Blakeman seeks to court splintered Jewish vote as state GOP follows suit

Rabbi Deborah Bravo said a few members of her politically mixed Bethpage synagogue have talked with her about their priorities in deciding between a vote for Democrat Gov. Kathy Hochul and Republican Bruce Blakeman. 

She says one Democratic-leaning independent voter told her she "sort of feels party-less right now."

It's in those conversations playing out in the large and diverse Jewish communities throughout the state where Republicans believe concerns about Israel, along with allegations of antisemitism, are creating an opening with moderate Jewish voters, many of whom historically broke Democratic. Blakeman, who is Jewish, has increasingly emphasized the argument in his campaign as he challenges Hochul this November. He is bolstered by a new state Republican Party ad campaign, hoping to pick up votes with a direct appeal to Jews: "You have a home with us." 

Bravo, who is among about 20 religious leaders on a statewide interfaith council, said her community is interested in which candidates protect their religious rights best and believe in Israel's existence as a Jewish state.

"I have had conversations with people who are like, 'Israel is my leading issue. When I go to the polls I am voting about Israel because if I don't vote about Israel, who's going to vote about Israel?' " she said. 

With the new ad campaign, Blakeman and state Republicans are aiming to pick up Democratic and Democratic-leaning independent Jewish voters in swing communities across Nassau and other voter-rich downstate counties. The print and digital campaign includes a QR code that lands voters on a page where they can become registered Republicans. 

But will it be enough to win over more Jewish voters for Blakeman? 

Campaigning on Israel

Even before the GOP's promotional launch, Blakeman has increasingly tapped into his Jewish identity on the campaign trail. He made history in 2021 when he was elected the first Jewish county executive of Nassau County. New York State is home to one of the largest population of Jews in the United States. 

The five boroughs of New York City plus Nassau, Suffolk and Westchester counties is home to 736,000 Jewish households that contain about 1,372,000 Jewish people, 1,076,000 of whom are adults and 296,000 children, according to a 2023 survey by the UJA Federation of NY. 

After the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel killed 1,200 people, Blakeman tied himself to the military strategy of President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in speeches and media events, often praising the Israeli leader, whose handling of Gaza has drawn international criticism. A resident of Atlantic Beach, Blakeman's Republican base includes the Orthodox communities of the Five Towns section of the county's South Shore and the Iranian American Jewish residents of the Great Neck area on the North Shore.

During his first term as county executive, the crisis in the Middle East waged on, with Israel at the center, and nearly 75,000 people in Gaza died as Israel retaliated, according to United Nations estimates. The Israeli government has denied international court allegations of crimes against humanity for intentionally blocking food and healthcare as it attacked civilians. College campus protests, as well as fears of antisemitism, spread across New York and the United States.

Division over Israel has increasingly surfaced among congressional Democrats.

Last week, more than 100 Democratic members of the U.S. House, though not Long Island's representatives, voted to block U.S. military funding to the Israeli government in a move illustrative of the divisions over Israel within the Democratic Party and American politics. 

Blakeman over the years appeared with rabbis and Jewish leaders at news conferences who have been vocal about the Israeli government's right to defend itself. Outside the county's Holocaust memorial in Glen Cove, he announced the creation of a special deputies program for armed citizen volunteers — about 10% of whom are from Orthodox private synagogue security firms based in the Five Towns.

He built an alliance with county Legis. Mazi Melesa Pilip (R-Great Neck), lead sponsor of a bill creating a free-speech buffer zone around houses of worship. Pilip, in introducing the bill, said she was motivated by a protest outside a Manhattan synagogue. Blakeman, in front of hundreds of supporters, signed it into law at his second-term inauguration earlier this year.         

On his campaign's social media page, Blakeman is seen in videos walking with prominent Jewish leaders in Crown Heights and Flatbush in Brooklyn; denouncing the Vermont-based ice cream company Ben & Jerry's U.S. for the political views of its Jewish founders who oppose Israeli government policies in the West Bank and Gaza.

Blakeman has called New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, the city's first Muslim mayor and a democratic socialist, antisemitic and denounced him for not participating in the Israel Day Parade, often attempting to tie Hochul, who has taken a more mainstream Democratic stance, with Mamdani and the rising left-wing of the Democratic Party.

If elected governor, Blakeman vows to be a check on Mamdani, he has said. 

"I think he's an antisemite. I think he's anti-Israel. One of the first things he did as mayor was water down the definition of antisemitism. He speaks out against Israel all the time," Blakeman told reporters at the New York City parade.   

In interviews, Blakeman also doubled down on comments he made about Democratic congressional candidate Brad Lander, who is also Jewish, being a guard in a Nazi concentration camp.

When asked about whether Hochul believes Democrats have been too tolerant of some of what Blakeman and some Jews perceive as antisemitism, campaign spokesperson Sarafina Chitika pointed to the governor's support for Jewish communities.

“Governor Hochul launched a nation-leading plan to combat antisemitism across New York state, invested billions in keeping New Yorkers safe, and led the passage of a historic buffer zone bill to protect houses of worship," she said in a statement to Newsday. "She was the first American official to visit disaster sites in Israel in the wake of the Oct. 7 attack — she will never stop fighting back against antisemitism every time it rears its head and she will never stop standing up for Jewish New Yorkers.”

Three years into the conflict in the Middle East, American involvement and support of Israel's military strategy in the most recent war in Gaza have divided America's Jewish communities, with only half saying Israel's ongoing military operations in Gaza are justified. About one-quarter say they believe Israel has committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, an Associated Press-NORC poll released earlier this month showed.  

An April survey by the Jewish Electorate Institute found 86% of American Jews describe themselves as generally pro-Israel but fewer than one-quarter say they are both pro-Israel and supportive of Israeli policies. A 63% majority identified as pro-Israel and critical of the Israeli government policies — split roughly equally between those who are critical of some policies and those critical of many. Only 14% said they were not generally pro-Israel or do not hold a view.

"There's a fracturing along many complicated lines which I guess plays out somewhat in electoral politics but it's a much more intra-community debate that's going on and that won't necessarily be reflected in election returns," said Bob Liff, a political analyst and former journalist who extensively covered politics and Jewish communities in New York City. 

New York's Jewish vote, "to the extent that there is one," Liff said, is complex, multilayered and far from uniform. He said he believes most non-Orthodox American Jews, like many in Israel, are critical of the Netanyahu government. Many also are not supporters of Trump and by extension are likely to be unconvinced by Blakeman, a staunch ally of the president. 

"When it comes to the gubernatorial election, I would think you are going to see that Jews remain a progressive electorate in terms of civil rights, economic rights, social services — a lot of things that have driven Jews to the Democratic camp," Liff said. 

Blakeman would get more of the Orthodox, right-wing Jews, Liff said, but in an appeal to independent voters he said he thinks "Trump is a bigger anchor around Blakeman's neck than any difficulties Jews might have with the Democratic Party is around Hochul's neck." 

Seizing on fissures

State GOP chairman Ed Cox, in an open letter to encourage Jewish voters to support Republicans, writes: "We watch with sadness as the Democratic Party, which alleges to stand for marginalized groups, spirals into that ugliest and oldest hatred, anti-Semitism." 

Blakeman, when asked about whether he was actively courting New York's independent Jewish voters, said he believes moderate Democrats and independent voters are "fed up with weird and anti-American policies" and touted his 2025 county executive campaign's success among independents and centrist Democrats. 

"Each day more and more Democrat Jewish voters say that this will be their first time voting Republican because Hochul and Mamdani have embraced anti-American values that hurt everyone, especially Jewish New Yorkers," Blakeman said in a statement to Newsday.

State and Nassau County Democratic Committee chairman Jay Jacobs said Republicans are trying to paint the entire party with views that come from a few individuals. He said Jewish voters "should take offense with the political opportunism and pandering Republicans resort to." 

"I think it is rich for Republicans and Blakeman to claim that Jewish voters have a home in the Republican Party, which is home to the Young Republicans who had those awful hateful statements in their private messaging that went public, including adoration for Adolf Hitler," Jacobs said. 

Jewish Democrats say they do have their concerns with the rhetoric from the party's left flank, exposing a political vulnerability that did not exist in 2022 when Hochul faced Republican Lee Zeldin, who is Jewish. Hochul went on to beat Zeldin by 6 percentage points. 

Assemb. Charles Lavine (D-Glen Cove) said while he believes the Jewish outreaches are "all part of Blakeman's shtick," he also agrees that in some areas Democrats are vulnerable "to a limited extent." 

"It would be amongst those people who hold the Democratic Party responsible for the DSA people," Lavine said, referring to the Democratic Socialists of America, a rising political organization that's been critical of the Israeli government. "They're not all antisemites, they're not all Jew haters, but there are a certain number of them who are. So yeah, that's a concern."

He said he believes Hochul has a track record of very strong support for Israel and has appropriately separated herself from the far-left members of the party. 

Eve Meltzer-Krief, a Huntington pediatrician who unsuccessfully ran for a seat on the Suffolk County Legislature in 2023, said the concerns wouldn't drive most Jewish voters toward Blakeman.

"While I have concerns there are factions in the Democratic Party that are not understanding,  my experience as a liberal Zionist Jewish Democrat, there is no way those concerns could ever lead me to vote for Blakeman, who stands squarely against my values," she said. 

Bravo, the rabbi, said the governor has proved her support of Israel in ways like her own creation of religious buffer zones, Holocaust memorials and a trip to Israel soon after the October 2023 attack.

Bravo said those who are pro-Israel shouldn't feel as if they would need to vote for Blakeman, unless they also support his position on immigration, environmental and gender issues.

"If you also believe in these other Democratic principles then maybe you should vote for Hochul. ...It's not a choice of 'should I support Israel or should I support Democrats,'" she said.  

By Candice Ferrette

candice.ferrette@newsday.comcandiceferrette

Candice Ferrette covers Nassau County government and politics on Long Island. She has been a reporter at Newsday since 2011.