Republicans Tap Israeli Military Veteran to Run for Santos’s Seat

Republicans battling to hold onto the New York House seat vacated by George Santos chose on Thursday another relatively unknown candidate with a remarkable biography but a thin political résumé to run in a special election next year, according to two party officials briefed on the decision.

After extensive vetting, Republican leaders selected Mazi Melesa Pilip, a local legislator who was born in Ethiopia, served as a paratrooper in the Israel Defense Forces and ran for office for the first time in 2021 vowing to fight antisemitism.

The selection was a bold gamble by Long Island Republicans, a group better known for nominating older, white establishment figures. Republicans believe Ms. Pilip, a 44-year-old mother of seven, has the potential to become a breakout national star before the Feb. 13 special election, particularly at a moment when Israel’s war with Hamas is reordering American political alliances.

Ms. Pilip, however, lacks many of the credentials typically prized in a competitive congressional race. She has almost no experience raising money, lacks relationships with key party figures outside her affluent New York City suburb and has never faced the kind of scrutiny that comes with being a candidate for high office.

In fact, beyond fierce advocacy for Israel and support for the police, she has taken no known public opinions on major issues that have shaped recent House contests. That includes abortion rights, gun laws and the criminal charges against former President Donald J. Trump.

A panel of Republicans from Queens and Nassau Counties voted to nominate Ms. Pilip from among more than 20 candidates in a secret meeting on Thursday morning, the party officials said. They were not authorized to discuss it publicly and a spokesman for the Nassau County Republican chairman declined to confirm the pick.

Ms. Pilip could not immediately be reached for comment.

Republicans were expected to introduce Ms. Pilip publicly at a rally on Friday in Massapequa. The announcement will come two weeks after the House voted to expel Mr. Santos, a Republican, over damning findings that he fabricated his life story and defrauded campaign donors.

Analysts have called the race a tossup.

Ms. Pilip’s relative anonymity stands in sharp contrast with her Democratic opponent, Tom Suozzi. A former congressman, Nassau County executive and candidate for governor, Mr. Suozzi has been a fixture in Long Island politics since the 1990s, accumulating a lengthy voting record. He even once held the House seat they are competing for.

The two candidates do have at least one thing in common: They are both registered Democrats. Republicans who have supported Ms. Pilip twice in elections for a Nassau County Legislature seat representing Great Neck and Manhasset said they were fully aware that she maintained that registration, but that they had concluded her values better aligned with their party.

The decision, steered by the chairmen of the Queens and Nassau County Republican parties, bypassed several potential nominees who had declared their intent to run for the seat well before Mr. Santos’s expulsion. Ms. Pilip has not publicly entered the race.

Local Republicans subjected several potential nominees, including Ms. Pilip, to extensive vetting. Party leaders said they had increased the scrutiny they put on a potential nominee, even using outside research firms, to avoid backing another nominee like Mr. Santos, whose egregious lies went undetected by Republicans for years.

Other finalists for the nomination to replace him included Mike Sapraicone, a wealthy former New York Police Department detective who owns a private security business; Daniel Norber, a moving company executive who also served in the Israeli military; Michael LiPetri, a former state assemblyman; and Kellen Curry, an Air Force veteran and banker.

Democrats nominated Mr. Suozzi last week, and he has wasted little time trying to claim the race’s middle lane. He formally launched his campaign last Saturday in Levittown in the front yard of a former New York Police Department officer who said Mr. Suozzi was the only Democrat he would ever support.

Flanked by dozens of supporters, Mr. Suozzi vowed to campaign against what he labeled threats to the suburban American dream: a growing affordability crisis, climate change, dysfunction in Washington and the influx of migrants across the southern border.

“I’m a Democrat, and I’ll always be a Democrat,” he said, adding, “But I will work with anybody who wants to work together to actually solve the problems that people face.”

It is a familiar posture for Mr. Suozzi, who over three decades won races for mayor, Nassau County executive and Congress by running as an outspoken moderate, sometimes at odds with his own party.

Kirsten Noyes contributed research.