Parties feel the tremors below the battlefield
Nassau County Executive and Republican gubernatorial candidate Bruce Blakeman, left, and upstate GOP congressional candidate Anthony Constantino. Credit: Newsday / Howard Schnapp, AP / Michael Hill
Both major political parties are engaged in a huge electoral battle across the nation for control of Congress. Barely below the surface, however, internal tensions within the warring camps have rumbled.
For out-of-state Democrats this week, a big rift between the ideological left and center drove primary races — a follow-up to the 2025 victory of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdami, a democratic socialist.
Peggy Flanagan, Minnesota’s lieutenant governor, won the Democratic nod as the leftier contender for U.S. Senate against centrist Rep. Angie Craig. In Wisconsin, however, democratic socialist State Rep. Francesca Hong — who had been heavily favored to win the Democratic primary for governor — lost to moderate David Crowley, the Milwaukee County executive.
After brutal fights like this the question becomes whether voters who backed the losers in contested primaries will come out in November for the winners.
There are tensions among Republicans too. President Donald Trump is the party’s monarch, but his high-handed overruling of local, state and county GOP strategies has generated sotto voce dissatisfaction in the ranks.
Trump backed eccentric pillow salesman Mike Lindell for Minnesota governor. On Tuesday Lisa Demuth, the state’s GOP House speaker, beat him by double digits — to the relief of party regulars. Lindell, a 2020 election denier whom a judge said defamed election company Smartmatic, is refusing to concede. Demuth will face Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar in the fall.
Another controversial Trump-endorsed candidate did win, in Wisconsin’s 7th Congressional District. Michael Alfonso, the 26-year-old son-in-law of Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, prevailed in a crowded primary in the deep-red district. Duffy previously held the seat; Alfonso received campaign money from executives of industries Duffy regulates.
Trump intervened in New York’s North Country in June. He rejected the candidacy of popular upstate Assemb. Robert Smullen who had been the state GOP and Conservative Party preference to succeed Rep. Elise Stefanik in the 21st Congressional District. The president insisted on pushing Tony Constantino, an irascible businessman and Trump cheerleader who publicly attacked Smullen and other New York conservatives.
Now Constantino, who won the nomination with the help of convicted-and-pardoned Trump consultant Roger Stone, faces Democratic dairy farmer Blake Gendebien. Gendebien stood to benefit from what would have been a three-way race after the primary had the Conservative Party not reluctantly ditched its nomination of Smullen.
Sunday, Trump’s pick to challenge Gov. Kathy Hochul, Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman, appeared with Constantino at a rally in Fulton County. Blakeman hailed the would-be congressman as an “anti-politician.” Trump, in contrast, likes to introduce Blakeman as looking like a politician “from central casting.”
On Friday, Trump, whose approval rating is at a record low, is due to appear at Nassau Community College to visit law enforcement facilities and “give some love” to Blakeman, who trails in the polls. Behind the scenes, even some loyal Long Island Republicans doubt the usefulness of the visit since the two men’s political bond has been displayed for months.
The sharpest internal party battle at the moment is underway in the Suffolk Democratic organization — where longtime chairman Rich Schaffer faces a leadership challenge from committee members who find him too accommodating to the rival Republicans.
Such a drama might have implications for elections beyond this year’s.
Columnist Dan Janison’s opinions are his own.
Dan Janison is a member of the Newsday editorial board.
