Dem
51
GOP
49
The Democratic Party would really, really, really like to snatch "George Santos'" old seat from the Republicans. And to that end, the House Majority PAC, which is the House Democrats' super PAC, just announced a massive outlay on behalf of Democratic candidate Tom Suozzi: $5.2 million.
It is true that NY-03 is in the nation's most expensive media market, but even with that caveat, $5 million-plus is a big spend for a single House district. To put that in context, just the money from the House Majority PAC makes this race more expensive than 17 of the 26 New York House races in 2022. If we assume that the candidates' individual fundraising, coupled with whatever the Republicans' Congressional Leadership Fund spends, adds up to $3 million, then this race will be more expensive than all but three of the 2022 races. And if that figure is greater than $3 million, then the third most expensive race ($9,309,254 in NY-11, won by Republican Nicole Malliotakis) is in spitting distance. Possibly even the second most expensive race ($11,969,437 in NY-21, won by Republican Elise Stefanik) and the most expensive race ($14,028,916 in NY-14, won by Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) are within reach.
It's not too hard to discern why Democrats are pushing all their chips in to the center of the table. If the blue team can win the seat, then thanks to the soon-to-be-vacant seats in OH-06 and CA-20, much of the first 6 months of 2024 will be spent with the Republicans having a meager 219-214 majority. That would mean that Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) could only afford three defections, or two defections and one absence or "present" vote. Not much room for error with big votes coming up on the budget, and possibly also on the impeachment of Joe Biden.
In addition, a high-profile win heading into the 2024 election cycle would be excellent PR for the Democrats. There would be a wave of stories about how the blue team has "momentum," and keeps winning special elections, and is successfully using abortion as a wedge issue. Eventually the "everything is bad news for Joe Biden" coverage would resume, but for a while, the Democrats would get some excellent earned media.
It is also possible that a win in NY-03 would affect the Democrats' calculations as they work on gerrymander v2.0. If that seat is occupied by an incumbent Democrat, particularly one who held the seat before (as Suozzi did), then it might give the Democratic-controlled state legislature a little bit of wiggle room, so they can have a smaller margin of error in NY-03, and thus a larger margin of error in another district. Note that NY-01 and NY-02, both of which border NY-03, are each R+3 right now.
For what it is worth, there's been one poll of the race so far. It's from a Republican polling firm, so you have to take it with a grain of salt, but it has Suozzi up on Mazi Melesa Pilip by 3 points, 43% to 40%, with 17% of voters undecided. We suspect that the Democrats' internal polling is painting a similar picture, because that is the exact statistical profile that would cause us to back up the money truck, if we were making the spending decisions.
In any event, any readers who live in New York City, and in particular on Long Island, you have our sympathies, because you are about to spend 6+ weeks being bombarded with political ads. Meanwhile, readers who live in Iowa and New Hampshire will say to them: "See, this is what it feels like every four years." (Z)