Election to usher in a new phase

The dominating win by the Democrats in the House and possibly a comfortable margin in the Senate, propelled by younger voters, is bound to usher in a new chapter for American politics. That means the leaders of both chambers are expected to be New Yorkers — who hail from the New York City borough at the western end of geographical Long Island.

Democrats won Senate seats in Texas and South Carolina, primarily because President Donald Trump for no comprehensible reason intervened in those races to pick the weaker of Republican candidates. It means the president enters a lame duck phase and faces elected resistance to his executive prerogatives he has not seen before while in the White House.

New Yorkers returned Gov. Kathy Hochul to Albany in a landslide and sent the loser, Bruce Blakeman, back to Long Island, ostensibly to finish out his term as Nassau County executive.

In a message that resonated most in the shape-shifting national election, Trump was the one who told voters to “pretend I’m on the ballot.” It was as if the electorate took him at his word.

This referendum on the first half of his second term in the White House thus ends in disappointment for Republicans in many congressional and statehouse races inside and outside New York. This, despite all Trump’s rallies and the huge amount of cash injected into the race by GOP donors.

On Long Island, the anti-Trump headwinds defeated Blakeman and left uncertain whether the two incumbent House members would at best win on the margins. The Island’s two Democratic Congress members, who were expected to face close races, won by double digits.

Democrats took the Senate majority, turning even Ohio and South Carolina blue.

Most uncertain Tuesday night was whether Trump will use the power of his administration to interfere with vote counts and certifications in some locations. At least 1,000 federal election monitors were dispatched to various states. Any action now to destabilize the outcomes would comprise a risk of democratic processes.

New York is not blue because most of its citizens love Democrats, but because many voters disliked the alternatives and came out in record numbers to say so. The fastest growing political group in the state are those who belong to no party. These unaffiliated voters, who number about 3.45 million, are now a larger group than registered Republicans, especially on Long Island where these “blanks” total 394,159 versus 380,472 Republicans, according to the most recent state enrollments.

Hochul, a moderate, will have to work to validate her victory to those who did not vote for Democrats but against the GOP. Her hardest job will be managing the strong Democratic majority in both chambers of the State Legislature to balance the demands of New York City against suburban interests. Rebelling against incumbents is one thing; governing another. That’s a message for both the New York governor and the new leaders of Congress.