Special state legislative elections thread (see OP for results/upcoming races)

[cinyc]

Governor Cuomo announced today that New York will hold special elections to fill the 4 vacant Assembly seats and 1 vacant State Senate seat on March 20.

The vacant Assembly seats are in the Buffalo area (including part of the city), Yonkers, Dutchess/Orange/Ulster counties and Dutchess/Columbia counties.  The vacant State Senate seat is Kruger's seat in Brooklyn.

[So the Heroes Fall]

I totally forgot until now we have two specials tomorrow.

One is for Senate district 59 in NE Minneapolis, made vacant by the appointment of former Senator Majority Leader Larry Pogemiller to head the State Office of Higher Education. The DFL candidate who won the primary is Kari Dziedzic (hmm, I do recall now seeing Dziedzic for Senate signs in neighborhoods near my church but never put much thought into them.), the daughter of some longterm city councilman. The Republican is some random irrelevant guy. Obviously it's an utterly safe DFL seat with nothing interesting going to happen.

The other one might actually be kind of interesting, it's 61B in South Minneapolis, made open by the election of Jeff Hayden to become my new State Senator (though I won't be able to vote in this one living in 61A.) No Republican filed. Tribal activist Susan Allen won the primary and her only opponent is Nathan Blumenshine, who is running under the "Respect" ticket and describes himself as an "independent progressive". His platform on his website is pretty much what you'd expect a liberal Democrat in this district to run on and even seems pretty respectful of Allen instead of attacking her. Good guy. I don't think he has a chance because too many folks in this district are party-line voters but at least the election won't be a boring blowout, he might even win a precinct or two.

Fun fact: If Allen wins (overwhelmingly likely), both House districts in this State Senate one will be represented by lesbians. In addition Minnesota will get its only Native member of the legislature. Blumenshine is good, but he's also a boring white heterosexual guy. I think I know who Lewis would be voting for if he lived here.

Apparently there was a "forum" between these two candidates which strikes me as insanely boring since they are basically identical on all the issues, but clips are on YouTube anyway.

[So the Heroes Fall]

State Senate District 59
Republican    BEN SCHWANKE    824   19.28   
Democratic-Farmer-Labor    KARI DZIEDZIC    3393   79.41   
Write-In    WRITE-IN**    56   1.31

*yawn*

State Representative District 61B
Democratic-Farmer-Labor    SUSAN ALLEN    1155   55.96   
Respect    NATHAN BLUMENSHINE    896   43.41   
Write-In    WRITE-IN**    13   0.63

Good showing by Blumenshine. He actually two precincts, one in a landslide, and tied another. Unsurprisingly he did best in the white areas, Allen won the minority areas.

[BigSkyBob]

State Senate District 59
Republican    BEN SCHWANKE    824   19.28   
Democratic-Farmer-Labor    KARI DZIEDZIC    3393   79.41   
Write-In    WRITE-IN**    56   1.31

*yawn*

State Representative District 61B
Democratic-Farmer-Labor    SUSAN ALLEN    1155   55.96   
Respect    NATHAN BLUMENSHINE    896   43.41   
Write-In    WRITE-IN**    13   0.63

Good showing by Blumenshine. He actually two precincts, one in a landslide, and tied another. Unsurprisingly he did best in the white areas, Allen won the minority areas.

Is this a sign of "racially polarized voting" within the Democratic primary?

[Gravis Marketing]

State Senate District 59
Republican    BEN SCHWANKE    824   19.28   
Democratic-Farmer-Labor    KARI DZIEDZIC    3393   79.41   
Write-In    WRITE-IN**    56   1.31

*yawn*

State Representative District 61B
Democratic-Farmer-Labor    SUSAN ALLEN    1155   55.96   
Respect    NATHAN BLUMENSHINE    896   43.41   
Write-In    WRITE-IN**    13   0.63

Good showing by Blumenshine. He actually two precincts, one in a landslide, and tied another. Unsurprisingly he did best in the white areas, Allen won the minority areas.

Is this a sign of "racially polarized voting" within the Democratic primary?

It's not a Democratic primary.

[Vasall des Midas]

Tribal activist Susan Allen won the primary and her only opponent is Nathan Blumenshine, who is running under the "Respect" ticket and describes himself as an "independent progressive". His platform on his website is pretty much what you'd expect a liberal Democrat in this district to run on and even seems pretty respectful of Allen instead of attacking her.

Echoed:

Thank you voters for your strong show of support in this Special Election! Thank you to the many, many volunteers for your hard work and commitment. I could not have done this without you. And thanks to Nate Blumenshine for running a respectful, issue focused campaign that brought the people of our district together, rather than divide us.

If the primary had been racially polarized, it couldn't possibly have been won by a Native American, no? Still, would be interesting to hear what the primary was like.
White Liberals having a problem with voting for non-White non-incumbents as long as there is a non-Republican alternative is nothing new in Minneapolis, of course.

[So the Heroes Fall]

Allen easily won the primary with 82%.

I don't think there's a sign of racial polarization here so much but rather simply that minorities just voted for the DFL candidate while the whites voted for the progressive candidate they were more impressed by. It was kind of the same thing in 2006 (actually that was more the progressive candidate who had less baggage and just happened to be white.)

[So the Heroes Fall]

Minnesota State Senator Gary Kubly passed away and a special election for his seat is being held on April 10. The seat is probably lean DFL, it's a rural area that's trended against the Democrats in recent years but was still carried by Dayton by about 2 points. Obama won it by about 5 points, and it was basically a tie in the 2008 Senate, won by Franken by 56 votes:

http://www.sos.state.mn.us/Modules/ShowDocument.aspx?documentid=11170

The bad news for the DFL is whoever wins it will have to run in the new 16th or 17th, both of which are more Republican.

[Keystone Phil]

All of our State House Specials will be on Primary day (April 24th). I believe there are six total (one in Pittsburgh, one in the Lehigh Valley, one in Montco and three in Philly). One is Likely GOP, three are Safe Dem, one is Likely Dem and the other (mine) is a toss up. The last one will be fun to watch. I have strong connections to that race.   If you get bored with the Presidential primaries and the Altmire-Critz race, tune in.

[Sam Spade]

So Dems won three of the four assembly seats, including both held by Republicans, and the GOP won the inner city Buffalo district formerly held by a Dem by running a popular Dem who has said he will caucus with the Dems, but not support Sheldon Silver, and endorsed Paladino in 2010.  The race here was D-Cons v. R-Ind. (lol)

Of the two GOP seats, 100 was the more likely one to go as the Dem incumbent who lost to the GOP former 14-term incumbent who had previously lost in 2008 but won the seat back in 2010 (and then died in 2011) was running.  103 is the big win for the Dems.  At any rate, it doesn't really affect Assembly number, but hey.

Meanwhile, the open State Senate seat is basically tied right now.  Storobin leads Fidler by 94 votes with 213/258 precincts reporting.

[Sam Spade]

Per Daily Politics and Celeste Katz, the NYC Board of Elections has the unofficial total for 100% of precincts at Storobin +120, 10756 to 10636.  AP now matches this.

Also, per Board of Elections, 1194 absentees were returned, 437 were invalid, 757 were valid.  2090 were issued in total.  At any rate, we won't know a winner on this one tonight.

Right now, the margin would be just outside that of a mandatory recount, fyi.

Where is NY Jew now?

[BigSkyBob]

Per Daily Politics and Celeste Katz, the NYC Board of Elections has the unofficial total for 100% of precincts at Storobin +120, 10756 to 10636.  AP now matches this.

Also, per Board of Elections, 1194 absentees were returned, 437 were invalid, 757 were valid.  2090 were issued in total.  At any rate, we won't know a winner on this one tonight.

Right now, the margin would be just outside that of a mandatory recount, fyi.

Where is NY Jew now?

Of the 757, how many do you expect to successfully challenged by either campaign before they are opened and counted?

[NY Jew]

Per Daily Politics and Celeste Katz, the NYC Board of Elections has the unofficial total for 100% of precincts at Storobin +120, 10756 to 10636.  AP now matches this.

Also, per Board of Elections, 1194 absentees were returned, 437 were invalid, 757 were valid.  2090 were issued in total.  At any rate, we won't know a winner on this one tonight.

Right now, the margin would be just outside that of a mandatory recount, fyi.

Where is NY Jew now?

from the NYT
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/21/nyregion/both-sides-declare-victory-in-bumpy-brooklyn-senate-race.html?_r=2

He generated support from the staunchly Orthodox communities who did not favor Mr. Fidler’s support of same-sex marriage.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/22/nyregion/in-overtime-close-senate-election-shifts-to-the-vote-counters.html

He took advantage of two growing and politically conservative communities in Brooklyn — Orthodox Jews, who related to Mr. Storobin’s position against same-sex marriage, and Russians, who were eager to elect a young candidate who spoke their language.

[Sam Spade]

Per Daily Politics and Celeste Katz, the NYC Board of Elections has the unofficial total for 100% of precincts at Storobin +120, 10756 to 10636.  AP now matches this.

Also, per Board of Elections, 1194 absentees were returned, 437 were invalid, 757 were valid.  2090 were issued in total.  At any rate, we won't know a winner on this one tonight.

Right now, the margin would be just outside that of a mandatory recount, fyi.

Where is NY Jew now?

Of the 757, how many do you expect to successfully challenged by either campaign before they are opened and counted?

I have no clue there, but as indicated in the second article NY Jew posted, Storobin's lead is now up to +143, as of yesterday.

[Vasall des Midas]

That's basically a lot closer than I expected.

[Sam Spade]

That's basically a lot closer than I expected.

For who? The conventional wisdom was safe D, and given Dem bloodletting over the past couple of days, obviously they held to that. Of course with the NY State Senate Dems, nothing is ever safe D, so who knows.

I personally suspected it would be close for a number of reasons.

[rbt48]

That's basically a lot closer than I expected.

For who? The conventional wisdom was safe D, and given Dem bloodletting over the past couple of days, obviously they held to that. Of course with the NY State Senate Dems, nothing is ever safe D, so who knows.

I personally suspected it would be close for a number of reasons.

Whatever the reasons, if Storobin wins, the Senate goes to 33R, 29D.

[So the Heroes Fall]

Didn't that district even vote for McCain? Don't see how that could be safe D.

[Landslide Lyndon]

Who cares anyway? The real battle over who controls the senate was given during redistricting and there Cuomo screwed royally his fellow Democrats.

[So the Heroes Fall]

Who cares anyway? The real battle over who controls the senate was given during redistricting and there Cuomo screwed royally his fellow Democrats.

I think most would agree it's more likely than not the Democrats take the Senate before the end of the decade even under the current map.

[Gravis Marketing]

Wasn't this district one of the McCainiest in NY, beating out most R-held districts?

[Vasall des Midas]

Wasn't this district one of the McCainiest in NY, beating out most R-held districts?

Yeah; not that that's actually surprising given how there are few sizable really heavily GOP parts in the state and how gerried the upstate is. I thought this seat a goner for the Dems without the incumbent.

[Sam Spade]

Didn't that district even vote for McCain? Don't see how that could be safe D.

Yes.  I'm just giving you the conventional wisdom, which of course, is also based on the 3-1 Dem registration advantage and the fact that Democrats have held seats in this area since rocks cooled.

[Sam Spade]

Who cares anyway? The real battle over who controls the senate was given during redistricting and there Cuomo screwed royally his fellow Democrats.

I think most would agree it's more likely than not the Democrats take the Senate before the end of the decade even under the current map.

Never ever underestimate the power of the NY State Senate Democrats to screw everything up.

[Torie]

Isn't this senate seat converted to a much safer Pub one under the new map?