Poloncarz founds new national political action committee

Buffalo, N.Y. (WBEN) - Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz is branching out his efforts to support the future leaders of America with the founding of Boosting Future Leaders Onward (BFLO), a national political action committee focused on strengthening the pipeline of Democratic candidates running for local and county-level office across the country.

BFLO works to identify and support community-focused candidates who are committed to effective local government, public service and representing the people and communities they serve.

"Boosting Future Leaders Onward is a federal PAC that was created to assist local county candidates and others move forward," said Poloncarz in an interview with WBEN. "It is unlike a lot of the other political action committees that focus primarily on federal races. This focuses on local races, as well as county races, assisting candidates move and run in districts across the United States."

Earlier this week, Poloncarz - who also serves as Chair of the National Democratic County Officials (NDCO) - highlighted 38 endorsed Democratic candidates across 10 states who are working to bring new leadership, fresh perspectives and a commitment to public service to communities across the country. These candidates range from individuals running for governor, Congress, state legislatures, county executives, commissioners, and other local legislators and town officials.

"We need strong leaders, those who have a proven track record advancing, but we also need to support good first-time candidates that maybe are running at the local or county level, because we know the importance of local and county governments. They often get neglected, including by national political organizations, because it's not as sexy and as high-profile as a gubernatorial run or a Congressional run or Senate. But we've supported candidates across the board," Poloncarz said.

With his efforts to bring up BFLO, does that have any influence in his future in local, state or federal government himself?

"Right now, I'm just focused on finishing my year and a couple months left as county executive," Poloncarz acknowledged. "I wanted to get this organization up-and-running so that when I did leave, it could be in strong position and self-sustaining. I'm looking at my future as whatever may come will come, and we'll deal with that as as time goes by."

While BFLO is focused on supporting Democratic candidates running for various levels of office across the nation, Poloncarz says he will never shut the door on endorsing candidates with other political affiliations.

"We're going to support candidates that have the same ideals, the same belief in what government should be," he explained. "If there's Independent candidates or others, we might consider them. If a Republican stood for the same ideals as BFLO, they could potentially be considered. But as of now, we have not seen anyone apply or seek an endorsement that stands with our ideals. And I'm not certain a Republican would, if they truly believe what is the, sort of, MAGA Republican standards of today."