Democrat flip seat of disgraced New York congressman
DEMOCRAT Tom Suozzi won the race to succeed ousted New York Representative George Santos, according to the Associated Press, taking back a seat he previously held for three terms and narrowing the GOP’s razor-thin majority in the US House of Representatives.
Suozzi’s victory on Tuesday over the Republican candidate, Mazi Pilip, flipped the affluent, Long Island district back to Democrats and narrows House Republicans’ already slim margin. Suozzi represented the district for three terms until 2023.
“You want to take the country back from the people who want to divide it,” Suozzi asked to a jubilant crowd in his victory speech. A protester tried unsuccessfully to mount the stage as he began to speak.
The race, which attracted significant national interest, was seen as a possible bellwether of November’s presidential and congressional elections. It quickly became a referendum on immigration, Israel and abortion, and both sides lashed out at one another in ubiquitous ad campaigns and in a fiery debate.
“We are fighters. Yes, we lost, but that doesn’t mean we’re going to end here.” Pilip said in her concession speech. “We’re going to bring back common sense government, I promise you,” she added.
The election took place during a major snowstorm in the New York metropolitan area, though it was unclear how much that affected turnout.
“Well, let me say, this morning, I was very concerned because of the weather,” said Nassau County executive Bruce Blakeman, a Republican. “The fact that it was snowing all morning very much slowed voter turnout. But it began gaining momentum throughout the day.”
Suozzi was able to withstand repeated attacks by the 44-year-old Pilip over immigration and the Biden administration’s border policies. Many residents commute into New York City, where more than 170,000 migrants have arrived since April 2022, straining resources and prompting concern about crime. A mid-January Emerson poll showed a plurality of voters in the district, 26 per cent, ranked immigration as their top concern.
He also out-raised Pilip by 3 to 1, and his campaign and surrogates spent more than US$13 million in the eight-week campaign, compared with roughly US$6.2 million in spending from Pilip’s campaign and PACs supporting her.
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Pilip, who was polling neck-and-neck with Suozzi, tried to capitalise on her remarkable background.
The Ethiopian-born Orthodox Jewish mother of seven was airlifted to Israel as a child in 1991 as part of Operation Solomon. She went on to serve in the Israel Defence Forces before immigrating to the US in 2005, eventually settling in Great Neck with her Ukrainian-American husband.
Voters in the district handed Joe Biden an 8-point victory in 2020 and have chosen the Democratic nominee for president in every election save the 2004 contest over the past 30 years. But its leadership at every other level of government routinely changed hands between Republican and Democratic control.
Since 2020, however, Republicans have won an astonishing string of victories in the area, thanks to a disciplined and effective county party organisation that’s proved adept at turning out votes. Not counting the seat Suozzi just won, the GOP now controls virtually every elected office in Nassau County.
Suozzi previously represented the 3rd district from 2017 to 2023 before mounting an unsuccessful campaign for New York governor in 2022, which allowed Santos to win his vacated seat.
President Joe Biden’s presidential campaign tried to tie Republican front-runner Donald Trump to the loss.
“Donald Trump lost again tonight. When Republicans run on Trump’s extreme agenda – even in a Republican-held seat – voters reject them. As we saw in 2020, 2022, 2023, and now tonight, when it comes down to the choice between Donald Trump’s chaos and division and President Biden who wakes up everyday working to get things done,” the campaign said in a statement.
The GOP currently has a 219-212 majority in the House. BLOOMBERG
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