COURIER L 40 IFE, FEB. 1–7, 2019 M B G
t’s official: the battle royal
between Republicans hoping
to unseat newly elected
Democratic Rep. Max Rose in
2020 has begun.
Last week, GOP Assemblywoman
and 2017 mayoral
candidate Nicole Malliotakis
— who in Albany represents
many of the same Brooklyn
neighborhoods that Rose does
down in Washington, DC —
filed paperwork with the Federal
Election Commission to
begin raising funds for her
future campaign against the
freshman Congressman.
Malliotakis teased her decision
in a Jan. 18 tweet, which
included a photo of her with
the House of Representatives’s
top Republican — Minority
Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy,
from California — whom she
thanked for “facilitating”
a phone call with President
Trump. Of course, those who
read between the lines knew
her desired message was that
national Republicans are recruiting
her to win back New
York’s 11th Congressional District
— which also includes all
of Staten Island — from Rose
and the Democratic Party.
Also expected to reenter
the fray on the right is Michael
Grimm, the convicted
felon who held Rose’s seat from
2011 to 2015, before resigning
after pleading guilty to tax
fraud. Grimm — who last year
lost a primary bid for his old
seat to his successor, former
GOP Rep. Dan Donovan, who
went on to lose to Rose in the
general election — promptly
went on the attack after Malliotakis
made her filing statement,
declaring, “It is comical
to expect Republican voters
will want someone as unprincipled,
unaccomplished, and
underwhelming as Nicole to
share the ballot with President
Trump in 2020. This is a
joke … just like her mayoral
debacle was.”
Staten Island GOP Councilman
Joe Borelli is being
floated as a serious candidate,
too. He served as a co-chair
of Trump’s presidential campaign,
and has unabashedly
supported the president in
the national media. Borelli
— whom many see as well-respected,
smart, and politically
savvy — reportedly also went
down to Washington, DC, to
meet with Republican leaders.
Still, Malliotakis has already
earned some telling support
for her bid, including an
endorsement from the Brooklyn
Conservative Party, which
always plays a significant role
in local Republican primaries.
State GOP powerbroker John
Catsimatidis — whom I work
for, and who unsuccessfully
ran for mayor in 2013 — has
also pledged his allegiance to
the Assemblywoman.
The early jockeying to oust
Rose comes as a response to
what many see as a disturbing
move to the left among Democrats
since the November election
that put him in office.
Kings County constituents
make up less than a third of
Rose’s 11th Congressional District,
but its Brooklyn electorate
has moved further to the
left since the late ’90s — one
reason why past Republicans
who’ve held the seat typically
win most of their votes from
Staten Island.
Last fall, for instance,
Rose and Donovan virtually
ran neck and neck on Staten
Island, where the Democrat
won 49.9 percent of votes, compared
to the Republican incumbent’s
48.6 percent. But
Brooklyn was another story,
with Donovan getting only 39
percent of votes, compared to
Rose’s 58 percent.
Prior to his loss to Rose last
year, Donovan earned about 52
percent of the Kings County
vote when he defeated Democratic
rival Richard Reichard
to win the office in 2016. Before
that, the last time a GOP candidate
won this side of the Narrows
while campaigning to
represent the area was in 2006,
when former Rep. Vito Fossella
claimed the seat — which then
represented New York’s 13th
Congressional District.
Data from the past eight
congressional elections in the
district, from 2004 through
2018, shows Republican candidates
averaging roughly 45
percent of the Kings County
vote, and roughly 55 percent of
that on Staten Island. The key
to a GOP victory is pushing a
candidate who will not get totally
decimated in Brooklyn.
And Malliotakis, who won
about 70 percent of the vote
in the district during her unsuccessful
mayoral campaign,
could hold that key.
The Assemblywoman at
this moment seems to be the
GOP’s best positioned candidate
to defeat Rose, thanks to
her years of service to those
Brooklyn neighborhoods —
and because she is now the
borough’s only Republican
elected official.
Bob Capano is a professor
of political science of more
than 15 years.
THE RIGHT
VIEW