Once the Board of Elections posts its certified election results, I usually do at least one story where I try to glean what there is to be found from the data. As you may have noticed, I’ve already done one story from this year’s data.
Sometimes I use the data to predict an important new trend. Sometimes, as in my last piece, I write about an unimportant new trend. Sometimes I use it to shatter a myth. And sometimes I find something which attracts national attention.
But sometimes there are columns like this one.
So, here now, a few observations about the 2012 Federal primary.
Republican Primary for US Senate:
Bob Turner’s 63/27 landslide victory in the City over Wendy Long was accomplished in a turnout of barely over 19,000; almost 2/3 of the votes came from Brooklyn and Queens, where Turner’s Congressional District lies.
In Queens, nearly a third of the 6,500 votes cast came from two ADs largely within Turner’s Congressional District, while the County’s other 16 AD’s managed an average of 287 votes.
In Brooklyn, Turner actually lost four black majority ADs.
Outside of Brooklyn and Queens, Turner was not particularly strong. He did not take a majority in any of the three other Boroughs, barely carrying the Bronx and losing Staten Island by almost five points.
Outside of Turner’s home-base counties, he beat Long in the City by only 42 votes, which accounts for less than half a percentage point.
A few points about the pathetic showing of George Maragos.
The support of the Brooklyn Tea Party brought him less than 6% of the Borough’s votes.
His home County’s proximity to Queens got him less than 10% in that Borough.
His Greek name got him less than 19% in Astoria’s 36th AD and less than 9% in the Brooklyn/Staten Island based 60th.
5th Congressional District:
Greg Meeks got just over 2/3rds of the vote in Queens, with the psychotic and possibly dangerous Allan Jennings running second in a fragmented field.
By contrast, Meeks got a bare majority in the district’s small new Nassau County portion, with runner-up status there going to the delusional, though probably harmless, Joseph Marthone.
Of note?
The district contains portions of five Assembly Districts represented by white people. Of those, two were carried by Mike Scala. While I suspect the portion of the 24th AD contained within the 5th is actually heavily black, I still think the combined numbers for these five ADs are revealing.
Meeks got 43%, Scala 34% and the others 22%. Subtracting the 24th AD, It is Meeks 38%, Scala 38% (Meeks beat him by one vote) and the others 22%.
6th. Congressional District:
The starling thing about Grace Meng’s victory is its magnitude—an outright majority of nearly 53% in a four way field.
But it is more than that, Meng beat runner up Rory Lancman in his own Assembly district by 6%; Lancman would have lost there even had he received every vote which had gone instead to Dr. Robert Mittman.
In fact, in the eastern end of the district where the most of the Jewish vote lie, Meng beat Lancman in every AD but the 27th, which has a heavy Orthodox Jewish vote.
Further, in none of the area’s where there were significant Jewish votes would Lancman’s getting Dr. Mittman’s votes have altered the order of finish.
As expected, Meng rampaged among Oriental Asian voters; in her home AD, she got just under 83% of the vote.
Perhaps less expected was her strong vote among South Asians.
South Asians prime Democratic voters may or may not outnumber Jewish primes in the 24th and 25th ADs under the old lines still used in this primary (I strongly suspect that they do not), but apparently South Asians in these ADs went to Meng with enough force to help deliver her both of them (the 24th by an outright majority), even though Lancman is the 25th AD’s Assemblyman.
But, Asian votes alone could not have delivered those victories; and they certainly don’t account for Meng’s rampage through the Forest Hills-based 28th AD, which Meng won by an astonishing 17 points.
At the district’s west end, Meng’s rabbit in her hat was Latinos. Meng took around 2/3rd of the vote, give or take, in ADs 34, 35 and 39.
Elizabeth Crowley’s strength was pretty much restricted to the district’s white Christian areas—she carried ADs 30, 37 and 38.
As noted, Dr. Robert Mittman’s ability to split the Jewish from Lancman was probably less significant than Grace Meng’s.
If we remove from consideration those ADs where none of the candidates broke into triple digits in their actual vote, Mittman’s vote was pretty consistently between 3.5% and 5.5% almost everywhere, whether Jewish or not.
The exceptions are instructive.
Mittman took less that 2.5% in Meng’s home AD and took almost 6.5% in his home area.
There was one larger exception. Mittman took almost 11% in the 27th AD, where he ran a targeted campaign among Orthodox Jews based on his opposition to same sex marriage.
However, even this cannot be written off as an example of using a candidate with a Jewish name to split off Jewish votes from a Jewish candidate. If the efforts on behalf of Bob Turner prove anything, it’s that such efforts can work just as well for a candidate with an uncircumcised shamrock.
We may not like it, but Dr. Mittman didn’t steal those anti-gay votes; Dr. Mittman earned those votes.
7th Congressional District:
The final numbers show Nydia Velazquez won just under 58%, while Erik Dilan got just under 35%, a margin of almost 23%. The much ballyhooed fringe candidacy of libertarian Dan O’Connor got less than 5% , while former hack turned faux Wall Street occupier George Martinez proved that an Astroturf grass-roots campaign fueled entirely on cattle oriented methane was good for less than 2.5%.
But for much of the district it wasn’t even that much of a race.
In Manhattan, Velazquez got nearly 76%, while Dilan got just over 6%, with Dan O’Connor’s Chinatown “I speak your languages” strategy yielding him nearly 14%. (In the 62nd AD, which includes most of Chinatown, O’Connor got over 16%).
In Queens, Velazquez won nearly 64%, while Dilan got just over 20%.
Surprisingly, one of my theories turned out to be wrong; in the two Queens ADs where the Lopez social services empire is a force to be reckoned with, Velazquez won nearly 65% and Dilan got just under 20%.
Since these are also the Queens areas where Velazquez has the most incumbency advantage (she did far worse in the new areas of Queens she picked up in redistricting), that might account for why Ridgewood—Bushwick does not seem to matter all that much, though it might also be that these voters just don’t care for Lopez, who is said to actually live in their neighborhood.
In the context of Manhattan and Queens, Dilan’s nearly 41% in Brooklyn to Velazquez’s 54% doesn’t look half bad.
But Brooklyn was actually three races.
The First Brooklyn race was in East Brooklyn.
Four ADs (53, 54, 55 and 56) in the 7th CD overlap into Dilan’s Council District. Nydia’s represented more of this turf than Dilan, although there is some turf he which only he’s represented previously (or at least in the last decade) and most of the non-Dilan turf is in Vito Lopez’s 53rd AD.
While there is a growing Yuppie/Artist/Hipster sector here, some clusters of black voters and various Asians, as well as some Hasidim, this area is basically the heart of Latino East Brooklyn, and Velazquez once considered it her base, although it is also the base of her worst enemies.
The results here?
Velazquez 3692 (50.59%), Dilan 3243 (44.44%), O’Connor 151 (2.07%); Martinez 175 (2.40%).
While Nydia beat the boys in their own turf, they did give her a good fight.
The second Brooklyn race was in Hasidic Williamsburg.
The 7th CD’s portion of the 50th AD is Hasidic by a healthy majority, and the 7th’s Hasidim overwhelmingly live in the 50th AD (which, in addition to Williamsburg, includes most of the 7th CD’s portion of Hasidic Bed-Stuy).
The vote in the 50th AD was Velazquez 3774 (37.40%), Dilan 6206 (61.50%) with the fringe boys taking less than 1% between them.
Hasidic observers have been nearly unanimous in estimating how the non-Hasidic vote went in the 50th by using the 68% to 21% figure applicable to the rest of the Congressional District outside of the 50th AD, thereby showing a somewhat larger % of the Hasidic vote going to Dilan than I think occurred.
Those mostly Latino non-Hasidic voters in the 50th did not vote like Yuppies in Carroll Gardens or radicals in the East Village—most likely, they voted like other East Brooklyn Latinos–something like 51% to 44% in favor of Nydia–therefore their impact on the 50AD vote was slight, and in the absence of an ED by ED analysis I’m going to say that the Dilan victory among the Hasidim was something like 65% to 35%, give or take.
The third Brooklyn race was for the rest of of the District’s Brooklyn portion: the Brownstone belt, Latino and Asian Sunset Park and a small ethnically mixed area of Borough Park.
The vote in the rest of Brooklyn was Velazquez 5691(82.60%), Dilan 418 (6.07%); O’Connor 415 (6.02%, despite the area including Brooklyn’s Chinatown) and Martinez 323 (4.69% in an area which includes his old base where he once served as a District Leader).
And that pretty much accounts for Nydia Velazquez’s 13% plus victory in Brooklyn, and pretty much accounts for why Lincoln Restler has to worry, but Jo Anne Simon probably does not.
8th Congressional District:
Let’s be fair to Charles Barron in analyzing his 72% to 28% defeat by Hakeem Jeffries.
First of all, it wasn’t 72% to 28%; it was 71.56% to 28.17%.
Clearly, the white media has been exaggerating the Jeffries victory.
Further, if we take out the Klansmen of Howard Beach, where those with blood still fresh on their hands gave Barron only 11% and instead just include the Brooklyn vote, the margin slims down to a thisclose 71.18% to 28.56%.
How bad was this landslide?
Well, in the 45th AD, the only one in the district where white votes are almost totally undiluted by people of color, Barron got beat by a vote of just over 96% to just under 4%.
But when one gets beat 90% to 10% in the 46th, which includes the projects of Coney Island, or 76% to 24% in the 41st , which includes a healthy dose of Flatlands , 80% to 19% in the 50th, which includes the Whitman and Ingersoll projects, or 83% to 17% in the 59th which includes most of Canarsie, and where black voters may account for nearly half the vote, one has to conclude that redneck southern Brooklyn whiteys and Orthodox Jews were not your only problem.
And indeed they were not. Lefty Brownstone types were as well.
In the district’s portion of the 52nd AD, which now consists only of a portion of Boerum Hill where Barron actually beat Ed Towns in 2006, thanks to Atlantic Yards, Barron lost 84% to 15%, even though he was once again better placed on that issue.
Then there are black voters.
One can perhaps forgive Barron his loss in the 57th, which has a healthy contingent of white votes, and is represented by Jeffries in the Assembly, but 82% to 18% with Atlantic Yards working in your favor?
And in the heart of black Brooklyn, Barron lost Bed-Stuy’s 56th AD 64% to 36%.
What’s that you say? The influx of whiteys?
Well in Brownsville’s 55th AD, Barron lost 61% to 39%. A 22% loss in the blackest of black Brooklyn.
In the 54th AD, Barron lost 59% to 38%, despite the remnants of Daryl and Deidre Towns’ old club spoiling for victory in a part of the district which contained their best turf, and the other side's locals otherwise occupied trying to elect their Councilman/District Leader to Congress in the next District.
The only AD where Barron managed to break 40% was the one represented by his wife (almost all of which he represents on the City Council); and even there he managed to lose 53% to 47%.
Chris Banks’ Assembly campaign against Inez Barron is now loaded for bear and riding a wave.
9th Congressional District:
Yvette Clarke beat Sylvia Kinard with just over 87% of the vote to a bit under 12%.
My prediction that some militantly pro-Israel voters might try to give Clarke a slap is borne out in the results. Kinard got 32.5% in the heavily Orthodox 48th AD and 34% in the heavily Russian and Orthodox 45th. In other areas with smaller but still significant concentrations of such votes, Clarke’s performance was also significantly lower than in black or exclusively Brownstone areas.
13th Congressional District:
It was close, but not really recount close:
Rangel 44.34%, Espaillat 41.83%, Williams 9.86%, Johnson 2.35% and Schley 1.38%.
If not for the election night counting glitches, Rangel’s margin of slightly more than 2.5% should not have caused so much fuss.
Looked at by boroughs, the race looked competitive everywhere.
In Manhattan, it was Rangel 44.58%, Espaillat 41.10%, Williams 10.46%, Johnson 2.24% and Schley 1.40%.
In the Bronx, it was Espaillat 46.99%, Rangel 42.67%, Williams 5.67%, Johnson 3.14% and Schley 1.23%.
Looked AD by AD, the race was competitive almost nowhere.
Rangel rampaged through Central Harlem’s 70th AD, 60% to Espaillat’s 20%, with Williams taking 15%.
Rangel did his Puerto Rican daddy proud, charging through East Harlem’s 68th AD 64% to Espaillat’s 19% and Williams 12%.
In the 69th AD’s racially diverse Manhattan Valley and similar turf, Rangel took 52% to Espaillat 26% and Williams’ 16%.
Meanwhile, in the Inwood/Washington Heights based 72nd AD, Espaillat took 78% to Rangel’s 17% and Williams’ 3%.
In Manhattan, only the racially mixed 71st, where Washington Heights Dominicans cohabitate with West Harlem blacks and Hudson Heights whites, was there a real race, with Espaillat taking 47% to Rangel’s 40% and Williams’ 10%.
In the Bronx, it was more of the same.
Rangel won the mostly black 77th AD 63% to 27% and the mostly Puerto Rican 80th 61% to 28%.
Espaillat won the 78th AD, which has a growing Dominican population, 56% to 35% and the 86th AD, 72% to 24%.
Williams was hardly a factor in these areas, barely edging out Joyce Johnson.
Only in the 81st AD, which has a significant white vote, was there anything resembling a race.
Unlike in Manhattan, where white political support mostly went to Rangel, and where white voters seem to have inured mostly in Rangel’s favor, or to have gone to Williams (the 69th) or seem to have gone to Espaillat by a small margin (the 71st), the local white political establishment in the 81st AD was strongly in Espaillat’s corner, and Espaillat won here 48% to 40%, with Williams taking 9% (by far his best Bronx showing).
While it may have been expected for Rangel to have beat Espaillat handily among black voters, it seems striking how poorly Espaillat did in black areas against an incumbent who was such wounded meat.
In Manhattan at least, it appears that black voters who wanted to send a message to Rangel sent it by voting for Clyde Williams.
In fact, Espaillat’s showing in places like Central Harlem was so poor that one is probably not crazy to posit that most of the Williams’ voters there, if forced to choose between Rangel and Espaillat, would have voted for Rangel.
Even more striking is Espaillat’s weakness among non-Dominican Latinos, especially, but not exclusively Puerto Ricans.
Even in places where Espaillat probably won the non-Dominican Latino vote (parts of the Bronx), he clearly did not win it by much.
Then there is the white vote (much reduced here by redistricting).
After the election a friend wrote:
Sam Hudis: If not for Clyde Williams, Espaillat would have won easily.
Gate: I'd have to see where his vote came from to agree with that conclusion. If it came from Central Harlem, I would have to disagree–if it came mostly from whites–a different matter.
Sam Hudis: We'll see when the results by AD are published, but I suspect Williams got a lot of his votes from anti-Rangel whites.
The answer is Williams got votes both from whites and from Manhattan blacks.
For the reasons already outlined, I think Williams’ black votes came from Charlie Rangel’s hide.
The white votes are a different matter. First a caveat—I did not do an ED by ED analysis, so my conclusions are not really conclusive.
I note though that in the three ADs with a significant white vote, Rangel got between 40% and 52% of the vote. It seems unlikely he could have done so while getting blitzed among whites.
Further, in those ADs, Espaillat managed between 26% and 48% of the vote, meaning his appeal to the voters in these areas was hardly overwhelming in comparison to Rangel’s.
While I think that, unlike in the black areas where Williams did well, the 10% to 16% of the votes Williams managed in areas where there was a white presence would have broken in Espaillat’s favor, rather than Rangel’s, I don’t think it would have done so by any overwhelming margin.
Since Williams’ black vote would probably have broken for Rangel, I do not believe that Williams’ presence cost Espaillat the election.
16th Congressional District:
In this District’s Bronx portion, Eliot Engel beat nutcase Aniello Grimaldi 82% to 17% (in the Westchester portion, Engel won 92% to 8%).
Grimaldi’s best showing was in the 82nd AD (24.46%), which does include a number of Italian-American voters who obviously don’t know that Grimaldi once sued the Pope.