Bill Cotter, known as Barstool Sport‘s “Billy Football,” announced his bid in March to run as a Republican for New York‘s 3rd Congressional District, previously held by expelled Republican Rep. George Santos, but now the congressional candidate is taking on his own party.
The 25-year-old called out Nassau County GOP Chairman Joe Cairo and his primary opponent Mike LiPetri in a press conference Monday night, making claims that they were attempting to “remove every other Republican candidate in this race from the primary ballot.”
“In this race, there is a coordinated, intentional effort to remove every candidate from the ballot except one. Again, we do not know if the Nassau GOP, Joe Cairo, or Mike LiPetri are the agents behind this,” Cotter said, standing in front of the the Nassau Republican Party headquarters in Westbury, New York.
He added, “However, we do know that these onerous, restrictive ballot access rules are being used in New York’s 3rd Congressional District, right now, in this race, to prevent the Republican primary.”
Cotter explained that every candidate in the race had submitted more than the minimum number of signatures required to be on the ballot but suspiciously, all of the Republican primary challengers to LiPetri are having their signatures challenged.
He questioned how there were two signature challengers that used identical challenge forms, the same notary for the challenge forms, and are submitting identical lists of challenged signatures for each candidate.
The former All-State football player acknowledged that New York has “onerous ballot access rules” and “challenging ballot access signatures” are par for the course in the state.
“Nothing being done is illegal, but just because something is legal doesn’t mean it’s right,” Cotter said.
He continued, “This use of the rules is going to kill competition and prevent a lively, spirited contest for the Republican nomination. It is going to cause Republicans in New York’s 3rd District to be disenfranchised by making the Republican nomination a selection rather than an election.”
The Barstools Sports star said the primary is key to helping the chances of Republicans being elected in November.
“Utilizing procedural tricks to knock all but one candidate off the ballot represents corruption of the worst kind,” he said. “The Democratic Party has been engaging in a sustained effort to keep President Trump off the ballot in November, and this effort is no different.”
“If the Nassau GOP, Joe Cairo, or Mike LiPetri are, in fact, behind this effort, we call on them to end it by having these two individuals withdraw their challenges,” Cotter said in his press conference.
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Rep. Santos previously held the seat until he was ousted from Congress in December 2023. Cotter is competing against challengers Michael LiPetri Jr, Michael Mandel, and Jim Toes in the Republican primary scheduled on June 25, 2024.
He famously knocked out former Major League Baseball slugger Jose Canseco in less than 20 seconds and walked away with $50,000 in prize money during a fight at Barstool Sports’s Rough N’ Rowdy PPV. The political upstart said he used his prize money to launch his campaign for Congress. He is a self-proclaimed “fifth generation New Yorker” and a “proud conservative” on his campaign website.
