Ballot 'billboards' come to fore in NY's 'fusion' system of voting
New York State Democratic chairman Jay Jacobs says he wants to be sure of a second line for Gov. Kathy Hochul's ticket. Credit: Howard Schnapp
The irony of the state Democrats' plan to create a secondary line for their candidates on the November ballot shouldn’t be lost as this election preseason unfolds.
For years under ex-Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s direction, the dominant party organization did what it could to curb the power of cross-endorsements. But New York remains one of the few states that allows all candidates for office to collect votes from multiple party nominations. It’s also called fusion voting.
“I always will be opposed to fusion voting,” state Democratic chairman Jay Jacobs insisted Thursday. “But while we have fusion voting, I will not support the disarming of our side by allowing Republicans to have more lines than we do.”
The working title is the “Fair New Deal” line. The thinking is that the ballot becomes a billboard. “The more times a name appears on a billboard, the more times it’s in front of voters, it becomes more of a subliminal message, there is greater support," Jacobs said.
The state’s stalwart Conservative Party supports GOP designee Lee Zeldin for governor. On the political left, however, leaders of the Working Families Party have chafed against those who head the mainstream Democratic Party for reasons that often depend on whom you choose to believe.
This year the WFP backs New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, who’s challenging Hochul for the Democratic nomination. Even if Williams loses the Democratic bid, there’s no guarantee the WFP will throw in with the bigger party's nominee. Jacobs says he wants to be sure of a second line for Gov. Kathy Hochul's ticket.
That tactic sounds logical, even if the WFP responds that it "has never played the role of spoiler" and won't help offer right-wing Donald Trump backers a path to election.
But there may be more to Jacobs' gambit further down the ballot. A “Fair New Deal” label could help avowedly "moderate" Long Island Democratic candidates who want a second line for State Senate or Assembly but choose to distance themselves from the radical WFP image.
Jacobs further acknowledges that the extra line could net particular candidates support from non-Democrats and Republicans, or "people who won't vote for them on the Democratic line for whatever reason.’’
Jacobs is also Nassau County's Democratic chairman, and was in that post in 2009 when the county's Republicans used a “Tax Revolt” line to help elect their nominee Ed Mangano as county executive over then-incumbent Tom Suozzi. “There the idea was to use the term to generate support for a philosophical concept with an angry electorate,” Jacobs says.
The tactic is one small way to address the concerns of the majority party — in a very blue state — about losing ground in this fall's congressional midterm elections.
What's easy for the common voter to miss in all the ballot branding is that New York's minor parties are a very different creation than its ad hoc lines. The Conservative and Working Families parties have survived higher legal hurdles imposed a few years ago to qualify for automatic ballot status. While their actions often revolve around the major parties, they remain independent entities with their own platforms. Alternative lines created by Republicans or Democrats, however, are just a way to better display major-party nominees' names on the ballot, adorning them with shorthand, short-term slogans.
That's a distinction worth remembering for voters trying to navigate their choices.
Columnist Dan Janison's opinions are his own.
Dan Janison is a member of the Newsday editorial board.
