Suffolk County executive race: David Calone, Ed Romaine ads turn 'nasty'

With just weeks left in the race for Suffolk County executive, the ad campaigns featuring Republican Ed Romaine and Democrat David Calone are turning sharply negative.

The two are running to replace County Executive Steve Bellone, a Democrat who is term-limited. The winner of the Nov. 7 election will be the county's first new executive in 12 years. The four-year term comes with a $234,124 annual salary.

Video ads paid for by Calone's campaign and "Advancing Suffolk," an outside political action committee that backs him, call Romaine "Crook-Ed" and say that as Brookhaven Town supervisor, Romaine "ignores corruption and raises our taxes.” Romaine representatives said he has no ties to past scandals and has a record of fiscal responsibility.

Ads paid for by the New York Republican State Committee and Romaine's campaign call Calone a "Hochul Liberal." The ads are part of an effort to tie Calone to Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat criticized for her affordable housing proposal that would have allowed the state to override local zoning. Calone has criticized the housing plan, which failed at the state level this year. 

Michael Dawidziak, a political consultant who has worked with both Republicans and Democrats in local elections, said the race has gotten “unnecessarily nasty” on both sides. 

“It is definitely the politics of personal destruction,” Dawidziak said. “They are basically trying to say … each other are terrible people. I don’t think the voters like it or buy it.”

There are 972,257 registered voters in Suffolk County, according to the state Board of Elections. Of those, 355,006 are Democrats and 322,420 are Republicans. There are 294,831 voters not registered with any party.

Attacking Romaine

Many of the anti-Romaine ads, running online and on local cable television channels, try to tie him to past GOP corruption cases in Brookhaven and Suffolk County. Romaine, 76, of Center Moriches, has served since 1986 in elected posts including Suffolk County legislator, county clerk and Brookhaven Town supervisor.

"Romaine's pals have been convicted of fraud, bribery and public corruption," according to a 30-second TV ad paid for by Calone's campaign. "That is shady."

The TV ad refers to the town Romaine runs as “Crookhaven” — a moniker given to Brookhaven after a scandal in the early 1990s involving car dealer and developer John McNamara. McNamara in 1992 pleaded guilty to defrauding General Motors through a $6 billion loan scheme and admitted he bribed town officials. Romaine was a Suffolk County legislator at the time and says he had no involvement in the McNamara scandal.

The Calone ads also are designed to highlight Romaine's connections with other Republican figures such as the late Brookhaven and Suffolk County GOP chairman John Powell, who was convicted of extortion and racketeering and served 2 years in prison, Calone campaign manager Shane Wolfe said. Romaine attended a fundraiser for Powell's legal fund and filed a letter of support with the court before Powell’s sentencing in 2000, according to Newsday archives. 

Wolfe also pointed to Romaine's association with former Suffolk County Legis. Fred Towle Jr., a Shirley Republican who resigned after pleading guilty to bribery in 2003. Towle was a deputy county clerk in the 1990s when Romaine served as Suffolk County clerk.

“It's all part of this good-old-boys network of corruption in the Town of Brookhaven that Romaine has been a part of his whole career,” Wolfe said.

Romaine campaign manager Brendan Sweeney did not dispute Romaine's connections with Powell or Towle, but said Romaine took no part in any wrongdoing. 

“Instead of focusing on the now and the future, they're choosing to bring up something from 20 years ago that they [Romaine and GOP candidates] have no ties to whatsoever," Sweeney said.

Other ads say Romaine raised taxes during his tenure as supervisor and accepted six salary increases. Sweeney said the bulk of town spending increases were due to contractual obligations for items such as health care costs and employee raises. Brookhaven's annual budgets in 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2023 contained raises for the supervisor, according to town records. Romaine was first elected supervisor in a special election in 2012.

Sweeney said Brookhaven last month received a top fiscal score from the state Comptroller Office’s annual report monitoring municipal financial health. 

“I have always put the taxpayers first to ensure they are safer and live in a community that’s more affordable,” Romaine said.

A Calone-funded mailer says Romaine has an "extreme" view on abortion and cites a 1990 Newsday story quoting Romaine as he protested outside an office that provided abortions, as well as a 1989 letter he wrote to Newsday that says “life deserves the protection of law.”

Wolfe said the campaign added the issue because they “think it's important for voters to know.”

Suffolk GOP Chairman Jesse Garcia said it signals Calone is "desperate." Romaine now “supports life, with reasonable exceptions," Garcia said. 

Calone's campaign spent $1,128,376 on television ads in September, and Advancing Suffolk spent at least $200,000 on TV commercials between Aug. 30 and Oct. 2, according to state Board of Elections filings. Calone's campaign in September transferred $230,000 to the state Democratic committee, which has paid for his mailers. 

Attacking Calone 

Romaine's ads paint Calone, an investment firm CEO and a former state and federal prosecutor from Setauket, as more liberal and softer on crime than he professes. Calone, 50, has touted his record as a prosecutor for the U.S. Department of Justice from 1999 until 2004, and has said public safety would be his top priority as county executive.

A TV ad paid for by Romaine's campaign asserts that Democratic policies make the region less safe. Photos of Calone, Hochul and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, a Democrat, appear as a narrator talks about "carjackings … theft … violence" and "the deadly consequences of Democrats' failed policies."

State and national Republicans have attacked Bragg for announcing soon after he took office in January 2022 that he would not prosecute misdemeanor marijuana charges, farebeating, prostitution and most trespassing charges.

Republicans also have criticized Bragg's prosecution of former President Donald Trump for allegedly falsifying business records in connection with hush money payments to adult film actor Stormy Daniels. Trump, who is seeking the 2024 GOP nomination for president, has denied the charges. His trial is set to begin in March in State Supreme Court in Manhattan.

A mailer paid for by the state Republican Committee calls Calone “soft on crime” and implies he supports a 2019 law sponsored by Democratic state legislators that eliminated cash bail for most misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies.

Another ad paid for by the state Republican Committee says Calone supports “busing unvetted migrants into Suffolk County” and voted for rate increases as a member of the Long Island Power Authority board of trustees from 2009 to 2012.

Garcia said the mailers are backed up by campaign finance records showing contributions from Calone and his wife, Kate, to Hochul and Bragg in recent years. Calone gave $2,500 to Hochul in 2022, and he and his wife gave $5,600 total to Bragg between 2019 and 2021, according to state Board of Elections records.

The ads targeting bail reform, Garcia said, are based on Calone's endorsement by the Suffolk County Working Families Party. The party has supported state bail reform laws and other measures the county GOP characterizes as anti-police.

Calone's campaign said he told the WFP on its candidate questionnaire that people shouldn't be held in jail because they can't afford to make bail but that “judges should have the discretion to make a dangerousness assessment as part of their bail determination.” 

On the migrants issue, Calone said at a forum on Sept. 20 hosted by the Suffolk County Association of Municipal Employees and Schneps Media that “under my leadership it [Suffolk] will not be a sanctuary county.”

Calone voted for rate increases and decreases while on the Long Island Power Authority board, his campaign said.

Wolfe said Calone is more moderate than Republicans portray him.

“There is a candidate the Republicans wish they were running against, and it’s not former prosecutor Dave Calone,” Wolfe said.

Romaine's campaign spent at least $240,395 on television ads in September, according to the most recent filing with the state Board of Elections.

Correction: Ads paid for by the Suffolk County executive campaign of Democrat Dave Calone attacking his Republican opponent Ed Romaine over GOP corruption cases used statements from Suffolk County residents. A previous version of this story misstated their backgrounds. 

By Vera Chinese

vera.chinese@newsday.com@VeraChinese

Vera Chinese covers Suffolk County government and politics. She joined Newsday in 2017 after working as an editor for the East End lifestyle publication northforker and a general assignment reporter for the New York Daily News.