Life-long Republican Lorraine Pace, a battler for Breast Cancer survivors, endorsed Dem.Congressional Candidate Pat Halpin (2nd CD) ; It’s NY’s answer to the Bushes backing Dem. James Talarico (Tex).
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(Lorraine Pace, a long-time Long Island Republican and Breast Cancer survivor, who started the Breast Cancer Mapping Project in New York State, and was instumental in creating the Breast Cancer Center at SUNY StonyBrook Medical Center, (pictured, left) throws her strong support behind Democratic Congressional Candidate Pat Halpin, (pictured right with Congressman Jamie Raskin), in what may be the single most important Congressional Race in the nation in 2026, against the incumbent GOP Chair of the Homeland Security Committee, who approved ALL ICE funding, and gutted federal funding for Breast Cancer Research, treatment and care.)
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(Please click on the link below to play the video of Lorraine Pace’s endorsement of Pat Halpin for Congress)
Patrick Halpin (D-2nd CD) has picked up some pretty high profile endorsements lately—one from Congressman Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee; and another, from Connecticut Democratic Senator Chris Murphy, elected at age 39 to the US.Senate in 2012, by defeating Donald Trump’s Education Secretary, and former Worldwide Wrestling Federation flack, Linda McMahon.
However, this weekend, heading into the final week of the November election that may determine which life & death policies control the House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate, Halpin— a Democrat, and the youngest person ever elected Suffolk County Executive nearly 40 years ago, received, what may turn out to be, an even more important endorsement: from Long Island life-long Republican and national breast cancer health advocate Lorraine Pace, who has already changed American healthcare history once in her 85 years of life. Together, Pace & Halpin are poised to do it again.
Jamie Raskin may be the next Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee if the Democrats take control of the House and a leader of one of the impeachment efforts against Trump; and Chris Murphy may be one of a handful of Democratic Senators being talked about as a possible presidential candidate in 2028, but neither one of these rising political stars is Lorraine Pace, who speaks the language Long Islanders clearly understand—especially Long Island’s women and anyone denied medical care.
Halfway through her eighth decade of life and still fighting for the rights of Breast Cancer survivors and Breast Cancer research, treatment and care some 34 years after her own original diagnosis, Lorraine Pace’s passion, organizational ability and indefatigable will to live and fight, should never be understimated.
“I’m living proof that early detection for Breast Cancer saves and prolongs lives,” Lorraine told me in a telephone interview just minutes after her incredibly powerful video endorsement of Democrat Patrick Halpin (CD-2, Long Island) started playing all over social media.
Poetically, the video is shot at the kitchen table in Lorraine Pace’s West Islip, Long Island home overlooking the Great South Bay—the very spot where she headed a movement of thousands of Long Island women to begin mapping the frequency of Breast Cancer cases, at a time when Insurance companies were denying basic coverage to women with such a diagnosis.
As real and passionate on camera as she is in person, Lorraine speaks directly into the camera and does not flinch:
“My name is Lorraine Pace. I’m a life-long Republican who grew up in West Islip since I was a teenager, and for more than 30 years I’ve devoted myself in the fight against breast cancer. When I was diagnosed with Cancer, I was angry and wanted answers, so our grassroots organization of volunteers started mapping Breast Cancer patients right here in West Islip, going door-to-door and eventually surveying thousands of home.”
That first paragraph, backed with lots of history and information, doesn’t do justice to Lorraine Pace’s contributions to the fight against Breast Cancer, at a time when women were denied health insurance if they had a diagnosis of Breast Cancer. Yes, that really happened.
I first met Lorraine Pace—a 1959 graduate of West Islip High School— at a community meeting when I was working with Governor Mario Cuomo. This determined, fearless woman—who spoke in an urgent and distinctive Long Island accent—seized the microphone and unveiled a meticulously detailed map of breast cancer cases on the South Shore of Long Island. The entire room of hundreds of people went completely silent.
Pace’s presentation was electrifying, commanding the Governor’s attention, and securing a front page story in Long Island’s Newsday, changing the course of how Breast Cancer was researched and treated in New York State, and across the country. Just think about that for a moment: this one unstoppable advocate—working in concert with thousands of others—saved and enhanced the lives of millions of women across the country.
From the beginning, Lorraine Pace—with the full backing of her husband John—a kind, loving, compassionate man from a politically powerful Long Island Republican family, was proud of the love of his life even if some of his fellow Republicans were made uncomfortable by her no-holds barred advocacy. To Lorraine, politics was a means to get things done for people. She was totally focused on working with public officials of all backgrounds to help Breast Cancer patients. She underscored that truth in her Congressional endorsement of Patrick Halpin, who grew up in neighboring West Babylon, and represented Lorraine Pace and the entire Pace family in the County and State legislatures for years.
“I’m a Republican, but this election I’m putting facts and morality before party loyalty. Cancer doesn’t care if you’re a Republican or Democrat, and surviving it shouldn’t mean losing your home, draining your savings, or going bankrupt. That’s why I’m supporting Pat Halpin for Congress. I’ve known Pat for years, and I know he cares deeply about people—but just as importantly, I know he’ll fight for us when it matters most,”
People familiar with the political history of Long Island and New York State know what a huge deal it is for an articulate, respected & well-connected member of a leading Republican family to strongly support a Democratic candidate for Congress in a crucial race that can, potentially, flip control of the House of Representatives from Trump-owned Republicans to Democrats, and unseat the GOP Chair of the House Homeland Security Committee, Andrew Garbarino, who has voted unquestioningly for every single cent of ICE funding, and repeatedly voted to rescind funding for Breast Cancer research and treatment and for the National Institutes of Health—gutting Lorraine Pace’s life’s work.
For New Yorkers & Long Islanders, it’s the equivalent of the Bush Family endorsing the outstanding Democrat James Talarico for the US Senate Seat in Texas over a terrible GOP candidate who has abandoned the people of his State. For Long Islanders, Garbarino IS Ken Paxton.
In her usual direct fashion, Lorraine Pace pulls no punches in why she is giving Pat Halpin her enthusiastic endorsement:
“When I saw Andrew Garbarino (the incumbent Congressman) vote for a bill that guts health care and medical research in New York, I was appalled. That betrayal attacked our South Shore (of Long Island) environment and are just some of the reasons I’m supporting Pat Halpin…That Big Ugly Bill cut Medicaid and Medicare and the Affordable Care Act coverage, and put enormous financial pressure on hospitals right here on Long Island…”
Lorraine Pace has lived what she talks about.
Three decades ago, I hired her as the very first Breast Cancer Health Specialist for the State University Medical Center Hospital at Stony Brook. We made an incredibly effective bi-partisan team for public health: Lorraine advocated our medical & health care positions to Republican members of the State Legislature and to US Republican Senator Senator Al D’amato; and, I called upon Democrats at all levels of government with whom we had worked in the Administration of Mario M. Cuomo on a wide range of issues. Together, we worked with Breast Cancer researchers and surgeons at SUNY Stony Brook to secure a $10 million Breast Cancer research grant from the National Institutes of Health—one of the biggest NIH grants for breast cancer ever secured by a public health institution at that time. It would not have happened without Lorraine Pace’s activism.
Patrick Halpin was once the youngest person to ever be elected Suffolk County Executive at 34 years old, when he broke new ground in environmental protection, launched an anti-domestic violence initiative and started an innovative Drug Education program called DARE. Now at 73, Halpin is poised to become the oldest “newly-elected” Member of Congress in Long Island’s history bringing with him a wealth of public & private sector experience, and an impeccable reputation for honesty and humanity.
It took someone of Pat Halpin’s high calibre and integrity—with experience in State and local government, and as the CEO of two major organizations, the Suffolk County Water Authority and the non-profit Institute for Student Achievement—to bring the 85-year old unbowed leadership of Lorraine Pace back full-force into the life and death struggle for restoring health care and medical research for tens of thousands of their neighbors, many of whom Lorraine Pace and Pat Halpin grew up with on the South Shore of Long Island.
The perfect circle of this moment, as Long Island singer/songer Harry Chapin would describe it, is that these two, down-to-earth kids from West Islip and West Babylon, from different political parties and backgrounds, in their seventh and eighth decades on this earth, have come together for the common good of restoring health care and life-saving medical research for tens of millions of people across this country.
And, they just might save American democracy in the process.