Immigration and abortion are listed as top concerns by voters and
have dominated the sparring between candidates, including at the first
and only debate of the race last Thursday night. The election will test
whether the now dead-on-arrival border package legislation in Washington
will backfire against Republicans, as national Democrats hope, and how
much staying power abortion still has for voters in a blue state.
Even in a tough swing district, you’d expect the Democratic candidate
to trounce the opponent after the scorched rubble left by Santos’s
disastrous ten months in office. Yet despite vastly outspending his
opponent nearly 3-to-1, Suozzi’s margins in recent polling are razor-thin, with some pollsters designating the race a toss-up. The most recent public poll from Emerson College has Suozzi up 50-47.
More from Luke Goldstein
The special election will put the New York Democratic Party under
scrutiny after underperforming the rest of the country with a series of
defeats in the 2022 midterms. State party chair Jay Jacobs is a close
ally of Suozzi and a longtime chair of the Nassau County Democratic
Party, the home of the NY-03 district. Jacobs has fashioned a “Long
Island strategy” that’s shifted the party in a more conservative
direction to win contested seats across the state. So far, that strategy
hasn’t borne out, and Jacobs has received criticism for not tapping
into the party’s more grassroots base.
“This race should be the ultimate shoo-in,” said one progressive
strategist in New York. “If Suozzi loses or really if it’s even a close
race, that raises serious questions about the Democratic establishment
in New York, especially for a race in Jay Jacobs’s backyard.”
THE NATIONAL STAKES FOR THE SPECIAL ELECTION are mixed.
For one, the winner will only hold office for roughly eight months
before the contest is redecided this November in a redrawn district. The
New York Supreme Court ruled last December that the New York
independent redistricting commission will have to redraw the
congressional map. The decision is expected to shift the seat in a direction more favorable for Democrats in November.
But until then, there could potentially be near-term implications,
given the slim majority that Republicans currently hold in the House and
constant tumult over the Speakership. Just this past week, Republicans
failed to impeach the Biden administration’s secretary of homeland
security, Alejandro Mayorkas, by the thinnest of margins, prompting Rep.
Matt Gaetz to remark that he’d “never missed George Santos more.”
But primarily, the race is receiving national attention for a check of
the national mood heading into the 2024 presidential year. To underscore
just how dramatized this storyline has become, a recent Politico
Magazine story put as its headline “Nassau County Is Replacing George Santos—and Maybe Picking the Next President.”
Some surrogates close to Suozzi’s campaign have downplayed this
Beltway narrative somewhat, at least as a presidential indicator.
“It’s called a special election for a reason and the dynamics are
different; we’re not picking the next president, but that’s not to say
this isn’t highly important,” said Zak Malamed, who was one of the many
Democratic candidates running in the primary to challenge Santos before
the congressman’s expulsion.
In an unconventional procedure, national leadership in consultation
with the state party got to select the candidate for the special
election and cleared the way for Suozzi. Malamed endorsed Suozzi and has
been supporting him in the race ever since.
The special election will put the New York Democratic
Party under scrutiny after underperforming the rest of the country with a
series of defeats in the 2022 midterms.
But the coronation of Suozzi was somewhat more contentious in other
quarters. The bad blood is because Suozzi left the seat to make a failed
run for governor against Kathy Hochul in 2022. Many believe that
Suozzi’s exit opened the seat up for the Santos drama that New York and
the country have endured for the past year. Despite that criticism,
Suozzi was rewarded by the party that saw him as the safest bet to flip
the district.
Suozzi, a conservative Democrat who helped found the Problems Solvers
Caucus, also has a mixed record on abortion, a major factor in sinking
his bid for governor. Suozzi initially supported the Hyde Amendment,
which bans the use of federal funds for abortion procedures, but has
since reversed himself. Still, some of his opponents questioned whether
his track record on the issue might make him a poor fit for the seat,
given how mobilizing the issue has been against Republicans since the
overturning of Roe v. Wade.
One lesson New York Democrats took away from the 2022 midterm races
is that they didn’t adequately turn abortion into a central issue, which
carried Democrats elsewhere. Suozzi seems to agree. He’s shored up
support from reproductive rights groups such as Planned Parenthood and
gone on the attack against his Republican opponent over her party’s
extreme position. He’s repeatedly pressed Pilip on what exactly her
stance is on supporting Roe v. Wade or the proposed national
abortion ban legislation. Pilip has only offered vague responses about
respecting a woman’s “decision,” both bucking the conservative flank of
her party without fully committing to supporting Roe either.
Pilip has other issues as well. She hid from the public for a stretch
of the campaign, only appearing on the trail occasionally. In her
absence, a major controversy broke that echoed her Republican
predecessor’s corruption. A New York Times investigation
revealed that Pilip’s financial disclosures included a number of
inconsistencies and omissions compared to her previous filings for
Nassau County, where she served as a legislator. Her campaign
immediately corrected some of the errors, claiming they were mistakes,
but there are still outstanding questions about her and her husband’s
financial holdings.
Despite the national tenor of the race, both candidates have distanced
themselves from the presumptive nominees of their respective parties
and exhibited nothing but angst about the possibility of them visiting
the district. Pilip won’t even say whether she voted for President Trump
in 2020 despite being pressed on this question constantly by Suozzi’s
campaign. In swing districts like NY-03, with scores of independent and
moderate voters, it’s a reflection of the extreme unpopularity of both
presidential candidates and even the toxicity of the national brands of
both parties. In fact, both candidates also opted
not to publicize when House Speaker Mike Johnson and Minority Leader
Hakeem Jeffries each visited the candidates for rallies in the district.
Yet, the adage “all politics is local” doesn’t seem to be holding
true so far in the race, where hot-button national issues predominate.
While Santos won on relatively parochial issues like crime and migrant
busing, this contest is centered heavily on the southern border
situation, along with abortion.
Both candidates have exchanged barbs
on immigration. Up until the past few weeks, Pilip, an immigrant
herself, was accusing Democrats of allowing an invasion at the southern
border. The tenor has changed somewhat since the collapse of the border
deal brokered in Washington to pair restrictive immigration enforcement
with military aid for Israel and Ukraine.
Republicans killing the deal, to avoid delivering Biden another
legislative victory, has given Suozzi a talking point in the race to
fend off the open-borders charge from Republicans. He’s pushed Pilip to
respond to the collapse of the border deal, accusing Republicans of not
being serious about solutions. Whether that will change the minds of
voters is yet to be tested.
The border package also raises the question of support for Israel and
the ongoing war in Gaza. Suozzi is a loyal supporter of Israel and even
visited the country in December. For that, he received the endorsement
and financial support of Democratic Majority for Israel PAC, even though
his opponent actually fought in the IDF. Suozzi has used his backing by
the Israel lobby to try to defang his opponent’s charge that his party
welcomes “terrorist sympathizers.”
THE MAIN QUESTION HANGING OVER THE RACE is whether the state
party can revamp itself after suffering four humiliating congressional
losses in 2022, two of which were in Long Island, which also saw wipeout
down-ballot at the local level.
Those four races arguably cost Democrats control of the House, which
Republicans won back by just four seats. National Democratic leadership
has made it clear they believe their path back to the majority in 2024 runs
through Long Island and retaking those lost seats from the midterms.
They’re already dedicating an incredible amount of resources to those
races up and down the state, upwards of $45 million from the national
party’s coffers. That vast amount of money earmarked for what would
usually be state party responsibilities indicates national Democrats might not fully trust the abilities of the Albany bosses to get the job done.
Democrats are also spending big in the special election. Just over a
week before the election, the GOP’s Congressional Leadership Fund was forced
to pump $2.6 million into TV ads to try to make up the yawning gap
Democrats had put between them and Republicans on spending. Prior to
that infusion of funds, Suozzi led almost threefold on spending for television and digital ads, at $8 million to $3 million.
House Majority PAC, the main vehicle for Democratic leadership spending, dumped $7 million on the race for Suozzi.
That amount of spending is obscenely high for a special-election race
that will just be redecided in November, likely under more favorable
conditions for Democrats after redistricting. While leadership PACs
expend resources on Suozzi, they have all but refused to lift a finger
to protect the incumbent house progressives facing well-financed primary
challenges, funded largely by right-wing donors.
Some progressives in New York also question the tactics that the
state party has decided to run with under the leadership of party chair
Jay Jacobs to win back Long Island.
As Gov. Hochul has consolidated power, the state party for the most
part has supported the more moderate candidates in state and local races
across the state against progressives.
In contested Long Island races, the party believes tacking right to
win over middle-of-the-road Republican and independent voters is the
necessary path to victory. In 2022, that more conservative strategy led
not just to the losses of congressional candidates but also the unseating
of the Democratic Nassau County executive, Laura Curran, and several
district attorney candidates who tried to distance themselves from
criminal justice reform positions.
The alternative approach would be to try to mobilize more energy among the party’s core base of voters.
Tuesday’s election has been made out to be a referendum on President
Biden. In reality, it may be more a reflection of the state party in New
York, and whether it’s up for the task in 2024.
