decade earlier, said Friday.

The race for Congress in the Southern Tier's 23rd District pits a self-styled Republican "problem solver" against a feisty Democratic opponent who sees the incumbent himself as a problem voters can solve – by throwing him out of office.

It's the second time Rep. Tom Reed of Corning will face off against Tracy Mitrano, a cybersecurity expert and former professor who lives in Penn Yan, in Yates County. And two years after Reed beat Mitrano by 8.4 points, there are signs that their rematch might be closer.

The global pandemic and its effect on New York State has emerged as a main issue in the race for the 59th State Senate District seat.

"Right now, coronavirus is everybody's concern and it overshadows everything," said Patrick M. Gallivan, the Republican incumbent from Elma. 

The race for the New York State Senate's 60th District seat – vacated when Republican Chris Jacobs was elected to Congress – is a key local race that pits veteran Democratic Assemblyman Sean Ryan against Joshua Mertzlufft, a Republican political newcomer.

This contest is being closely followed because it's one of a small number of seats statewide with the potential to transition from Republican to Democratic hands and give Democrats a veto-proof supermajority after Republicans lost the chamber in 2018. 

Edward A. Rath III touts his experience in the business world and on the Erie County Legislature in his race to replace retiring State Sen. Michael H. Ranzenhofer, a fellow Amherst Republican.

Jacqualine G. Berger points to her service on the Amherst Town Board and her years of work as an activist with local labor unions as she seeks to flip the seat to the Democrats, moving her party closer to a supermajority in the State Senate.

A Tonawanda Town Board member and a North Tonawanda alderman are vying to replace Assemblyman Robin L. Schimminger, the Kenmore Democrat retiring after 44 years in office.

For North Tonawanda Republican Robert Pecoraro, it's a rare opening for the GOP to win the 140th Assembly district. But Town of Tonawanda Democrat William C. Conrad III hopes to keep the seat in his party's hands.

In a race that pits a powerful Albany leader against a political newcomer, both candidates for the 141st Assembly District have a focus on aiding small businesses.

“Especially those minority- and women-owned businesses who've been hit hardest during these unprecedented times, and yet have received the least amount of financial support,” said incumbent Democrat Crystal D. Peoples-Stokes.

Assemblywoman Karen M. McMahon says being a Democrat gives her constituents a voice in the room where Albany's decisions are made.

Republican Robin L. Wolfgang likens McMahon's role in that room to "wallpaper."

Bail reform has been one of the most contentious issues in New York. The Covid-19 pandemic – and the state and national response to it – continues to be the biggest issue in the United States and will be for months or longer.

So it is no surprise that both issues would find their way to the campaigns of two people seeking to represent a part of Western New York in the state Legislature.

Frank C. Smierciak II, the 2020 challenger to Democratic incumbent Monica P. Wallace in the 143rd Assembly District, is echoing a familiar Republican refrain as he chastises his opponent for an "anti-police agenda."

Indeed, just about every Republican candidate for State Legislature this year lists as a priority rolling back new laws making it easier for those who have been arrested to be freed on bail. Smierciak is no exception.

The son of a longtime Common Council member is running for public office for the first time in a bid to succeed Assemblyman Sean Ryan in the 149th District against a Republican who lost handily when he ran for the seat in 2018.

Jonathan Rivera, 34, the son of Niagara Council Member David Rivera, calls himself ready and qualified for the job.

Voters don’t always get to elect their State Supreme Court judges. Often, a single candidate will be cross-endorsed by the major party bosses, stripping voters of the opportunity to choose. But that's not so with a race for a court vacancy this year.

Two men with well-known political names, but who have never before run for office, are competing in the Nov. 3 election to become the next Niagara County district attorney.

Brian D. Seaman, the son of a longtime municipal attorney and the nephew of a former assemblyman and judge, faces John D. Ceretto II, the son of a former assemblyman.

John D. Ceretto II, the Democratic candidate for Niagara County district attorney, was fired as an assistant district attorney the day after a friend from Lewiston called police to complain about what he was doing outside her apartment at 3:30 a.m. on a Sunday.

Ceretto told The Buffalo News on Thursday that he could not remember why he was fired.

Early balloting in Erie County surpassed its 2019 total in just two days as large numbers of voters again turned out Sunday.

A total of 13,262 ballots were cast Sunday for candidates in the Nov. 3 general election, Elections Commissioners Ralph M. Mohr and Jeremy J. Zellner reported.

Early voting is a hit, especially among Democrats.

As of 11 a.m. Wednesday, 70,016 Erie County residents had voted early at the county's 37 polling sites.

Early voting in New York State began Saturday and runs through Sunday, Nov. 1. 

Voters can vote early at any location within their own county. Masks are required. 

Don't expect a "Trump wins" or "Biden wins" headline on BuffaloNews.com Tuesday night. Or in the newspaper Wednesday morning.

It isn't that kind of election.