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2010 Gov Race
Cox Now Banking On Down-Ballot Races
Nov 2nd - 9:26 pm
A few minutes after YNN projected Democrats to retain the office of governor and New York’s two US Senate seats, New York GOP Chair Ed Cox turned the focus to the state Senate, which he believes his party will win by the end of the evening.
“The other races are going to be very good races for us,” Cox told YNN’s Steve Ference.
“The state senate, I think we win that. We kept adding more seats. Six months ago we thought we could win two…now we think we’re competitive in eight or nine seats. The assembly is very interesting that has been a sleeper I think we’re going to win enough seats there, maybe 10 or more that would give us more than 50 seats and the ability to uphold the governor’s veto, and be a player in the selection of the next speaker of the assembly.
YNN: Cuomo, Gillibrand, Schumer Projected To Win (UPDATED)
Nov 2nd - 8:59 pm
Based on our exit polling YNN/NY1 has called the projected winners in the gubernatorial, and US Senate races:
Andrew Cuomo (D)
Kirsten Gillibrand (D)
Charles Schumer (D)
UPDATE:
Just after 9 p.m., NY1′s Josh Robin was joined by New York State Democratic Party Chair Jay Jacobs to get his reaction to the projected winners.
“It’s so good to have somebody with his integrity his ethical standards as our leader in this state we’re all very excited about it,” said Jacobs.
“He’s earned it. He deserves it and we’re all very very excited about it. New york is desperate for a governor that will come in and take charge of what has to be done and solve our problems he’s going to have to make tough decisions, he’s going to…he hasn’t shied away from it. So we’re ready for it. That’s why they elected him, that’s the mandate they’ve given him.”
Caputo: Carl Wasn’t Polished, But He Told The Truth
Nov 2nd - 8:21 pm
Paladino campaign manager Michael Caputo remains confident in his candidate’s chances tonight. Less than an hour before polls close in New York, Caputo pointed out to NY1′s Michael Scotto that polls showed Paladino trailing Rick Lazio in the GOP primary two months ago, then cruised to a sizable victory.
Scotto asked Caputo if Paladino’s “mad-as-hell” style hindered him from connecting with the general election audience.
“Mike, you got to get out of New York City more often,” said Caputo.
“People talk like that outside of New York City. People use kitchen-table language and when Carl Paladino spoke, everybody knew one thing: That he was telling the truth. He wasn’t polished about it, he wasn’t glib, he wasn’t in some cases even good at campaigning, but he listened to them because he brought a message of hope.”
An Angry Man And His Bats
Nov 2nd - 5:41 pm
Here’s Carl Paladino’s Election Night press pass. It’s a collector’s item! Someone save me one!
Paladino: Campaigning Is ‘Treacherous’
Nov 2nd - 4:33 pm
After casting his ballot in Buffalo today (presumably for himself and his running mate, Chautauqua County Executive Greg Edwards), gubernatorial hopeful Carl Paladino said he found his first political campaign “treacherous, very confusing in many respects,” but insisted he had no regrets.
“I don’t think I’m going to miss it,” Paladino said. “…I’m not a great campaigner. I’m just me. I’m just human. I’m just a builder from Buffalo.”
Paladino continued to insist the polls are wrong and he will surprise everyone by defeating Democratic frontrunner Andrew Cuomo when the polls close tonight. Asked what he planned to do today, he said: “Take a nap.”
Cuomo Votes (With Sandra Lee In Tow)
Nov 2nd - 4:08 pm
Democratic gubernatorial frontrunner Andrew Cuomo voted without incident on the new electronic voting machines in Mount Kisco earlier today. He was accompanied by the youngest of his three daughters and his companion, Food Network star Sandra Lee.
Lee hasn’t made many appearances on the campaign trail, although she was present when Cuomo formally announced his candidacy in the shadow of the Tweed Courthouse and also on stage at the Democratic convention in Rye where he was unanimously voted to be the party’s nominee.
Cuomo was a little subdued, but he seemed to be in a good mood. Asked who he had voted for, he joked: “You’ll have to guess; I followed my daughter’s recommendation.”
Mrs. Duffy Speaks
Nov 2nd - 2:55 pm
The local Rochester station, 13 WHAM, sat down for an extended interview with Second Lady-in-waiting, Barb Duffy, wife of Andrew Cuomo’s LG running mate, Bob Buffy.
Sadly, the video isn’t embeddable, but the interview reveals Barb Duffy to be a supportive yet somewhat reluctant political wife. She also says she and her husband will not likely be relocating to Albany if and when he is elected to be Cuomo’s second-in-command.
“If Bob was chosen for upstate – this is more upstate than Albany is,” she said. “What we’d try to do is go back and forth and see how that worked.”
Gov. David Paterson kept his primary residence in Harlem when he was elected LG in 2006, but he also had a home in Guilderland that he had purchased during his state Senate days. When he ascended to his current post in the wake of Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s March 2008 prostitution scandal, Paterson and his family started using the executive mansion part-time.
Cuomo, who lives in Westchester with his girlfriend, Food Network star Sandra Lee, has joint custody of the three daughters with his ex-wife, Kerry Kennedy. Unlike his father, former Gov. Mario Cuomo, he’s not expected to live full-time in the executive mansion on Eagle Street.
McMillan’s Final Plea, The Rap Version
Nov 2nd - 2:02 pm
..If this man doesn’t get 50,000 votes, I will be shocked.
I have now spoken to three well-educated and astute Democrats who cast protest votes today for McMillan on the Rent is Too Damn High Party line.
Another reader wrote in musing on which third party would win third place today. He offered this prediction: “I think pot beats green and rent beats freedom.”
In other words: The Manhattan Madam out-polls Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins on the Anti-Prohibition Party line, but McMillan beats Libertarian Warren Redlich. (Another reader thinks “freedom” means NYC Councilman Charles Barron’s Freedom Party, which is probably right).
Thoughts?
(H/T to Jimmy Vielkind, who posted this on Facebook, after his TU colleague, Casey Seiler, put it on CapCon). Also…The Politicker reminds us that McMillan’s first album comes out today.
Lazio: ‘No Regrets’
Nov 2nd - 7:54 am
Former gubernatorial hopeful Rick Lazio joined me on CapTon last night and insisted he has “no regrets” about dropping out of the race to cede the Conservative line to Carl Paladino, although he refused to say whether he will be voting today for the Buffalo businessman who trounced him in the GOP primary on Sept. 14.
In his first extended TV appearance since he quit the race in September, Lazio said his judicial candidacy (for state Supreme Court in the Bronx), which he used to get off Row D, prevents him from making any endorsements or overt political statements. He did, however, lament the tone of the governor’s race and its lack of focus on issues.
“It would have been a different race for sure,” Lazio said when I asked him if he wished he had stuck it out in the gubernatorial contest.
“I don’t think it would have been likely that it would have effected the ultimate outcome in terms of who the victor might be, and my thinking of it at the time was I did not want to create unintended consequences where people were voting for me and one candidate or the other was a net beneficiary.”
“…I thought the right and honorable thing for me to do honestly was to step aside even though I had won that Conservative Party line, so I have no regrets at all about that.”
Lazio did take a swipe at state GOP Chairman Ed Cox for candidate shopping and failing to unite early behind contenders who had no significant primary opposition (actually, only comptroller hopeful Harry Wilson falls into that category).
The former congressman said he thinks criticism of Cox is “fair,” although I’ve heard some say he’ll be vindicated in backing Suffolk County Executive Steve Levy if Paladino loses big today. (Heck, even Eliot Spitzer thinks Levy would have beat Andrew Cuomo).
Paladino Pitches ‘Taxpayers’ Line
Nov 2nd - 7:34 am
GOP gubernatorial hopeful Carl Paladino’s last-minute campaign video pushes his candidacy on the independent Taxpayers Party line, and deems the Democrats a “threat” to the solvency of New York and accuses them of “playing games” with public funds.
This is a new approach for the Buffalo businessman, who hasn’t been talking about that new third party line all that much since he won the Sept. 14 primary. At one point, it was unclear whether he would even run on the line, which he created through a petition drive (separate from the one he used to get onto the GOP primary ballot).
Interestingly, the video targets Democratic gubernatorial frontrunner Andrew Cuomo, Gov. David Paterson, Senate Majority Leader Pedro Espada Jr. and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, but says not a word about Senate Democratic Conference Leader John Sampson.
Paladino did an early-morning interview with Curtis Sliwa on AM 970 The Apple. He continued to insist the polls are wrong – particularly the Siena poll, which he said “we have to get rid of.”
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