Analysis and insight from City news staff, updated throughout the day on Wednesday.
Tom Richards for Congress?
[2:53 p.m.] Almost neglected to mention that Channel 13’s anchors were speculating last night about a possible Tom Richards bid for Congress, should Louise Slaughter ever get tired of serving. That gave me a chuckle, since Rochester had to practically beg-force Richards to run for mayor. But I’m ready to be wrong. Another name tossed out: Lt. Governor Bob Duffy. That speculation is nothing new; Duffy has long been rumored as a Slaughter replacement.
[12:55 p.m.] Collins win isn’t a total loss for Democrats
Democratic Representative Kathy Hochul didn’t survive her challenge from Republican Chris Collins, but her loss isn’t all bad news for Democrats.
The Buffalo News reports that Collins won with 50.7 percent of the votes cast yesterday to Hochul’s 49.3 percent. That’s an incredibly thin margin and, for a Democrat running in the most Republican district in New York, a heck of a performance.
Hochul had already proved that Democrats could win the district: she defeated Republican Jane Corwin to win the seat in a 2011 special election — Medicare played a major role in that race. This time, the presidential election brought more people to the polls. Hochul and Collins waged aggressive campaigns, with plenty of negative television ads. Clearly, each candidate’s message resonated with district voters.
It may be tough to pinpoint what ultimately tipped the scales for Collins. Obamacare wasn’t polling well in the district, and Collins supports repealing it. Free trade, agricultural issues, abortion rights, and federal spending also came up during campaign.
The seat will be up again in two years, and Democrats should make a proper run at it. On paper, the district is a tough win. But Hochul has shown her party that it can be done.
[10:37 a.m.] State Senate control still not settled
Several media outlets are reporting that Democrats are on track to win the 32 seats they need to be the majority party in the state Senate. Democrats are confident that they’ve won the seats, but votes are still being counted in some of the races.
For example, a Democrat has such a narrow lead in one race that the winner will be decided by absentee ballots, reports the Albany Times Union.
Locally, Democrat Ted O’Brien’s victory over Republican Sean Hanna added a seat to the Senate’s Democratic caucus. The seat was previously held by Republican Jim Alesi.
But IF Democrats do, in fact, have the majority, that doesn’t mean they’ll all agree on the chamber’s leadership. Four Democratic members previously formed their own caucus and the New York Times reports that they “have not said whom they would support as majority leader — a Democrat or a Republican — to control the chamber.”
The Times also reports that another Democrat, Simcha Felder of Brooklyn, hasn’t ruled out siding with Republicans.
The last time Democrats controlled the Senate, several members joined with Republicans in a leadership coup, throwing the chamber into chaos and gridlock.
If Democrats do end up with the majority of seats, they’d be wise to settle the leadership question before the start of the January session. The four-member Independent Democratic Caucus started because its members said they’d lost faith in their caucus’s leader, Senator John Sampson (see this New York Times story for the details).
Albany’s got enough to deal with, it doesn’t need another protracted leadership battle.
[10:15 a.m.] SLAUGHTER/BROOKS
I think people expected more from the Congressional contest
between incumbent Democrat Louise Slaughter and her Republican opponent, Monroe
County Executive Maggie Brooks. (According to unofficial results from the Board
of Elections, Slaughter won about 57 percent of the vote.)
Brooks delayed talking about national issues as long as she
could, and then her replies were either vague or straight from the Republican answer-factory.
In place of real discussion, her campaign repeatedly taunted Slaughter for “dodging”
debates. Brooks challenged her opponent to six debates, Slaughter agreed to
two.
There were also ugly and untrue rumors about Slaughter’s health, and contemptible remarks about her age and
appearance — none directly from the Brooks camp, it should be pointed out.
Slaughter’s team went right for Brooks’ soft underbelly: the
county scandals. That strategy never worked for local Dems, but maybe Slaughter’s
money finally got the message across.
Slaughter was also certainly boosted by a strong turnout in
the city and by President Obama’s popularity. Slaughter’s numbers closely
parallel Obama’s in Monroe County. Democrats also have an enrollment edge in
the 25th District, but the district is more conservative than the one Slaughter
currently represents.
Maybe voters also understood that no matter what Brooks
promised, she’d have little option as a freshman representative but to follow
the wishes of the House Republican leadership. And those extremist positions
probably don’t play well in Monroe County.
What’s next? Though a powerful and influential
representative, Slaughter is still a member of the minority party in the House
— which makes it much more difficult to get things done.
Brooks has three years left as county executive before term
limits kick in, but it’s doubtful she’ll serve them out. A much more likely
scenario is that she steps down — to run for another office, to take another job — to pave the way for her successor, who would be appointed by
the Republicans in the County Legislature. Who would that person be? No obvious
candidate comes to mind, though some town supervisors are salivating — off the
record, of course.
This article appears in Nov 7-13, 2012.
“Brooks has three years left as county executive before term limits kick in, but it’s doubtful she’ll serve them out
This ain’t rocket science folks. Maggie’s future is already carved in stone. She’ll hang on as County Exec (probably pretending to be more bipartisan) until 2014. By that time Louise will finally have announced her retirement from Congress and Our Miss Brooks will waltz into the House (God help us !) since there are no discernible Democratic candidates of any weight on the horizon that could successfully oppose her.
I suppose it;’s possible that for whatever reason Louise will retire early, but that simply means a special election which Maggie will win.
“Duffy has long been rumored as a Slaughter replacement.”
So if Duffy were to run we’d have TWO Republicans in the race. One (Maggie) who at least is open about her affiliation, And the other (Bobby) who after being a life-long Republican cynically changed his party registration in order to be elected mayor and then retained his sheep’s clothing to become Gov. Andy’s errand boy.
Assemblyman Joe Morelle, who had a better-than-expected night with the Slaughter and O’Brien wins, might be willing to bear the Democratic standard when Slaughter retires. He’s always been a tough, ambitious politician (like Brooks and Slaughter) and he is sitting on a substantial war chest that he didn’t need to use this time around (he ran unopposed). The question is whether he can win or atleast be competitive, in towns like Henrietta, Rush, and Mendon. In local races the last two cycles, Democrats have been enemic at best. I don’t see Duffy giving up his lieutenant gubernatorial post to run for Congress, and I certainly don’t see Richards. Both are Morelle’s proxies and they take their marching orders from him. I suspect O’Brien will do the same in the Senate. Lovely Warren may take a crack at mayor next year, should Richards step down, with David Gantt’s explicit backing (she is his chief deputy). The divide between the “city” (read: African-American) and “suburban” (read: white), has been slowly widening in Democratic circles, with David Gantt’s easy pushback against Jose Cruz and John Lightfoot in the September primary. The Democratic axle has always held the opposing wheels apart (Morelle and Gantt), but a Warren run for mayor may split it open if Morelle runs someone else.
On an unrelated aside, Cuomo must not be happy about the Hochul race. Rumors had it that he didn’t support her as quickly because he was POed she didn’t run for county executive against Collins and take him out as a 2014 rival to Cuomo. Instead she ran for Congress and Collins was defeated anyway. Then Cuomo refused to intervene in the legislative redistricting because he didn’t want to spend too much political capital on a low-wattage issue for the general public, which was the independent redistricting that was supposedly a campaign priority when he ran for governor. The redistricting by LAFTOR (New York Legislative Task Force on Demographic Research) made Hochul the most vulernable incumbent in the state. Collins won narrowly against her, making him a possible contender against Cuomo in 2014. You got to love politics!
Scott – you are correct that ersatz Democrat Duffy isn’t looking to run for Congress. He’s clearly got his eye on Gov. Andy’s job should Cuomo decide to run for president in 2016 , Were that to happen and were Andy to move to the White House we’d be stuck with Duffy as governor.
And as Tiny Tim would observe were that catastrophe to occur… “God help us, everyone”.
Who won the election………….woman……………..for the next four years the Supreme Court will be purged
if the idealogs that insist on regulating vaginas.
Ed