Here are the key primary races on the ballot across Long Island

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s name is not on Tuesday’s primary ballot, but he looms over several races as Long Island voters prepare to make their party’s choices, including those for four congressional seats.

"After all, he's been a factor — made himself a factor — in GOP primaries far and wide," said Donald Nieman, a history professor at Binghamton University. "There's restiveness with Trump in the party; he needs to show that he still controls the base."

But Trump’s name is also playing out as a factor in a Democratic primary, where the incumbent, Rep. Tom Suozzi, (D-Glen Cove), is being accused of failing to sufficiently oppose or aggressively speak out against the president and his policies.

Also on statewide ballots is state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli’s first challenge by another Democrat since appointed to the office in 2007.

Here’s a rundown of these contests heading into Tuesday’s primary:

District 3 Republican primary

With the endorsements of Trump and the Nassau County GOP establishment, former Assemblyman Michael LiPetri, 35, of Farmingdale, is running again for a seat he narrowly lost to Suozzi in 2024.

But a largely self-funded conservative opponent, personal injury lawyer Gregory Hach, 55, of Oyster Bay, has run an aggressive insurgent campaign, depicting himself as the more genuine MAGA candidate and conservative, who will stand stronger with Trump.

Vice President JD Vance weighed in with a pre-primary event Wednesday in Suozzi’s district. 

During that event in Bethpage, Vance urged Republicans to vote for LiPetri and attacked Suozzi. Hach, though, gained the backing this past week of former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, in this MAGA-upsmanship race. 

Local Republican leaders are privately expressing concerns about low voter turnout that could result in a potentially mediocre showing by LiPetri even if he does win.

District 3 Democratic primary

Danielle Welch, 35, of Bayside, Queens, has sought to gain traction in her underdog campaign against incumbent Suozzi, 63, in part by depicting him to Democrats as someone who can’t be trusted to stand up to Trump or for working-class families.

Welch also asserts that Suozzi is frozen onto a 1996 John McCain-style view of a need for pursuing bipartisan or moderate solutions to issues facing Washington, D.C. She argues that today’s far right and "the nightmare in the White House" are not interested in political compromise.

She’s campaigned on such issues as taxing the ultra wealthy, casting the U.S. military actions in Iran war as illegal, and abolishing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Suozzi’s campaign says he’s been an effective fighter for his constituents. And he’s not shown any sign of worry about Welch outflanking him in this primary with greater appeal to far-left voters.

Suozzi held a news conference where he pledged to swing voters that he is centrist and mainstream, not socialist and extreme.

It’s a move seen as trying to inoculate himself from anticipated Republican efforts ahead of the November election tying him to his party’s democratic socialists, such as New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.)

District 4 Republican primary

Both of the Republicans seeking the party’s nomination to challenge freshman Rep. Laura Gillen (D-Rockville Centre) insist they are the race’s MAGA candidate. But neither has received Trump's public endorsement.

Jeanine Driscoll, 59, of the Village of Bellerose, a sitting Hempstead tax official, was the default pick by Nassau County GOP leaders to challenge Gillen. Her opponent is Marvin Williams, 64, a former Air Force lieutenant colonel and Presbyterian minister.

Driscoll was chosen after former GOP Rep. Anthony D’Esposito waited until April to decide he would not run for this seat he lost in 2024. As a result, Driscoll got off to a late start in her primary bid.

But by virtue of her already being elected twice to a public office within this congressional district, Driscoll believes her name recognition is competitive with that of Gillen’s, 56. Williams has poked at Driscoll’s job as being, in his words, "a tax collector," while he says he focused on reducing taxes.

Williams said that while he did not intend to make race a central issue, he also has said, "It is apparent that I am a Black man, as well as a conservative, a 30-year U.S. military veteran and an ordained Presbyterian minister — someone who Gillen cannot paint as an ‘extremist.’ "

District 1 Democratic primary

Chris Gallant, 37, of Amity Harbor, and Lukas Ventouras, 25, of Northport, are battling to be the party’s choice to take on GOP incumbent Nick LaLota (R-Amityville) this fall.

Gallant is an Army veteran and National Guardsman who has served as a Black Hawk pilot. He is also a former air traffic controller and has been a volunteer firefighter with several local fire districts.

Ventouras is attending St. John’s Law School and has worked for local civil rights attorney Frederick Brewington, of Hempstead, and spent a summer working in the office of Rep. Grace Meng (D-Queens).

Both candidates say they will bring fresh ideas to Congress, though the district is not listed on many nonpartisan analysts’ watch cards as likely to be very competitive in November. But there are signs it might become so if Long Island experiences a blue wave. Eyebrows were raised, for instance, when a state GOP-affiliated committee decided this month to openly intercede in this Democratic primary — sending out postcard flyers attacking Ventouras as an out-of-touch left-wing liberal.

In another sign this district may be starting to blip on political radar screens, former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg earlier this month announced he is backing Gallant, his first endorsement of a congressional non-incumbent nationally.

State comptroller’s race

Tuesday's statewide primary will be the first time state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli faces a primary challenge since he was appointed to the office in 2007.

DiNapoli, 72, seeking a fifth elected term, is running against Drew Warshaw and Raj Goyle.

Warshaw, 45, is the executive director of a nonprofit housing firm. Goyle, 51, has worked on a number of philanthropic campaigns in New York City and served in the Kansas state legislature.

Both men have run on similar platforms of taking more of an activist approach to the state comptroller's office and the nearly $300 billion state pension fund than DiNapoli has.

That includes divesting from foreign bonds, using pension funds to invest in affordable housing for New Yorkers and divesting from companies such as the data analytics firm Palantir that do business with U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement.

The comptroller's race is the only statewide race on the primary ballot in what is expected to be a low-turnout election contest.

DiNapoli has widespread support among major labor unions in the state and has been endorsed by most state party officials. Neither of his challengers has received endorsements from sitting elected officials.

The winner will face Republican Joseph Hernandez.

East Hampton's key race

Beyond races with national implications, East Hampton Town's Democrat primary pits Supervisor Kathee Burke-Gonzalez against challenger East Hampton Village Mayor Jerry Larsen.

With no Republican on the November ballot, the contest is likely to determine who takes office next year.

Larsen has made the primary a referendum on the direction of local leadership and control of the Democratic Party in the town, where Democrats outnumber Republicans almost 3 to 1 and have handily won supervisor races since 2013.

Burke-Gonzalez said she is running on a record of securing major state and federal funding for coastal resilience and infrastructure, expanding affordable housing programs, and growing town staff in the building and parks departments.

Newsday's Alek Lewis contributed to this story.