The boss of a New York-based sticker company, whose staunch support for Donald Trump prompted him to record a Maga-themed rap album and call for an extension of Mount Rushmore to add the president’s face, is running for Congress.

Anthony Constantino, who began a brief pro boxing career at age 40, is the Republican candidate for GOP congresswoman Elise Stefanik’s seat in New York’s 21st district.

While Trump won the district by 21 points in 2024, and it has been represented by a Republican in the US House of Representatives since 2015, the party’s lead appears to have dwindled significantly as Constantino, 43, campaigns for voters to send him to Washington.

His lead in recent polls has fallen to single digits; one survey earlier this month put him four points behind. In September, the Cook Partisan Voting Index shifted the race from solid Republican to likely Republican. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee added the district to its Red to Blue program in early October.

“I’m running for Congress. I built a company with over 1,000 people. Not an easy thing to do,” Constantino said, referring to his company, Sticker Mule. “I went pro in boxing at the age of 40. Not an easy thing to do.”

Mike Tyson “decided to endorse me”, he added in an interview, claiming the former boxing world champion had only endorsed four candidates. “It’s not easy to get endorsed by Mike Tyson.”

Most political candidates lay out their agenda in lengthy publications, or campaign speeches. In December 2025, Constantino released a 20-track album – titled Thank You President Trump – which praised the president’s alleged golfing prowess and described how the world purportedly loves him . It took two weeks to complete, according to a press release.

“I just realize it’s good to be different, first of all,” Constantino said of the album. “Secondly, some people like listening to speeches. Other people like listening to music. Not everybody in this country wants to listen to political speeches.”

In one song, Family Man, “I talked about the fact that President Trump built a great family”, he said. In another, Fight, “I talked about President Trump standing up after he got shot”, he added.

In another song, War, “I talked about how horrible war is, and how we want to stay away from war to how we want peace”, Constantino said. Trump launched a war with Iran in February, which he has struggled to end in recent months, as polling indicated its widespread unpopularity among Americans.

In Hole in One, Constantino talks up Trump’s golf game. “He shot multiple holes in one,” he said. “That’s not an easy thing to do. And I’m a person that believes if you can do one difficult thing, you can do another difficult thing.”

Far from simply praising the president, Constantino has also used his music to launched extraordinary – and, in some cases, xenophobic and racist – attacks on other politicians. In September 2025, he published a music video on WorldStarHipHop criticizing the New York City mayor, Zohran Mamdani, rapping: “First off, fuck you, bitch. I see through your game. You ain’t from here. You’re from Uganda, where your friends kill gays.”

Constantino has also called Mamdani a “wannabe terrorist” and in 2025 offered to pay 10 people $500 each if they told the mayor that Constantino “says his terrorist-loving Daddy is a coward who hides behind his weak little boy”.

His brash rhetoric has also upset fellow Republicans, triggering several acrimonious legal battles.

Blake Gendebien, a dairy farmer in Lisbon, New York, and the Democratic candidate in the race for New York’s 21st district, is in no doubt of the primary issue affecting residents.

“For the past nearly 22 months, we’ve been crisscrossing the district, and lowering costs is the number one issue,” he said in an interview. “Inflation is outpacing our veterans and our seniors in New York’s 21st district. It’s time that we had a congressperson from rural America who really understands what it’s like, because as a farmer, I can’t ignore the prices of diesel fuel, gasoline, fertilizer and food. We go through it as well.”

The 21st congressional district has one of the largest populations of veterans in New York, and the largest population of seniors in the state. Fort Drum, a US army base with more than 17,000 military and civilian employees, is the largest single-site employer in the district.

Gendebien criticized Trump’s war in Iran, its impact on gas prices and the lack of congressional approval for the president’s military actions.

“One in three households in this district are union households,” Gendebien said, claiming Constantino had previously backed campaigns which would “destroy unions”.

“I am not a fan of unionization,” Constantino told the Watertown Daily Times in January 2026. “I want to support our law enforcement 100%, but as a CEO, unions are a barrier between management and the workers.”

Gendebien criticized Constantino’s views on labor, and wealthy background, as out of step with the district’s constituents, whose median household income is about $70,000 annually, below the national average.

“These aren’t reflections of how we live in the North Country, and he’s on a $16m vacation through the district because he’s trying to buy himself the seat. That’s not how we live up here,” added Gendebien. “Nobody knows anybody that can put that kind of money into a congressional seat.

“We’re just trying to make decisions on food or fuel, we’re trying to figure out how to keep our small businesses open, how to keep our school systems viable, how to save our rural healthcare. So he’s not a great fit for the district.”

Constantino was born into a wealthy family in Amsterdam, New York, a neighboring congressional district, although he now lives in Edinburg, New York, in the 21st congressional district. He was previously registered as a Democrat, which Constantino told the Glens Falls Chronicle was only due to supporting a friend’s bid for Albany’s mayoral seat in 2017.

His father, who passed away from cancer when Constantino was six years old, invented the car litter bag in the 1950s. After attending the Albany Academy, a private school where tuition for high school is currently $28,760, he attended the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and earned enough credits to be considered an alumnus, though he never completed a degree; Constantino claimed this was due to financial issues with the family company, Noteworthy, that he had to leave school to address while his mother ran the company.

Asked what he would do to help New Yorkers struggling to make ends meet, Constantino cited “Operation Overhaul”, his proposal to upgrade software across government and tackle “hidden costs” affecting Americans.

“One thing that I do that requires no legislation, I’m uniquely qualified to do, is just be a champion for creating jobs,” he said. “More than anything, the biggest hidden cost in New York state is the fact that people are leaving.”

New York state’s population hit a record in April 2020, with more than 20.2 million people, but dropped by hundreds of thousands during the Covid-19 pandemic. It has slightly rebounded, but remains down more than 200,000 from the 2020 census count.

“I also want to do other sensible things – a lot of other sensible things, too – but the big ones [are that] we got to inspire people to come back, fight for funding for the district for things that make sense like rural healthcare, Operation Overhaul to update all of our government systems, keep the border secure because there’s a hidden cost when illegal immigrants cross the border illegally,” he said. “There’s a hidden cost to crime. There’s hidden cost of people leaving, and I want to address all those things in Congress.”

Constantino’s claim of being a “champion” of job creation has invited scrutiny. As of September 2025, according to a company filings, Sticker Mule employed 446 full-time employees at two sites in Amsterdam, New York – down from 610 full-time employees in November 2024.

Sticker Mule – which claims to employ about 1,200 employees globally, with production in Amsterdam, New York; Pisa, Italy; and Gaffney, South Carolina – laid off 68 employees from its Amsterdam facility in April 2025, citing automation and robots in Italy. “The best way to keep manufacturing in the USA is to automate, automate, automate to do more with fewer people and offer higher wages,” Sticker Mule said in a statement defending the layoffs.

When asked about the layoffs, Constantino cited a recent economic impact report commissioned by Sticker Mule which claimed that, from 2016 to 2025, it generated an estimated $2.7bn in economic impact and supported 9,500 jobs in New York.

“After I endorsed President Trump, I endured a massive boycott, and my sales declined,” said Constantino, who claimed that sales are rebounding. “We’re hiring again, and wages are going up because of automation.”

Gendebien has not been spared his attacks. Constantino accused his opponent of illegally dumping tires, deceased cattle and debris at a site in the district they are contesting. Gendebien’s campaign says the alleged dumping did not take place on his property.

Constantino has largely self-funded his congressional campaign with $16m. “We want successful people in general getting involved in politics because who became successful in business or in sports or in whatever, it shows that you’re pretty sharp and you’re a good thinker and you can get things done,” Constantino argued.

“It’s not easy to become Mike Tyson,” added Constantino. “It’s not easy to become [wrestler] Henry Cejudo, a friend of mine.”

As he pushes for election to Washington, where do the businessman’s ambitions end?

In another song on his hip-hop album, titled Trump, Constantino claims that people across the world adore his political idol. “You know North Koreans, they love Donald Donald Trump / South Koreans, too, they love Donald Donald Trump,” he raps. “I forgot Japan / They love Donald Donald Trump.”

“As somebody that ran a global company, I travel a lot,” he explained in an interview. “I speak multiple languages. I know people all over the world, and I wanted people to understand that President Trump is actually liked all over the world. I just tried to educate people about that fact just to reduce the hatred. I think we should argue over ideas and not hate. We should try to stay away from having such strong animosity towards each other.”

But another line in the song highlights another aspiration.

“Man, I gotta say, I love Donald Donald Trump,” he raps. “Might be president one day, just like Donald Donald Trump.”