Hochul Courts Jewish Voters With Mamdani In Her Corner

ALBANY, New York — Gov. Kathy Hochul is campaigning with New York City’s socialist mayor and she’s making in-roads with Orthodox Jewish leaders in communities that backed her GOP opponent four years ago.

The Democratic governor is trying to hold together a complex coalition in an era of profound political upheaval.

After a near-catastrophic campaign against Republican Lee Zeldin, Hochul has sewn together a cross-section of New Yorkers she needs for a convincing victory next week and to aid down-ballot House candidates in races that stand to determine control of the narrowly divided chamber.

She opted into a federal education tax credit that was part of President Donald Trump’s sweeping domestic policy package to the cheers of Orthodox communities. She has also steered hundreds of millions of dollars in state aid to New York City — bolstering Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s budget during his first year in office. And polls have shown Hochul has the lion’s share of support from Black New Yorkers, the backbone of her party.

“She’s been able to thread the needle with the divide in the Democratic Party between the left and the right, where she’s worked with both sides — openly with Mamdani and taken positions that some of the progressives may have disagreed with,” the Rev. Al Sharpton said. “She’s been able to balance. She’s shown a lot more political acumen to me this time around.”

The moderate, Buffalo-born governor needs to muster New York City voters — including those activated by Mamdani’s pledge to address affordability during his successful campaign last year — while also appealing to people in the bellwether suburbs. If successful, Hochul’s reelection campaign to lead this diverse, Democratic-dominated state is a test case for how her party can navigate ideological tensions as the Trump era draws to a close in the next two years.

The challenges to hold this fragile, statewide coalition together are enormous. And so are the stakes. Hochul’s run four years ago was marred by down-ballot losses for her party in crucial House races. Democrats lost control of the chamber and the governor’s weak coattails were blamed.

This year the task is even more complicated.

Some Jewish voters are alarmed by Mamdani’s rise as well as growing anti-Israel sentiment within the party. Suburban voters remain wary of crime — an issue Hochul’s Republican foe Bruce Blakeman is attacking her on in the final days of the campaign. Left-flank voters are also incredulous that Hochul has opposed higher income taxes on wealthy people and large corporations.

“It’s pretty simple. She’s got to keep the progressives excited without giving suburban moderates a reason to walk away,” said Democratic former state Sen. David Carlucci, now a lobbyist in Albany. “Hochul knows that the suburbs are the road to Albany and she doesn’t need to have the suburban community love every Democrat she’s standing with. She needs to convince them she’ll act independently in their interests.”

Blakeman, the Nassau County executive, is trying to turn Mamdani into a wedge issue — especially in the vote-rich suburbs that make up the Republican nominee’s political base. He’s accused the New York City mayor of being antisemitic and anti-Christian after Mamdani did not attend the installation of Archbishop Ronald Hicks. Blakeman’s campaign casts Hochul as a puppet for Mamdani’s expansive, costly agenda. And he’s warned that Mamdani’s approach to public safety will leave vulnerable people — including the state’s large Jewish population — at risk.

Capitalizing on the polarizing democratic socialist will potentially pay the greatest dividends in suburban communities and moderate-to-conservative neighborhoods of New York City, which backed Mamdani's rival Andrew Cuomo in last year’s mayoral election.

“Mayor Mamdani — he hasn’t fulfilled any promises he’s made,” Blakeman said recently. “He said he’d make it more affordable; it’s less affordable now then when he became mayor.”

Mamdani’s coalition — composed mainly of younger voters fretting about the cost of living — has alienated many older New Yorkers distrustful of socialism and supportive of Israel. Hochul, though, has retained support from some of the state’s varying Jewish communities. She traveled to Israel days after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attacks. Prompted by pro-Palestinian protests near synagogues, the governor backed a measure in Albany creating “buffer zones” around houses of worship. And she signed onto the new federal tax credit meant to encourage donations to private and parochial schools — a move that angered the state’s influential teachers union.

These moves have thrilled some Jewish leaders. She is campaigning in heavily Jewish Brooklyn neighborhoods and attended a massive rally for herself last week in Kiryas Joel, an ultra-Orthodox enclave in the Hudson Valley.

“This is a governor who cares deeply about my community and understands that the Jewish community is part of the beautiful mosaic that is New York,” said Assemblymember Simcha Eichenstein, who represents Brooklyn’s Borough Park, home to one of the largest Orthodox and Hasidic Jewish communities outside of Israel.

He described Hochul as “a champion of the Jewish people.”

Still, the politics surrounding Israel remain tricky for the governor. Blakeman, who would be New York’s third Jewish governor, has warned Jewish voters that Mamdani would not come to their aid if their neighborhoods come under attack. Hochul also acknowledged in a recent interview with POLITICO’s Jonathan Martin that it would make her job easier if Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lost reelection. After elections in Israel this week, no clear winner has emerged.

“We have to have leadership there that understands the security of Israel is paramount — critically important to me, but also the world — but to have a safe Palestinian state as well, which has been talked about my entire life,” she said. “I still believe that this can happen. I believe we have to get people of goodwill who can make this happen, and as long as Netanyahu is sitting there, that is not in his interest to do that. It’s just not, and it won’t happen.”

Similarly, her efforts to keep a base of Black support — selecting former New York City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams as her running mate, visiting Black churches and routinely blasting Trump — are also expected to pay off. The most recent Siena poll found she is drawing support from 86% of Black voters.

Sharpton pointed to her visibility in Black neighborhoods. The governor has also courted him, attending his birthday party and a celebration for his MSNOW show.

“I was impressed with the governor,” he said. “I think she was underestimated as lieutenant governor.”

Convincing left-leaning voters to back the governor’s reelection is a different challenge.

Hochul has opposed higher income tax rates, though she has not fully ruled out proposing increases next year. She previously clashed with the left over her choice to lead the state’s highest court — a nomination that was rejected in the Democratic-dominated state Senate.

Yet Hochul has forged a working relationship with Mamdani, bonding over the shared priority of expanding no-cost child care in New York. She also backed the creation of a narrow tax on costly New York City second homes, with the revenue earmarked for Mamdani’s budget.

The mayor, who is expected to again undertake a tax-the-rich push in Albany next year, is stumping for the governor — a chit that he can potentially cash in next year. Mamdani’s allies backing the governor are also casting ballots for her on the left-leaning Working Families Party line — a move aimed at sending a message to Hochul about the left’s surging political power.

“Campaigning with the mayor in my opinion is the smartest thing that she can be doing both for appealing to voters, taking advantage of his platform, but also speaking to left-wing voters who are just not normally part of her base even in the general election,” state Sen. Julia Salazar, a democratic socialist, said.

The efforts have solidified a political alliance unusual between New York governors and mayors — and one that will likely be tested next year.

For now, Mamdani is serving as an acerbic Blakeman critic, cutting short-form videos for the governor all in an effort to give her a final jolt in the waning days of the election. The mayor this week said he was confident his voters will turn out for her.

“What I’ve heard from many New Yorkers is an excitement about the tangible things the governor has delivered,” he said.