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Tag: NY State of Politics Blog

  • Trump plans to meet with NYC Mayor-elect Mamdani

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    WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — President Donald Trump indicated Sunday that he plans to meet with New York City’s mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani and said they’ll “work something out,” in what could be a detente for the Republican president and Democratic political star who have cast each other as political foils.

    What You Need To Know

    • President Donald Trump is indicating that he plans to meet with New York City’s mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani and says they’ll “work something out

    • It could be a detente for the Republican president and Democratic political star, who have cast each other as political foils

    • Trump has for months slammed Mamdani, falsely labeling him as a “communist” and predicting the ruin of his hometown if the democratic socialist was elected

    • Mamdani rose from an obscure state lawmaker to become a social media star and symbol of the resistance against Trump during his mayoral campaign

    Trump has for months slammed Mamdani, falsely labeling him as a “communist” and predicting the ruin of his hometown, New York, if the democratic socialist was elected. He also threatened to deport Mamdani, who was born in Uganda and became a naturalized American citizen, and to pull federal money from the city.

    Mamdani rose from an obscure state lawmaker to become a social media star and symbol of the resistance against Trump during his mayoral campaign. He campaigned on an array of progressive policies and a message that was stark in its opposition to the aggressive, anti-immigrant agenda Trump has rolled out in his second White House term.

    The 34-year-old appealed to a broad cross-section of New Yorkers and defeated one of its political heavyweights, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, by nearly 9 percentage points.

    In his election night victory speech, Mamdani said he wanted New York to show the country how to defeat the president. But the day after, while speaking about his plans for “Trump-proofing” New York once he takes office in January, the incoming mayor also said he was willing to work with anyone, including the president, if it can help New Yorkers.

    Representatives for Mamdani did not have an immediate comment Sunday night on the president’s remarks, but a spokesperson pointed to the mayor-elect’s remarks last week when he said he planned to reach out to the White House “because this is a relationship that will be critical to the success of the city.”

    Trump expressed a similar sentiment on Sunday.

    “The mayor of New York, I will say, would like to meet with us. We’ll work something out,” Trump told reporters as he prepared to fly back to Washington after spending the weekend in Florida.

    White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt clarified shortly after that Trump was referring to Mamdani and said no date had been set for such a meeting.

    “We want to see everything work out well for New York,” Trump said.

    Trump’s comments came as he also said the U.S. may hold discussions soon with Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, after a military buildup near the South American country: “I’ll talk to anybody,” Trump said.

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    Associated Press

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  • Jeffries demands House Republicans return to Washington to negotiate

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    WASHINGTON — As hundreds of thousands of federal workers went unpaid Friday during the 24th day of an agonizing government shutdown, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., called on House Republicans to return to Washington to negotiate a bipartisan agreement.

    “We need Republican support for a bipartisan path forward in order to get out of this situation,” Jeffries said Friday during a news conference at the Capitol.

    What You Need To Know

    • As hundreds of thousands of federal workers went unpaid Friday during the 24th day of an agonizing government shutdown, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., called on House Republicans to come back to Washington, D.C. and negotiate a bipartisan agreement

    • House Republicans have been on recess since September 19 after passing a stopgap funding bill to keep the government open through Nov. 21

    • That bill has repeatedly failed in the Senate as Democrats demand an extension of Affordable Care Act subsidies that will otherwise expire at the end of the year

    • On Thursday, Senate Democrats blocked a Republican bill called the Shutdown Fairness Act that would have allowed pay for air traffic controllers, military troops and other essential federal workers the Office of Personnel Management has approved while the government is shut down


    “I said this directly to the president with (House Speaker Mike) Johnson and (Senate Majority Leader John) Thune right next to me,” Jeffries said, referencing a White House meeting in late September to avert the current shutdown. “This does not get resolved until you decide to give permission to Republicans on Capitol Hill to negotiate a bipartisan resolution.”

    House Republicans have been in recess since Sept. 19 after passing a stopgap funding bill to keep the government open through Nov. 21. That bill has repeatedly failed in the Senate as Democrats demand an extension of Affordable Care Act subsidies that will otherwise expire at the end of the year.

    The federal government has been closed since Oct. 1, when Democrats and Republicans in Congress failed to pass legislation that would fund it for the 2026 fiscal year. Hundreds of thousands of essential federal workers are now working without pay while others are furloughed.

    On Thursday, Senate Democrats blocked a Republican bill called the Shutdown Fairness Act that would have allowed pay for air traffic controllers, military troops and other essential federal workers the Office of Personnel Management has approved while the government is shut down.

    “Deranged Democrats just blocked our bill to pay essential workers who keep Americans safe. Why? They believe that forcing Americans to work without pay gives them leverage,” Senate Republicans wrote on X after the failed vote.

    On Friday, Jeffries reiterated a point he has made multiple times since the shutdown began.

    “We’re prepared to support any bipartisan legislation that comes out of the Senate that is designed to decisively address the Republican health care crisis, reopen the government and enact a bipartisan spending agreement that actually makes life better for the American people,” he said.

    Jeffries cited Friday’s Bureau of Labor Statistics report that inflation rose at an annual rate of 3% in September as evidence that Republican policies are not working. He said the upcoming health care open enrollment season will make it “even more significant for Congress and the president to deal with” the protracted shutdown as Americans begin to see increased costs for health insurance premiums, co-pays and deductibles in 2026.

    He refuted the idea that Democrats bear responsibility for any lasting fallout from the shuttered government and pushed back on the Republican contention that their stalled funding bill continues spending levels approved during the Biden administration.

    He said the spending levels the Republicans would like to extend are based on the Republican stopgap funding bill Congress passed in March to keep the government running through the end of September. That bill cut $13 billion for domestic programs, including Medicaid.

    “That March spending bill wasn’t Biden-level spending. It was Trump partisan-level spending,” Jeffries said Friday.

    “We’ve made clear we will not support a partisan Republican spending bill that continues to gut the health care of the American people. We’ve been saying that for six weeks. We have not moved off our position.”

    Neither have Republicans, who insist the govenrment must reopen before any negotiations can happen. 

    “It’s becoming clearer by the day that Democrats don’t want an outcome, they want a political issue,” Thune wrote on X on Friday. “They’ve refused to reopen the government – 12 times. They’ve refused my offer to discuss Obamacare’s failures. They’ve refused my offer to hold a vote on their own proposal to address a problem they created. They’ve refused to pay the troops and federal employees who are working without a paycheck. The only thing they’ve said yes to? The Schumer Shutdown and political ‘leverage.’”

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    Susan Carpenter

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  • Trump commutes sentence of former U.S. Rep. George Santos in federal fraud case

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    President Donald Trump said Friday he had commuted the sentence of former U.S. Rep. George Santos, who is serving more than seven years in federal prison after pleading guilty to fraud and identity theft charges.

    What You Need To Know

    • President Donald Trump said Friday he had commuted the sentence of former U.S. Rep. George Santos, who is serving more than seven years in federal prison after pleading guilty to fraud and identity theft charges

    • The New York Republican was sentenced in April after admitting last year to deceiving donors and stealing the identities of 11 people — including his own family members — to make donations to his campaign

    • He reported to Federal Correctional Institution in Fairton, in southern New Jersey, on July 25 and is being housed in a minimum security prison camp with fewer than 50 other inmates

    The New York Republican was sentenced in April after admitting last year to deceiving donors and stealing the identities of 11 people — including his own family members — to make donations to his campaign.

    He reported to the Federal Correctional Institution in Fairton, in southern New Jersey, on July 25 and is being housed in a minimum security prison camp with fewer than 50 other inmates.

    “George Santos was somewhat of a ‘rogue,’ but there are many rogues throughout our Country that aren’t forced to serve seven years in prison,” Trump posted on his social media platform. He said he had “just signed a Commutation, releasing George Santos from prison, IMMEDIATELY.”

    “Good luck George, have a great life!” Trump said.

    Joseph Murray, one of Santos’ lawyers, said late Friday that the former lawmaker’s family was en route to the prison for his release. Andrew Mancilla, another Santos lawyer, applauded the president “for doing the right thing.”

    Spokespersons for the Bureau of Prisons didn’t immediately respond to messages seeking comment.

    Santos’ account on X, which has been active throughout his roughly 84 days in prison, reposted a screenshot of Trump’s Truth Social post Friday.

    During his time behind bars, Santos has been writing regular dispatches in a local newspaper on Long Island, in which he mainly complained about the prison conditions.

    In his latest letter, though, he pleaded to Trump directly, citing his fealty to the president’s agenda and to the Republican Party.

    “Sir, I appeal to your sense of justice and humanity — the same qualities that have inspired millions of Americans to believe in you,” he wrote in The South Shore Press on Oct. 13. “I humbly ask that you consider the unusual pain and hardship of this environment and allow me the opportunity to return to my family, my friends, and my community.”

    Santos’ commutation is Trump’s latest high-profile act of clemency for former Republican politicians since retaking the White House in January.

    In late May, he pardoned former U.S. Rep. Michael Grimm, a New York Republican who in 2014 pleaded guilty to underreporting wages and revenue at a restaurant he ran in Manhattan. He also pardoned former Connecticut Gov. John Rowland, whose promising political career was upended by a corruption scandal and two federal prison stints.

    But in granting clemency to Santos, Trump was rewarding a figure who has drawn scorn from within his own party.

    After becoming the first openly gay Republican elected to Congress in 2022, Santos served less than a year after it was revealed that he had fabricated much of his life story.

    On the campaign trail, Santos had claimed he was a successful business consultant with Wall Street cred and a sizable real estate portfolio. But when his resume came under scrutiny, Santos eventually admitted he had never graduated from Baruch College — or been a standout player on the Manhattan college’s volleyball team, as he had claimed. He had never worked at Citigroup and Goldman Sachs.

    He wasn’t even Jewish. Santos insisted he meant he was “Jew-ish” because his mother’s family had a Jewish background, even though he was raised Catholic.

    In truth, the then-34-year-old was struggling financially and even faced eviction.

    Santos was charged in 2023 with stealing from donors and his campaign, fraudulently collecting unemployment benefits and lying to Congress about his wealth.

    Within months, he was expelled from the U.S. House of Representatives — with 105 Republicans joining with Democrats to make Santos just the sixth member in the chamber’s history to be ousted by colleagues..

    Santos pleaded guilty as he was set to stand trial.

    Still, a prominent former House colleague, U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, urged the White House to commute Santos’ sentence, saying in a letter sent just days into his prison bid that the punishment was “a grave injustice” and a product of judicial overreach.

    Greene was among those who cheered the announcement Friday. But U.S. Rep. Nick LaLota, a Republican who represents part of Long Island and has been highly critical of Santos, said in a post on social media that Santos “didn’t merely lie” and his crimes “warrant more than a three-month sentence.”

    “He should devote the rest of his life to demonstrating remorse and making restitution to those he wronged,” LaLota said.

    Santos’ clemency appears to clear not just his prison term, but also any “further fines, restitution, probation, supervised release, or other conditions,” according to a copy of Trump’s order posted on X by Ed Martin, the Justice Department’s pardon attorney.

    As part of his guilty plea, Santos had agreed to pay restitution of $373,750 and forfeiture of $205,003.

    In explaining his reason for granting Santos clemency, Trump said the lies Santos told about himself were no worse than misleading statements U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal — a Democrat and frequent critic of the administration — had made about his military record.

    Blumenthal apologized 15 years ago for implying that he served in Vietnam, when he was stateside in the Marine Reserve during the war.

    “This is far worse than what George Santos did, and at least Santos had the Courage, Conviction, and Intelligence to ALWAYS VOTE REPUBLICAN!” Trump wrote.

    The president himself was convicted in a New York court last year in a case involving hush money payments. He derided the case as part of a politically motivated witch hunt.

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    Associated Press

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  • George Santos expected to plead guilty in fraud case, sources say

    George Santos expected to plead guilty in fraud case, sources say

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    Sources tell NY1 that former Republican Congressman George Santos is expected to plead guilty in a deal with federal prosecutors that will allow him to avoid his corruption trial next month.

    Santos, who represented parts of Queens and Long Island until he was expelled from Congress last year, is scheduled to appear in court in Suffolk County on Monday afternoon.

    Santos is facing 23 felony charges, accused of stealing tens of thousands of dollars from donors and spending some of the money on lavish personal expenses. Shortly after he was elected in 2022, The New York Times reported extensively how Santos colorfully fabricated much of his life story.

    While Santos had previously insisted that he would fight the charges in court, it appears that he has changed his mind.

    Neither Santos nor federal prosecutors would comment on Monday’s scheduled court appearance. On Santos’ social media account, the former lawmaker made no mention of his legal troubles, instead offering a negative movie review to the new film “Alien Romulus.”

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    Spectrum News Staff

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  • Trump loses gag order appeal in hush money case

    Trump loses gag order appeal in hush money case

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    A New York appeals court on Thursday denied Donald Trump’s bid to end a gag order in his hush money criminal case, rejecting the Republican ex-president’s argument that his May conviction “constitutes a change in circumstances” that warrants lifting the restrictions.

    What You Need To Know

    • A New York appeals court on Thursday denied Donald Trump’s bid to end a gag order in his hush money criminal case

    • The five-judge panel ruled that the trial judge, Juan M. Merchan, was correct in extending parts of the gag order until Trump is sentenced, writing that “the fair administration of justice necessarily includes sentencing”

    • Merchan imposed the gag order in March after prosecutors raised concerns about Trump’s habit of attacking people involved in his cases

    • The judge lifted some restrictions in June, freeing Trump to comment about witnesses and jurors but keeping trial prosecutors, court staffers and their families — including his own daughter — off limits until he is sentenced



    A five-judge panel in the state’s mid-level appellate court ruled that the trial judge, Juan M. Merchan, was correct in extending parts of the gag order until Trump is sentenced, writing that “the fair administration of justice necessarily includes sentencing.”

    Merchan imposed the gag order in March, a few weeks before the trial started, after prosecutors raised concerns about Trump’s habit of attacking people involved in his cases. During the trial, he held Trump in contempt of court and fined him $10,000 for violations, and he threatened to jail him if he did it again.

    The judge lifted some restrictions in June, freeing Trump to comment about witnesses and jurors but keeping trial prosecutors, court staffers and their families — including his own daughter — off limits until he is sentenced.

    Trump, who has denied any wrongdoing, was originally scheduled to be sentenced July 11, but Merchan postponed it until Sept. 18, if necessary, while he weighs a defense request to throw out his conviction in the wake of the Supreme Court’s presidential immunity ruling.

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    Associated Press

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  • Trump to undergo probation interview ahead of N.Y. sentencing

    Trump to undergo probation interview ahead of N.Y. sentencing

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    Former President Donald Trump is scheduled to be interviewed by New York probation officials Monday, a required step before his July sentencing in his criminal hush money case, according to three people familiar with the plan.

    What You Need To Know

    • Former President Donald Trump is scheduled to be interviewed by New York probation officials, a required step before his July sentencing in his criminal hush money case

    • Trump will do the interview via a computer video conference from his Florida home, according to those familiar with his planning

    • The usual purpose of a probation interview is to prepare a report that will tell the judge more about the defendant

    • People convicted of crimes in New York usually meet with probation officials without their lawyers, but the judge in Trump’s case, Juan Merchan, said in a letter Friday that he would allow Blanche’s presence


    Trump will do the interview via a computer video conference from his residence at the Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida, the people told The Associated Press.

    One of Trump’s lawyers, Todd Blanche, will be present for the interview. People convicted of crimes in New York usually meet with probation officials without their lawyers, but the judge in Trump’s case, Juan Merchan, said in a letter Friday that he would allow Blanche’s presence.

    The usual purpose of a pre-sentencing probation interview is to prepare a report that will tell the judge more about the defendant, and potentially help determine the proper punishment for the crime.

    Such reports are typically prepared by a probation officer, a social worker or a psychologist working for the probation department who interviews the defendant and possibly that person’s family and friends, as well as people affected by the crime.

    Presentence reports include a defendant’s personal history, criminal record and recommendations for sentencing. It will also include information about employment and any obligations to help care for a family member. It is also a chance for a defendant to say why they think they deserve a lighter punishment.

    A jury convicted Trump of falsifying business records at his own company as part of a broader scheme to buy the silence of people who might have told embarrassing stories about him during the 2016 presidential campaign. One $130,000 payment went to a porn actor, Stormy Daniels, who claimed to have had a sexual encounter with Trump, which he denied.

    Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, says he is innocent of any crime and that the criminal case was brought to hurt his chances to regain the White House.

    Trump’s campaign spokesman, Steven Cheung, said in statement Sunday that President Joe Biden’s Democratic Party allies “continue to ramp up their ongoing Witch-Hunts, further abusing and misusing the power of their offices to interfere in the presidential election.”

    “President Trump and his legal team are already taking necessary steps to challenge and defeat the lawless Manhattan DA case,” he said.

    Merchan has scheduled Trump’s sentencing for July 11. He has discretion to impose a wide range of punishments, ranging from probation and community service to up to four years in prison.

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    Associated Press

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  • Live Updates: Trump hush money trial resumes

    Live Updates: Trump hush money trial resumes

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    Opening statements began Monday in the hush money trial against Donald Trump, the first criminal case against a former president in U.S. history, after a full jury was selected last week. Witness testimony continues Thursday.

    Trump faces 34 charges of falsifying business records around purported efforts to cover up his alleged infidelity with an adult film actress during his 2016 presidential campaign. The former president has pleaded not guilty and denied any wrongdoing.

     

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    Spectrum News Staff

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  • Live Updates: Opening statements begin in Trump trial

    Live Updates: Opening statements begin in Trump trial

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    Opening statements began Monday in the hush money trial against Donald Trump, the first criminal case against a former president in U.S. history, after a full jury was selected last week.

    Trump faces 34 charges of falsifying business records around purported efforts to cover up his alleged infidelity with an adult film actress during his 2016 presidential campaign. The former president has pleaded not guilty and denied any wrongdoing.

     

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    Associated Press

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  • Democrat Tom Suozzi flips N.Y. congressional district held by George Santos

    Democrat Tom Suozzi flips N.Y. congressional district held by George Santos

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    Democrat Tom Suozzi has won the special election in the 3rd Congressional District in New York, the Associated Press projects, flipping the seat held by the ousted Republican Rep. George Santos and further narrowing the House GOP’s already razor-thin margins.

    What You Need To Know

    • Democrat Tom Suozzi has won the special election in the 3rd Congressional District in New York, the Associated Press projects

    • Suozzi, a longtime fixture of Long Island politics, previously held the congressional seat for three terms; he relinquished the seat in 2022 to mount an unsuccessful primary challenge to New York Gov. Kathy Hochul

    • The special election was held to replace Republican George Santos, who became the sixth House member to be ousted from Congress in U.S. history after he was indicted on fraud charges and exposed as having fabricated much of his background

    • The race was to fill the remainder of Santos’ term, which expires in January; the seat will be up for grabs once again in November.


    The race was widely viewed as an early barometer for November’s likely rematch between President Joe Biden, a Democrat, and former President Donald Trump, a Republican, and was expected to be a close race, according to recent polling. But 93% of the vote in as of Wednesday morning, Suozzi had nearly 54% of the vote, leading Republican Mazi Pilip (46.1%), a relative newcomer to politics, by more than 13,000 votes. 

    “Despite all the attacks, despite all the lies about Tom Suozzi and ‘the Squad,’ about Tom Suozzi being the godfather of the migrant crisis, about ‘sanctuary Suozzi,’ despite the dirty tricks, despite the vaunted Nassau County Republican machine, we won,” Suozzi said during his victory speech Tuesday night.

    Pilip, a Nassau County legislator who was elected as a Republican despite being a registered Democrat, conceded the election results before Suozzi spoke.

    “We all [worked] so hard every single day in the last eight weeks and we did a great job,” Pilip said. “Yes, we lost, but it doesn’t mean we’re going to end here.”

    The district covers the neighborhoods of Little Neck, Whitestone, Glen Oaks, Floral Park and Queens Village in Queens, as well as large stretches of Long Island’s Nassau County.

    Suozzi, a longtime fixture of Long Island politics, previously held the congressional seat for three terms. He gave up his seat to pursue an unsuccessful run for governor. He previously served as the mayor of Glen Cove and the Nassau County Executive.

    Throughout his campaign in a district that flipped from Democratic to Republican representation in November 2022, Suozzi tried to convince voters that he’s a politician who is not afraid to work with all parties, including leaning into migrant issues and highlighting the times he’s broke with his party on immigration. But his candidacy was also heavily focused on getting to work, a message encapsulated in his campaign slogan, “Let’s Fix This.”

    “Let’s send a message to our friends running the Congress these days,” Suozzi said in his remarks Tuesday night. “Stop running around for Trump and start running the country.”

    The Biden reelection campaign and the White House took a victory lap after Suozzi’s decisive win, calling it a rebuke of Trump and Republican policies.

    “Donald Trump lost again tonight. When Republicans run on Trump’s extreme agenda – even in a Republican-held seat – voters reject them,” said Biden campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez on Tuesday evening. “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 and make Americans’ lives better, voters are consistently choosing the leadership of President Biden and Democrats. Trump and the MAGA extremists in the House are already paying the political price for derailing a bipartisan deal to secure our borders and fix our broken immigration system.”

    Biden-Harris campaign communications director Michael Tyler called the race “Republicans’ district to lose,” citing the GOP’s successes in the district in 2022 up and down the ballot, but said that Suozzi’s embrace of a bipartisan bill that would have provided funding to Israel and Ukraine and enacted reforms at the U.S.-Mexico border, as well as Pilip’s “embrace of the former president and Republicans’ support for banning abortion,” cost her the election.

    “Again and again, when it comes time to go to the ballot box, voters are showing up to choose President Biden and Democrats’ agenda of safeguarding freedoms and fighting for working families over the extreme MAGA agenda,” Tyler said. “We are putting in the work every single day to make sure this November will be no different.”

    White House deputy press secretary Andrew Bates said that voters on Long Island proved Biden “right” when the president pledged last week that he would make sure Republicans bore the brunt of the blame for killing the bipartisan border deal.

    Bates said that on Tuesday, “voters proved [Biden] right with a devastating repudiation of congressional Republicans. Tom Suozzi put support for the bipartisan border legislation – and congressional Republicans’ killing of it for politics – at the forefront of his case. The results are unmistakable. And right now, House Republicans are yet again putting politics ahead of national security – siding with Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, and Tehran, against America’s defense industrial base, against NATO, against Ukraine, and against our interests in the Indo-Pacific. Tom Suozzi was clear about this choice in his campaign as well, siding with President Biden. As we said before, the American people see through congressional Republicans’ elevation of their personal politics over the safety of the country.”

    Republicans, meanwile, sought to downplay the results, with House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., attempting to make the case that he doesn’t believe the results “that Democrats should not celebrate too much,” dismissing Suozzi’s win as being a product of his name recognition and a snowstorm that impacted the area for part of Tuesday.

    “They spent about $15 million to win a seat President Biden won by 8 points, they won it by less than 8 points,” Johnson said. “Their candidate ran like a Republican, sounded like a Republican talking about the border and immigration … the incumbent had been a three-term member of Congress and had a 100% name ID and a deep family history in the district, our candidate was relatively unknown … she ran a remarkable campaign, there was a weather event that affected turnout, there are a lot of factors there, that is in no way a bellwether of what is gonna happen this fall.”

    Despite Johnson’s contentions, the results will no doubt be a cause of concern for his conference’s already razor-thin majority: When Suozzi is sworn in, the makeup of the chamber will shrink to 219-213, meaning he can only lose two votes on major legislation.

    The special election was called to replace Santos, who became the sixth House member to be ousted from Congress in U.S. history after he was indicted on fraud charges and was exposed as having fabricated much of his background.

    Santos, who has pleaded not guilty to 23 federal charges, was only in office for 11 months.

    With days leading up to Election Day, polls showed it was a tight race, with Suozzi slightly in the lead. But it turned out to be a relatively early night with the race call, and Pilip’s concession, coming quickly after the polls closed.

    “We, you, won this race,” he said, “because we addressed the issues and we found a way to bind our divisions.”

    Pro-Palestinian protesters interrupted Suozzi toward the beginning of his speech. The protesters accused Suozzi, a staunch supporter of Israel, of “supporting genocide,” and called for a cease-fire in Gaza.

    Suozzi later referenced the protest, saying there are divisions in the country where people can only yell and scream at each other, and that that “is not the answer to the problems we face in our country.”

    “The answer is to try and bring people of goodwill together to try and find that common ground,” he continued.

    The issue of the war in Gaza between Israel and Hamas was expected to play a large role in the race, particularly because of the district’s significant Jewish population. Pilip, who is an Orthodox Jew, was born in Ethiopia and emigrated to Israel when she was 12, serving in the Israel Defense Force’s Paratroopers Brigade. She moved to the U.S. in 2005 and settled in Great Neck, a town on Long Island with a large Jewish population. 

    But Suozzi also portrayed himself as a staunch defender of Israel and the Jewish people, pledging to break with some progressive members of the Democratic conference who want to curtail aid to the Middle Eastern country and criticizing Republicans in Congress who scuttled the bipartisan border and foreign assistance bill.

    The race was to fill the remainder of Santos’ term in Congress, which expires in January. The seat will be up for grabs once again in November, so despite both candidates and parties pouring millions into the race, they’ll have to hit the campaign trail once again in a few short months.

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    Deanna Garcia

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  • Democrat Tom Suozzi wins N.Y. congressional race in Santos’ former district

    Democrat Tom Suozzi wins N.Y. congressional race in Santos’ former district

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    Democrat Tom Suozzi has won the special election in the 3rd Congressional District in New York, the Associated Press projects.

    According to the AP, with approximately 85% of the expected vote tallied in Queens as of 11:50 p.m. Tuesday, Suozzi had 53.9% of the vote, while Republican Mazi Pilip had 46.1% of the vote.

    “Despite all the attack, despite all the lies about Tom Suozzi and the Squad, about Tom Suozzi being the godfather of the migrant crisis, about ‘sanctuary Suozzi,’ despite the dirty tricks, despite the vaunted Nassau County Republican machine, we won,” Suozzi said during his victory speech Tuesday night.

    The district covers the neighborhoods of Little Neck, Whitestone, Glen Oaks, Floral Park and Queens Village in Queens, as well as large stretches of Long Island’s Nassau County.

    Suozzi previously held the congressional seat for three terms. He gave up his seat to pursue an unsuccessful run for governor.

    Throughout his campaign in a district that flipped from Democratic to Republican representation in November 2022, Suozzi tried to convince voters that he’s a Democrat who is not afraid to work with all parties.

    The special election was called to replace George Santos, who became the sixth House member to be ousted from Congress in U.S. history.

    Santos, who has pleaded not guilty to 23 federal charges, was only in office for 11 months.

    With days leading up to Election Day, polls showed it was a tight race, with Suozzi slightly in the lead.

    “We, you, won this race,” he said, “because we addressed the issues and we found a way to bind our divisions.”

    Pro-Palestine protesters interrupted Suozzi toward the beginning of his speech. The protesters accused Suozzi, a staunch supporter of Israel, of “supporting genocide,” and called for a ceasefire in Gaza.

    Later in his remarks, Suozzi referenced the protest, saying there are divisions in the country where people can only yell and scream at each other, and that that “is not the answer to the problems we face in our country.”

    “The answer is to try and bring people of goodwill together to try and find that common ground,” he continued.

    Pilip, a Nassau County legislator, conceded the election results before Suozzi spoke.

    “We all [worked] so hard every single day in the last eight weeks and we did a great job,” Pilip said. “Yes, we lost, but it doesn’t mean we’re going to end here.”

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    Deanna Garcia

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