Matt Castelli and Matt Putorti are Democrats running to take on Rep. Elise Stefanik in the 21st Congressional District.

Castelli lives in Glens Falls and is a former CIA officer and director for counterterrorism at the National Security Council, serving during the Obama and Trump White Houses.

He said he’s running because he wants to help veterans and was upset by the events on January 6, as well as Stefanik’s response to it.

“Country before party is something that I learned throughout my career in public service," Castelli said. "That’s also our campaign mantra. It’s my lived experience, but it’s also something very important to us about what we really need. We deserve a representative who is going to put country before party.”

Putorti is from Whitehall. His family still runs a grocery store there his great-grandmother opened in 1927.

Putorti said he volunteered in Sudan and served in Americorps before becoming a lawyer. Now, he wants to stand up for his area as he feels representation is currently lacking.

“I decided to enter the congressional race over a year ago and do everything I can to restore honorable leadership to this district, and bring somebody into this district to represent it who can really advocate for the people here,” said Putorti.

Both candidates acknowledge the geographical enormity of the 21st District and feel confident they can listen to and stand-up for the wants and needs of the people in it.

However, their approaches are different. Castelli said he’s more of a moderate, while Putorti said he’s pragmatic.

“Supporting efforts to reduce living costs, protecting individual rights, combatting climate change, banning assault weapons. These are all things that I know that we can do, and that are pragmatic solutions to some of the issues,” said Putorti.

“Someone who’s gonna be right in the middle, that’s exactly the way we’re gonna represent, is to build a coalition, not just of Democrats, but those independents and Republicans as well. And in pursuit of this, we have a vehicle to help that. We were able to successfully establish an independent line on the ballot for November called the Moderate Party," Castelli said.

Both candidates support the right to abortion.

They also discussed the Second Amendment.

“I think there are opportunities for us to build a coalition of lawful gun owners, those of us who support the Second Amendment and those who want to keep their kids and communities safe by coming together and keeping firearms out of the hands of somebody who’s going to do themselves or others harm,” Castelli said.

“It is about taking common sense measures to keep our communities safe. Things like universal background checks, red flag laws, closing the gun show loophole and as I said, federal assault weapons, ban them. I’m the only candidate who is speaking out about that,” Putorti said.

The Republican candidate for the 21st Congressional District is incumbent Elise Stefanik.