Editor’s note: This story has been updated to clarify that Stefanik’s interview with Fox News Sunday took place in May.
This is part of The Hill’s ongoing series examining Donald Trump’s possible vice presidential nominees.
Member of Parliament Elise Stefanik (RN.Y.) has steadily increased She was a Republican for years, but it was only a impromptu question about anti-Semitism on college campuses that caused her public reputation to skyrocket.
“It wasn’t a prepared question,” Stefanik said in an interview with The Hill last month. “I wrote it out in pencil five minutes beforehand.”
As chair of the Republican Conference, Stefanik is one of the most influential women in her party and one of only a tiny a handful of female candidates on the list of former Presidents Trump potential running mates.
Although she has been considered a rising star of the Republican Party for a decade, the New York congresswoman’s popularity has increased considerably in the last two years.
In particular, Stefanik made headlines with her interrogation of university presidents in the wake of the October 7 Hamas attacks in Israel.
In December, she attended a hearing of the House Committee on Education and Workforce on the issue of anti-Semitism, which had flared up in the wake of the attacks.
Towards the end of the hearing, a junior member gave Stefanik the floor, leading to one of the most widely watched exchanges in the history of congressional hearings.
“Does calling for genocide against the Jews violate Harvard’s rules on bullying and harassment?” Stefanik asked the presidents of Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Pennsylvania.
The three presidents did not give direct answers, leading to widespread condemnation from both sides of the aisle.
Stefanik said she was shocked by the reactions of university presidents.
The reaction led to the resignation of the presidents of Harvard and Pennsylvania, but it also catapulted Stefanik, who had long been considered a rising star of the Republican Party, even further into the spotlight. There was also speculation that she could be Trump’s candidate for vice president in November.
Since then, Stefanik has made efforts to augment her visibility worldwide and nationally.
In May, she became the highest-ranking Republican in the House of Representatives to speak before the Knesset since the October 7 attacks in Israel. In her speech, Stefanik criticized the Biden administration’s Israel policy, prompting the White House to respond to the Republican’s comments.
The House Republican has also made it her mission to augment the number of Republican women in Congress, founding the Elevate PAC, or E-PAC, in 2018. That same year, she made headlines when she tweeted, “I did not ask permission,” in response to criticism from then-National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman-elect Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) of her calls to enter the primaries to aid more Republican women get elected.
Stefanik has steadily gained popularity in the House Republican Conference since he was elected as the youngest candidate to Congress in 2014.
After graduating from Harvard in 2006, Stefanik immersed herself in politics, serving in the administration of former President George W. Bush. She supported the Republican presidential nomination in 2012 and played a leading role in grooming then-Republican presidential candidate Paul Ryan (R-Wis.).
A year later, Stefanik ran for office in New York’s 21st congressional district. Stefanik ultimately won, flipping the district and becoming the first Republican to win the seat in 21 years. Her victory was part of a Republican wave across the country.
“She had to make this solid Republican territory,” said Ed Cox, chairman of the New York Republican Party. “She had to have the political guts to do it from the start, and she had them.”
The rural district in upstate New York includes Plattsburgh and Glens Falls and stretches to the borders of Vermont and Canada. The district has swung between both parties during presidential elections. Former President Clinton won the district twice, while Bush won it in 2000 and 2004. Former President Obama flipped the district in 2008 and won it in his 2012 re-election bid, but Trump flipped it back in 2016 and won it again in 2020.
Stefanik said she first noticed a change within the Republican Party during the 2014 midterm elections.
“If you look at the campaign I ran in 2014, that was the beginning of the huge shift that took place within the Republican Party under President Trump’s leadership,” she said. “We were able to win over those blue-collar, Second Amendment voters where today’s radical, socialist Democratic Party – particularly in New York State, based in New York City – has left them behind.”
Stefanik has emerged as one of Trump’s most vocal supporters on Capitol Hill. She was one of Trump’s other vice presidential nominees at the RNC’s spring meeting at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida earlier this month. The former president According to reports, high of Stefanik and the prospect of her becoming a running mate at a private dinner at Mar-a-Lago slow last year, saying – approvingly – that “she’s a killer.”
Stefanik says she feels “honored” to have her name mentioned in discussions about Trump’s running mate, but her main focus is to vote Republican on every ballot.
“I think there are numerous opportunities for many Republicans to make sure we work together as a team to win the presidency by electing Trump, flipping the Senate and winning seats in the House,” she said.
But it’s the same praise Stefanik and Trump have for each other that has drawn criticism from those who say she sold out to the former president. On May 19, “Fox News Sunday” anchor Shannon Bream cited a 2022 New York Times report that included years of anecdotes about comments Stefanik allegedly made against Trump. Stefanik contradicted Bream, calling the quotes “false smears” and saying it was a “disgrace” that the anchor cited the report.
The chair was also criticized for saying she would not have allowed the certification of the 2020 presidential election results if she had held the position of former Vice President Mike Pence. She voted against certifying the 2020 election results in Pennsylvania, but voted to certify the election in Arizona.
“These journalists who are writing this should actually take the time to talk to voters in my district who know that I have represented my district from day one,” Stefanik told The Hill when asked about the criticism she has faced for her support of the former president ahead of Sunday’s Fox News interview.
Like most lawmakers, Stefanik emphasizes that her constituency sets her Congress’ agenda. The district where Fort Drum is located has a enormous military population, leading Stefanik to focus on national security issues.
“What happens in this district, in the North Country, has a bigger impact on the world than many people realize,” said a Republican aide familiar with Stefanik’s work.
In addition to serving on the House Education and Workforce Committee, Stefanik is also a member of the Armed Services Committee and the Intelligence Committee.
Stefanik has focused her committee work on missile defense, up-to-date technologies and countering Chinese government influence. She and her allies have praised her efforts to spare Fort Drum from cuts in 2015 and her participation in a years-long effort to build a missile defense system at the base.
She also touts her early work in artificial intelligence research, introducing legislation in 2018 that helped create the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence. Stefanik has also looked at quantum information science work being done in her district at the Air Force Research Labs in Rome, NY.
In May, Stefanik led a group of Republican lawmakers that introduced a bill to augment tariffs on Chinese-made drone manufacturers, including DJI.
“I’m fighting to ensure our district has a seat at the highest level,” Stefanik said. “President Trump respects that fight and respects that strength.”
The New York congresswoman spoke proudly of a moment in 2018 when Trump visited Fort Drum to sign the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2019.
“This was really the first high-profile experience President Trump and I had on national security issues,” she said, referring to the 2018 signing. “He pointed out two weekends ago at Mar-a-Lago that this was an important moment not only for his record, but especially for my district.”
“No district tells the story of the Republican Party today better than New York’s 21st Congressional District,” she said.
