Suffolk County Conservative Chairman Ed Walsh announced today that he’s endorsing businessman Randy Altschuler to challenge Democratic Rep. Tim Bishop in NY-1, setting up a potential three-way fight in the Long Island district.

After screening five GOP contenders, Walsh said he now plans to recommend Altschuler to the party’s executive committee as the only candidate for consideration to receive Row D.

In a press release, Walsh praised Altschuler, saying his “life experience coupled with his business skill set, understanding of the issues and firm belief in conservative principles makes him uniquely qualified to be our standard bearer, and the man who will defeat Tim Bishop.”

“Randy knows that cutting taxes and spending, and shrinking the deficit is the right thing for Suffolk County and the right thing for America,” Walsh continued.

“In the weeks and months ahead, we plan to work with Randy Altschuler to unite Conservatives, Republicans and independents so as a team we can defeat Tim Bishop.”

That unity thing might be a little difficult to accomplish, since Suffolk County GOP Chairman John Jay LaValle is no longer an Altschuler supporter.

LaValle initially backed Altschuler, but then had a very public falling out with him that was caused, according to the chairman, by his discovery that Altschuler used to be a Green Party member and had outsourced jobs overseas through his business.

LaValle is now supporting Altschuler’s primary rival Chris Cox, who is the son of state GOP Chairman Ed Cox.

A number of people, including state Conservative Party Chairman Mike Long, who is supporting Rick Lazio for governor, suggested there might be a deal between Ed Cox and LaValle that involved agreement to back Lazio’s primary opponent, Suffolk County Executive Steve Levy, but both chairs deny that.

Now, it appears the Conservatives and the Republicans are going to be at odds in this race, too. And that’s good news for Bishop – assuming this situation holds – since it will force right-leaning voters to split their support in a district that is already dominated by Democrats.

A similar situation happened in NY-23, where the Conservatives decided to back Doug Hoffman over his more moderate fellow Republican, Assemblywoman Dede Scozzafava. She ended up dropping out of the race and endorsing the Democrat, Bill Owens, but her name remained on the ballot.

Owens won that special election. Hoffman is running again in NY-23 with Conservative support, but he’s being challenged for the Republican line by Matt Doheny, who has been gaining support among local GOP leaders.

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