It’s a battleground for the 2024 election, with millions of dollars being spent and big names in American politics emerging. But it’s not in the rust zone. And it’s not Georgia or Nevada either.
It’s Long Island, a suburb east of New York City home to about 3 million people that could play a big role in choosing the party that controls Congress. Democrats are just a few seats shy of a majority in the US House, and the island, just a train ride from liberal Manhattan, has emerged as an unlikely stage for some of this year’s most contentious races.
The district is also an unlikely center of Republican power in deep blue New York.
In some ways, the issues that have pushed Long Island to the right in recent elections could rouse any suburb in the battleground state come November, when GOP candidates plan their campaigns on crime, immigration and the economy. The Democratic move to replace President Joe Biden with Vice President Kamala Harris as the top ticket last month added another unpredictable variable to negative races across the country, with both parties scrambling to assess the impact.
But here, Republicans have seized momentum by harnessing the suburban backlash against New York’s progressive politics and positioning themselves as a dam that can prevent the left from invading Long Island with liberal excesses.
The strategy has so far proven to be successful. Long Island Republicans have dominated local races in Nassau and Suffolk counties and control all but one of the island’s congressional seats. All of New York can reliably vote Democratic, but there are nuances near Manhattan.
“The Democratic Party is no longer the Democratic Party as we knew it, or I knew it growing up. It’s changed. It’s become much more to the left, progressives are taking over,” said Joe Cairo, chairman of the Nassau County Republican Party and the architect of Republican victories on the island. “People are moving here, they’re tired of the city.”
Republicans scored perhaps their most significant victory in Long Island two years ago, when the city was reeling from a pandemic-era surge in violent crime. Suburban voters were constantly bombarded with apocalyptic headlines and TV commentary hinting at an urban hellscape next door.
Republicans swept all four of the island’s congressional seats, and a Long Island Republican, former U.S. Rep. Lee Zeldin, nearly pulled off an upset in the governor’s race — a position the GOP hasn’t held in years.
However, Democrats now see Long Island as a prime opportunity to regain congressional seats in their bid to regain the House majority.
The party is coming off an encouraging victory in a special winter election for the seat vacated when George Santos was expelled from Congress. Democrat Tom Suozzi, who ran as a centrist, won the Republican county legislature.
Republican U.S. Rep. Anthony D’Esposito, who is seeking a second term in the eastern Queens district, faces a serious challenge from Democrat Laura Gillen, whom he defeated by less than 4 points in 2022.
Democrats have also issued stark warnings about what a unified federal government under Republicans could mean for abortion, following a pattern that has worked elsewhere to boost voter turnout on their side.
“The legacy of the Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade is starting to have an impact and really resonate with people who care about access to reproductive health care,” said Gillen, a former city supervisor.
Long Island Democrats also hope to benefit from having Harris as a presidential candidate, as voters will energize around a female candidate in a year when abortion protection is on voters’ minds.
“Harris joining the top of the ticket has energized more than just the presidential race. It’s given a lot of hope to Democratic congressional campaigns where, as Biden sank, they also saw their prospects diminish,” said Larry Levy, dean of the National Center for Suburban Studies at Hofstra University on Long Island.
In New York, Democrats have been trying to recalibrate after the Long Island losses in 2022 by reorienting their political strategy toward moderates.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul has upped the ante on crime, winning concessions from state House progressives to enact bail laws and strengthen criminal penalties for assaulting retail workers. In June, Hochul also made an 11th-hour decision to suspend a new toll on Manhattan-bound drivers due to a heavy backlash from commuters.
Republicans downplayed Suozzi’s recent victory, arguing that the former congressman faced a relatively unheard-of low turnout in a special election on a cold, snowy day. Still, Democrats believe Suozzi’s centrist approach has given their candidates a Long Island road map.
“You can’t ignore the things people care about, and you have to grab the vital center to win,” said John Avlon, a former CNN anchor and Democrat running against Republican U.S. Rep. Nick LaLota in the congressional district east of Long. An island that has been under Republican control for a decade.
But Democrats may struggle to shake the perception that they are too progressive for some suburban voters.
Joe Gillespie, a 58-year-old electrician who commutes from Levittown, Long Island, to construction sites in New York City, said Democrats have become too liberal on crime, immigration and social issues to convincingly change course.
“They’ve gone so far to the left,” Gillespie said. “People assume they’re just doing it to get votes back right now.”
The candidates will also have to contend with a prominent figure in the 2024 races: former President Donald Trump.
The former Republican president is often hailed as a hero in parts of Long Island by many suburban blue-collar workers and New York City police and firefighters. Trump flags fly both on manicured front lawns and behind pickup trucks.
Trump won Suffolk County in the eastern part of the island in 2016 and 2020, although his margin narrowed last time. He lost Nassau County in both elections, trailing Biden by 15 points in the district where D’Esposito now faces Gillen. It remains to be seen whether Trump will hurt or help Republicans on the island this year, but both parties are optimistic.
Violent crime has dropped significantly in the New York metropolitan area since the 2022 election, but Republicans are still raising it.
Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman, a Republican, has sought to score points with suburban parents by leading an effort to ban women’s and girls’ sports teams with transgender players from county-run parks and fields. And while it may not have much practical effect, the push reflects a line of attack that has worked for GOP leaders elsewhere.
The new rules are now the subject of a legal battle. Democratic state Attorney General Letitia James claims the ban violates state anti-discrimination laws, but Blakeman said support for the policy locally has been “overwhelming.”
“My phone and text and email are probably eight for and two against,” he said. “The Democratic Party has drifted so far to the left that independent voters and common sense Democrats can no longer support their positions,” he said.
