Sen. LaValle to call it quits

Breaking Point

LaValle to exit State Senate

Republican State Sen. Kenneth LaValle will not seek reelection in November, calling it quits after 22 terms, several sources told The Point Wednesday. The sources said that LaValle began sharing his decision with confidantes this week and that he will announce it at an event on Long Island later this week.

The possibility of LaValle, 80, exiting elective office has been a hot topic in political circles since Democrats won the State Senate majority and the clout and perks that go with the gavel in 2018. LaValle, in his 43 years in the chamber, has almost never served in the minority. In addition, LaValle’s wife, Penny LaValle, was forced into retirement recently after Democratic County Executive Steve Bellone did not appoint her to a new term as director of the county’s Real Property Tax Service Agency.

LaValle’s decision makes the job of Senate Minority Leader John Flanagan, tasked with the extremely steep climb of reclaiming the majority for his party in November, even tougher. The consensus is that LaValle, popular across party lines for his powerful advocacy on behalf of Stony Brook University, Long Island’s public schools and the environment, would have had a fairly easy reelection race.

Without him on the ballot, the Democrats may have the advantage. 

LaValle’s decision will intensify the jockeying for position, in both parties. No Republican would have challenged the veteran, so none have yet announced for the spot, but popular New Suffolk Assemb. Anthony Palumbo is talked about as both the frontrunner for the nomination and the best GOP candidate for the general election.

On the Democratic side, three candidates have already announced: 

• Laura Ahearn, attorney and founder and executive director of The Crime Victims Center, who lives in Port Jefferson and has significant support from the Democratic establishment
• Tommy John Schiavoni, who is serving his first term as a Southampton Town Board member and recently retired as high school social studies teacher from Sag Harbor
• Skyler Johnson, a 19-year-old student at Suffolk County Community College 

County Democratic Chairman Rich Schaffer said two more have confirmed they will announce candidacies:

• Valerie Cartwright, a Brookhaven Town Board member who lives in Port Jefferson Station
• Margot Garant, an attorney who has served as mayor of Port Jefferson Village for a decade.

And that may not be all. With LaValle out of the way, other Democrats who’d been eyeing other races are said to be turning their eyes toward the 1st State Senate District, including one in particular: Bridget Fleming, the third-term Suffolk County legislator who is already campaigning to unseat Rep. Lee Zeldin but might decide to take on an easier race than the 1st Congressional District.

—Lane Filler @lanefiller

Trump Jr. joins LaValle’s district

Donald Trump Jr. is now  — officially  — a Long Islander.

At the end of last year, effective for 2020, Trump Jr. registered to vote  — as a Republican – with a Bridgehampton address, according to Suffolk County Board of Elections records obtained Wednesday by The Point.

That makes Trump Jr. a resident of State Sen. Ken LaValle’s district, just as LaValle plans not to seek reelection. 

Trump Jr. will also be a resident of Rep. Lee Zeldin’s congressional district, and State Assemb. member Fred Thiele will represent him, too. On the county level, Trump Jr. will be part of Bridget Fleming’s legislative district.

Trump Jr. and his girlfriend had purchased the 9,200-square-foot estate in Bridgehampton, which serves as his home for his new political registration, for $4.4 million in July, according to published reports.

Trump Jr.’s registration comes just a month after his sister-in-law, Lara Trump, was rumored to be a contender for the seat being vacated by Rep. Pete King in the neighboring 2nd Congressional District. Trump Jr. held a fundraiser in November for Zeldin, where he signed copies of his book.

Besides a chance to do more campaigning for Zeldin, is Trump Jr.’s move a chance for him to join the Suffolk political fray? 

Just imagine: Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s 2021 State of the State address could feature State Sen. Trump Jr. in the audience.

—Randi F. Marshall @RandiMarshall

Pencil Point

Wrong witness

For more cartoons, visit www.newsday.com/cartoons

Final Point

Who said what?

The Point has reached the end of its 2020 Democratic presidential contender reading. If the author was campaigning and the book existed, we read it. You’re welcome. 

You may be surprised to know that there were actually a few moments when a candidate or a candidate’s ghostwriter said something a little, dare we say, interesting. 

We gathered some of those moments. In the next eight newsletters, we’ll pick a topic or a question and include some of the candidates’ responses, as written in their books. But we won’t tell you who wrote what until the next day. Some are more revealing than you think, or you might see something more clearly argued than what emerged on the debate stage. 

As we get ready for the Iowa caucuses, see whether you can identify who said what about former President Barack Obama or capitalism; whose morals involve an iron stance on houseguests; whose defining life lesson involved PowerPoint, and who thinks what about America. 

The current candidates who wrote books are Michael Bennet, Joe Biden, Michael Bloomberg, Cory Booker, Pete Buttigieg, John Delaney, Amy Klobuchar, Deval Patrick, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Marianne Williamson and Andrew Yang. 

If the candidate wrote multiple books, we read the most recent one. We included three quotes total from each candidate, because we know you don’t want to read pages and pages. Then you might as well have read the books … 

Happy picking.

Which five 2020 candidates had the following outside-the-box ideas? 

1. “We should establish a U.S. Department of Peace to identify and foster domestic peace-creating projects in the United States.” 
2. “As president, I would engage once a quarter, for two to three hours, in a televised open debate with members of Congress.” 
3. This candidate proposes a new currency — Digital Social Credits — that would “reward people for doing things that serve the community,” such as babysitting a child, staffing a garage sale, or volunteering at a local shelter.
4. “We need to put some digital rules of the road into law when it comes to people’s privacy … Our laws need to be as sophisticated as the people who are breaking them. We must revamp our nation’s cybersecurity and guarantee net neutrality for all.”
5. This candidate “didn’t just want an infrastructure bill with money for highways, railroads, and airports. We were going to fund the highways of tomorrow, with thousands of charging stations for electric cars and dedicated lanes for self-driving cars,” plus jets going coast to coast “in an hour or two.”

—Mark Chiusano @mjchiusano