New York CD 3: Big Lessons for Both Parties

First, this declaimer. For years, I’ve cautioned against exaggerating the importance of any one special election. For the most part, they’re one and done, I argued. Don’t try to draw any wider lessons. And I still, generally, hold that view.

But this one is different. On Tuesday, Feb. 13, Democrat Tom Suozzi won a special election in Long Island’s 3 rd Congressional District, the seat formerly held by disgraced GOP Representative George Santos. It’s a stunning win for Democrats and an embarrassing shellacking for Republicans – with huge implications for both parties in this presidential election year.

For weeks, NY3 had been widely heralded as an election of national consequence. Which, indeed, it turned out to be. Both candidates focused on national issues: immigration, crime, abortion. Both national parties sank millions of dollars into the race. Some reporters called it the one congressional election whose results would predict the outcome of the presidential election in November.

Not only that. Most of the media went so far as to predict a big Republican win. After all, not only had Republicans won every recent Long Island election – for local, gubernatorial, and congressional campaigns – this special election was coming in the middle of a crisis at the border and war in the Middle East, at a time when public outrage at the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision has reportedly started to cool, and on the heels of Special Counsel Robert Hur’s report which painted President Biden as too old for the job. It was bound to be a bad night for Democrats, they said. Even Speaker Mike Johnson crowed: “If we win big here, we will set the tone for conservative victories across the board in 2024 so we can defend and grow the House Majority.”

Oops! Once again, the media – and Johnson – got it wrong. For all the reasons stated above, Republicans could have won this race. Instead, Democrat Tom Suozzi not only won, he crushed Republican candidate Mazi Pilip, 53.9 percent to 46.1 percent. The vaunted Long Island Republican Party machine didn’t deliver. And the dreaded Joe Biden curse didn’t exist.

Immediately, “Maga Mike” changed his tune, from saying NY3 meant everything to NY3 meant nothing. “It’s in no way a bellwether of what’s going to happen this fall,” Johnson told reporters. GOP pollster Frank Luntz was more honest. This is the “final wake-up call for House Republicans,” he warned, explaining: “The issues are on their side. Their congressional behavior is not.”

There are three lessons both parties can learn from NY3. First, the candidate matters. Republicans made a huge mistake in nominating Pilip, a largely unknown country legislator. After suffering national embarrassment from electing the fabulist George Santos, voters weren’t ready to gamble on another “new face.” Democrats wisely went with veteran mayor, county official, and congressman Suozzi.

Second, the campaign matters. Suozzi outgunned Pilip. He campaigned nonstop. Pilip didn’t even show up at some of her own rallies. Suozzi raised more money than she did. With the help of organized labor, he ran a massive ground game. And he relied heavily on voting by mail (which used to be a Republican specialty, until Donald Trump denounced it). Before polls opened on Feb. 13, Suozzi had captured 57 percent of votes cast in early voting and mail ballots.

Third, voters have had enough with partisan bickering in Washington. Buoyed by polls showing immigration the issue voters cared about most, with busloads of migrants arriving in New York every day, Pilip blasted Democrats for not doing anything about the border. But Suozzi fired back, correctly blaming MAGA Republicans in Congress for killing the strongest border bill ever, a bipartisan measure which he supported, but she didn’t, and Biden had promised to sign. Suozzi beat Republicans on their own issue.

For Democrats, there’s one other important message out of NY3: Celebrate! And get to work! Enough gloom and doom. All I’ve heard from fellow Democrats lately is how worried they are that Trump’s so popular, Biden’s so old, and all is lost.

Nonsense! Celebrate! Remember: Victory in NY3 doesn’t stand alone. It’s the latest in a string of Democratic victories under Biden in Virginia, Kentucky, Kansas, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Voters want results, not political game-playing. And, no matter how old he is, Biden has proven he can deliver.

Democrats have a winning message for 2024: Order, not chaos. Democracy, not autocracy. Experience, not amateur hour. They can win the White House, Senate, and House – if only they stop fretting, get to work, and make it happen.

(Bill Press is host of The BillPressPod, and author of 10 books, including: “From the Left: My Life in the Crossfire.” His email address is: bill@billpress.com. Readers may also follow him on Twitter @billpresspod.)