Mapping the future

Daily Point

LWV steps forward in court map furor

The next milestone in the nationally watched court challenge by Republicans over redistricting in New York is slated for Wednesday in Rochester before the 4th Department of the state’s midlevel Appellate Division.

So far Justice Stephen Lindley, who sits on that appeals bench, has stayed action on a lower-court ruling in Syracuse which found that the current House and State Senate plans approved by Albany’s Democratic-run State Legislature for this year’s elections violate the state constitution and need to be tossed out.

Primaries have proceeded so far based on those plans — but due to the time crunch, Lindley also permitted the lower court to hire an expert to redraw the districts if the higher courts in the end find that necessary. 

So don’t bet the mortgage money on either side just yet.

Enter the League of Women Voters — whose credibility and clout, as a good-government group which sponsors debates and distributes voter information, has long derived from its nonpartisanship.

Recently, the LWV’s Ohio and Florida chapters volubly opposed that state’s partisan Republican map manipulations. Now the New York chapter has filed a friend-of-the-court brief supporting the GOP’s challenge of what it sees as Democratic gerrymanders here.

Former Congressman John Faso, who’s helping coordinate the Republican side, told The Point on Monday: “The League and Republicans happen to be aligned with the plain language of the state constitution.”

On other issues, such as national voting rights legislation, the League these days is aligned with Democratic initiatives.

The LWV cites what it sees as two key wrongs in what has been the first New York redistricting process since it was declared “reformed” in a 2014 constitutional amendment approved by voters. One of its arguments is that the bipartisan Independent Redistricting Commission failed to perform its tasks as mandated by the law; the other is that once the IRC failed, the lawmakers drew their own improper lines. The case involves congressional races and State Senate districts; the lawsuit does not challenge the Assembly lines, which largely protect the GOP minority’s incumbencies.

According to the LWV’s friend-of-the-court brief, the state’s constitutionally mandatory process “was indisputably vitiated by a combination of the IRC’s abrogation of its constitutional responsibilities and the Legislature’s brazen disregard of the required process — with predictable consequences.”

While the court filing is new, the LWV’s position on this conflict has been consistent. Last November, the group urged a “no” vote on a proposed amendment that it saw as a bid to dilute independent redistricting.

That effort to fiddle with the 2014 changes, pushed last year by Albany’s Democratic supermajorities, was voted down on the Election Day ballot.

— Dan Janison @Danjanison

Talking Point

Committee politics

Elections to state and county party committees tend to come and go in New York, with the same friends, supporters, allies, or family members of the party faithful reclaiming their seats in the obscure, enormous bodies. But sometimes challengers percolate, like the progressive New Kings Democrats who are currently making another big push to take on the mainline Brooklyn party. 

The challenger ethos is present this year on Long Island, too. That includes Kim Cooley, who is the only person challenging a Democratic state committee party candidate on Long Island.

That sets up a contested primary for the role on the June primary ballot.

Cooley, 38, of Freeport, got involved with politics along with Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ ascension to the presidential stage. She is a founding steering committee member of the left-leaning Long Island Activists, and was a national convention delegate for Sanders in 2020. She told The Point she wanted to run for the state role to contribute to the party leadership’s conversation on topics like sexual harassment, and to bring more “voices” to the committee. 

“Most voters don't even realize that this committee exists,” she said. 

That may be true, but the body, made up of several hundred positions, has important roles like voting on nominations for statewide officials, an act which bestows candidates an automatic ballot spot. 

The other candidate running for the same spot as Cooley is the party’s designee, Christine Quigley, an attorney who has been active in local politics. State party chair Jay Jacobs called her “a moderate,” though Quigley said it depends on the issue and called herself a Democrat who believes in “little d democracy with a passion."

Jacobs suggested Cooley, for her part, is from the “Jumaane Williams wing,” referring to the left-wing NYC public advocate and candidate for governor.

Jacobs is also chair of the Nassau County party, whose committee is even bigger — some 2,300 slots of which about 1,800 are filled, Jacobs said. 

This year, some people are mounting challenges or trying for slots without full party support there, too — though the details can get messy. 

That was the case with Nicole Sano, 44, a North Bellmore activist who has worked with the Bellmore Merrick Democratic club and calls herself “vocal” on political issues, including the party’s tough local losses in 2021. 

The county party refused to file her petitions for her, and she ended up having to do it herself at the Board of Elections. 

Sano was surprised given that she says she was invited to be a committee member by the president of the Bellmore Merrick club. Jacobs told The Point he had not been aware of that — he originally said the party had returned Sano’s petitions to her “because we don’t know you.” 

Asked about the history of newcomers trying to get onto party committees, Jacobs said the mantra tended to be the need to “defeat the establishment.” He conceded it was one he had used before he became, more or less, the establishment: “I can’t blame them for that.”

He suggested that some insurgents wanted to push the Democrats toward more left-leaning candidates. On the other hand, he said, the state and county committees largely “represent the moderate wing of the party.”

— Mark Chiusano @mjchiusano

Pencil Point

Tax Day

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Quick Points

Russia, Russia, Russia

• Russia warned the U.S. through diplomatic channels not to continue to send weapons to Ukraine or it would face “unpredictable consequences.” After the way this war has been conducted so far, would anything Russia does be unpredictable?
• After British Prime Minister Boris Johnson visited Kyiv to demonstrate his support for Ukraine, Russia retaliated by banning Johnson and other British officials from entering Russia. Just checking: No one actually thinks Johnson wants to visit Russia, do they?
• In his Easter Sunday address, Pope Francis prayed for peace in Ukraine, saying people should demand peace “from our balconies and in our streets. May the leaders of the nations hear people’s plea for peace.” One obvious problem: Only one world leader matters on this issue and Vladimir Putin is deaf.
• As pressure mounts on President Joe Biden to visit Ukraine, that nation’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, said such a visit “would be an important message of support for us.” More important than the $800 million in weapons Biden recently agreed to send?
• Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer, the first European Union leader to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, said Putin agreed to participate in an investigation into war crime allegations against Russia. The most astonishing thing is that Nehammer apparently believed Putin.
• Prices at chain restaurants like McDonald’s and Burger King have risen 7.2% since last year, the biggest price spike since 1981. So now it’s not only the food that’s fast.
• Michigan Republican Rep. Fred Upton, who is retiring after voting to impeach former President Donald Trump, said death threats against GOP members make breaking with the party “frightening.” Hey, it makes just living in the U.S. frightening.
• The World Health Organization estimates about 15 million people worldwide have died from COVID-19, far higher than the 6 million reported by countries, but India is blocking the analysis by refusing to update its reported total of 525,000 deaths, when the more accurate figure for India is estimated at 4 million deaths. Now there’s an inconvenient truth.
• He epitomized grace and sportsmanship on the ice and lethal accuracy on a net. RIP, Mike Bossy.

— Michael Dobie @mwdobie