Democrat Tom Suozzi has won the New York special election to the U.S. House, according to an AP race call. Suozzi will serve out the remainder of the term for former GOP Rep. George Santos, who was expelled from the House last year.
IIRC, this is the district with suburban republicans that went ~+10 for Biden in 2020, then elected fucking Santos in ‘22. The pendulum has swung back to democrats and by a wide margin.
His lies were specifically tailored for the district to get him elected there. And apparently NO ONE did any opposition research on him to expose that before he was elected.
One paper did. They were ignored.
It’s also a very Jewish district. A lot of pro-Israeli Jews are concerned about the “left wing” of the Democratic party not supporting Israel’s genocide, and the Republicans were running an incredibly pro-Israel candidate. The combination of events made this race a lot closer than it might otherwise have been.
The Republican candidate is literally just an Israeli Defense Force solider.
So yeah, I guess it’s accurate to call her an “incredibly pro-Israel candidate.”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mazi_Melesa_Pilip
“She is an Ethiopian Jew, and was born in Ethiopia. She immigrated to Israel when she was 12 years old, and later served in the Israel Defense Force’s Paratroopers Brigade as a gunsmith. Pilip studied at the University of Haifa, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in occupational therapy, and also at Tel Aviv University, where she earned a masters degree in diplomacy and security.”
So an Ethiopian Jew was running on supporting Israel’s genocide. That’d be ironic if it wasn’t so sad.
Let’s get everything back into the hands of normal Americans.
Starting to right the timeline…
I certainly hope so. He seems to have won by a huge margin, too.
This is the exact reason repubs were so hesitant to sanction Santos for so long. The shit had to become totally egregious before they took action because their majority was so slim. This is the worst outcome for them.
Had he been a dem, they would have been trying to kick him out from the first negative publication. And MTG would have held up photos of his dick.
This really highlights the difference between the parties, because if Santos had been a Democrat and the same shit had come out about him, Democrats would have been calling for his expulsion before any Republicans would have needed to.
I still maintain that Franken should have stuck around, cause fuck those fascists. They’re not playing by any fair rules so trying to take the high road is useless.
This is encouraging, although it should be noted that this is the guy who had the seat previously, but gave it up in an idiotic run for Governor. So everyone in the district knew him.
One bright spot, though, is that his opponent intended to hammer him on the open borders bullshit, and he successfully managed to deflect it. The unofficial Trump policy of sabotaging the border and blaming Democrats for it might not have as much traction as he thinks. (But since Donald Trump is in control of the party and can never be wrong, Republicans can’t pivot away from it )
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The race was seen as a test of Democrats’ ability to overcome attacks over President Biden’s handling of the U.S. border with Mexico and convince voters that Republicans are unable to legislate in Washington.
Supporters of both candidates said a major influx of migrants into New York City is seriously impacting the district, which stretches from parts of working and middle class neighborhoods in Queens to wealthy suburbs in Nassau County, Long Island.
Her campaign focused heavily on blaming Suozzi for the record number of migrants entering the southwest border and the impact the broken immigration system is having in New York.
Other New York Republicans lawmakers, including GOP conference Chair Elise Stefanik, stumped for Pilip in Franklin Square in Nassau County.
Pilip and her GOP allies, on the ground and in paid campaign ads, link Suozzi to Biden, and to progressive Democrats in the House, often nicknamed “the Squad.”
Suozzi, who was a member of the moderate “New Democrat” coalition, rejects that comparison, and repeatedly stresses his support for Israel, another major factor in this district with a high percentage of Jewish voters.
The original article contains 1,285 words, the summary contains 184 words. Saved 86%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
It’s looking to be Suozzi 56-44 or 57-43 when all is said and done
But does anybody actually believe this electorate would’ve voted for Trump by 5? The polls are clearly underestimating Biden
Bro, 44% for that clown is terrifying.
Is she a clown? I don’t know much about her. Doesn’t matter now that she’s lost I guess.
Is a “special election” like what we call a “by election” in the Commonwealth?
If so I don’t know how much to read into this. In Parliamentary systems it’s a well known fact that by elections tend to see a swing against the majority. So if the House is Republican controlled, you’d expect a swing towards the Democrats, even if at the next full election it goes back to Republican.
The one spanner in the works with that comparison is the President. In our system, the “government” is formed out of Parliament, so the majority in the House is the same as the party forming Government. Presidential systems don’t have that, so maybe you’d be expecting a swing towards Republicans, in which case this is an even bigger win than it at first seems?
Special elections take place outside of normal election cycles for any number of reasons
Basically special elections are a “we need an election now and can’t wait for the normal time”
I think people are reading WAAAAY too much into this. This election took place under very abnormal circumstances. The seat was open because the incumbent was expelled from congress for a variety of crimes and lies that got progressively more insane the longer he was in office. The winning candidate is a fairly conservative Democrat who campaigned heavily on supporting Israel in their war. The losing candidate was from the same party as the crazy person who was expelled and essentially campaigned on the fact thatshe was in the Israeli defense force and is extremely pro Israel.
I don’t think any larger conclusions can be drawn from this race.
Since we have elections on a regular schedule for Congressional seats, the only way to have a special election is if a seat goes vacant for any reason. So since they are not held on Election Day, turnout can be an issue. People here are used to election day being in November, and may not bother with elections held at odd times during the year.
The media tends to make a big deal out of them because they make for good headlines, but the only trend they really track are whether the issues talked about in the campaign can drive turnout.
