TROY – Many strategies came into play in the boisterous race for Troy mayor, capped by Tuesday's victory by incumbent Patrick Madden — including timing and political perceptions.

Republicans didn’t consider backing Democrat Rodney Wiltshire against Democrat Madden until June -- long after they'd decided to go with one of their own party members to challenge the incumbent.

In a city where Democrats have a 3-1 majority over Republicans, Wiltshire said Wednesday the Republican endorsement would have been a detriment while competing in the Democratic primary against Madden.

“Having that would have been a problem to have to explain I wasn’t a Republican. It’s not a Republican city,” Wiltshire said.

Madden, running as the Democratic-Working Families Party candidate, defeated Wiltshire, who appeared on the Green and Independence line, and Republican-Conservative candidate Thomas Reale to win re-election to a second four-year term, according to unofficial results.

The whole issue of Republicans supporting Wiltshire burst into view during the final month of the campaign when Republican County Executive Steve McLaughlin and GOP operatives tried to force Reale out of the race and to endorse Wiltshire.

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A secret audio recording of the Oct. 7 meeting with McLaughlin, his staffers and political operatives Richard Crist and Jim Gordon, and former U.S. Rep. John Sweeney and Reale proved disturbing to many local voters who heard it. McLaughlin, Crist and Gordon used profane language and made political threats against Reale, who described the meeting as bullying.

Reale suspended his campaign, but without endorsing Wiltshire. A week before the election, Reale announced he was back in the race and condemned McLaughlin for his actions.

McLaughlin’s intervention into city GOP politics didn’t make sense, according to long-time city Republicans, who asked not to be identified for fear of retribution. Democrats and Republican have speculated that it was done to ward off a challenge by Madden for county executive in 2021.

Wiltshire described Reale’s actions as a “spectacle” and if he cared about the city he would have stayed out of the race at the end.

Reale said he stuck to his principles in deciding to return to the race and talk about what happened.

“I didn’t sit myself down in that meeting to be berated for 45 minutes. I did what I could with what I had,” Reale said.

Democrats don’t see how overt Republican support from the beginning would have helped Wiltshire to defeat Madden.

“I don’t believe that you can take all the Republican voters and give them to one candidate or another. Part of Rodney’s base would have been upset,” said Mark Streb, the mayor’s campaign manager for his two successful runs for office.

Madden couldn’t be reached for comment Wednesday.

City Democratic Chairman Gary Galuski said the 2015 and 2019 results were very similar, except for Wiltshire moving up to second from third when the Republican leadership backed away from Reale.

“They threw (Reale) to the wolves,” Galuski said.

Reale was brought into city politics by City Council President Carmella Mantello.

“I though Tom was great, a perfect candidate for District 3. They wanted him for mayor,” said Mantello, who was re-elected Tuesday.

Reale began losing support in June. Then Wiltshire defeated him 218 to 85 in the Independence primary. The Independence line typically goes to the Republican candidate and is considered essential for collecting support to offset the Democrats’ enrollment advantage.

At the same time, Madden beat Wiltshire in the Democratic primary 1,023 to 778, a larger margin than in 2015 when it was a three-way race in which Wiltshire received nearly the same number of votes: 776. But Wiltshire won the Green primary, defeating Madden, 30 to 12.

City Republican Chairman Mark Wojcik didn’t respond to a request for comment about why the party didn’t opt for Wiltshire at the beginning. Gordon, described by Republicans as pushing the party to back Wiltshire, also didn’t respond for a request for comment.

Tuesday's result showed Madden won with 3,627 votes to Wiltshire’s 3,122 and Reale’s 1,455.

Wiltshire said he was disappointed by the returns Tuesday night. He expected it to be closer with the final outcome determined by the still-to-be counted absentee ballots. About 447 out of 692 absentee ballots have been returned to the county Board of Elections. The Republicans are considered to be more adept at turning out absentee ballot voters. The Democrats didn’t want the race to go to the absentee count.

Under the city charter, Madden can’t run for a third term. Galuski said there is speculation that Madden would run for county executive. The mayor, however, has said he doesn’t intend to run for the county post. The county Democratic leadership has expressed interest in finding a candidate from a suburban town to run against McLaughlin to emulate the successful campaigns of District Attorney Mary Pat Donnelly of East Greenbush and County Court Judge Jennifer Sober of Schodack.

Mantello also can’t run for re-election as council president as she will reach the eight-year maximum in the office in 2024. There’s been speculation that it would be a Mantello-Wiltshire contest for mayor in 2023. Mantello won’t discuss running for the office, which she is known to want to win. Wiltshire said he doesn’t intend to run, but he said the same thing before running this year.

Reale said he would like to stay involved. “I love my city,” he said, “that’s why I ran.”