| Albany County
While the county accounted for roughly 55% of all registered Democrats in the district, over 65% of the 37,738 votes cast district-wide were cast in Albany County. That is proof positive that Albany County was the big cheese battleground in the district. Here are the final results for the county from their Board of Elections page:
Tracey Brooks: 8,419 votes (34%)
Paul Tonko: 7,879 votes (32%)
Darius Shahinfar: 2,684 (11%)
Joe Sullivan: 478 (2%)
Phil Steck: 5,187 (21%)
Total Votes: 24,647 (65%)
This represents a very close race between Paul Tonko and Tracey Brooks was waged in Albany County. For her part, Tracey Brooks should feel proud about winning the most votes in Albany County in its most heavily contested race in decades. On primary day, Tracey Brooks had gotten a court order to impound all election machines throughout the district in anticipation that the race would be similarly close in other counties, yet Tonko's victories in the western portion of the district shattered the need for this.
Worth noting is Phil Steck's strong showing in Albany County thanks to his win in the Town of Colonie. No official results are being relied upon for these numbers, just word from the Steck campaign, as the counties aren't posting precinct results. Like Tonko, Steck won his base in the town where he is Democratic Party chair and an Albany County Legislator. If anything, the results are significant because it proves the staying power of the Town Democrats' historic win over 112 years of Republican government last year.
Phil Steck will remain on the General Election ballot on the Independence Line, but will not actively campaign. Also, he will step down from his position as party chair in Colonie. This link provides some interesting Albany County information as well as a kind of "aftermath" article:
Observers, including Colonie Democratic committeeman Dick Barrett, have pointed out that Albany County Democrats did their part to hand the congressional primary to former Assemblyman Paul Tonko, of Amsterdam, by working against themselves.
The county Democratic committee with its suburban majority endorsed Steck, while Albany Mayor Jerry Jennings, the most influential city Democrat, backed Tracey Brooks. Other city politicians, such as current county Co-Chairman Frank Commisso backed Tonko.
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The five-way primary divided the Albany vote so extensively, Barrett said, that it helped hand the race to Tonko, the only candidate not from Albany County, who crushed all opponents in Schenectady County, which is closer to his home.
Emphasis added.
Expect more primary fallout from the 21st Congressional Primary in the Albany County Democratic Party at the Sept. committee meeting. There, the current co-chairs, including Tonko-backer Commisso, will be ousted; also, expect the seeds to be planted for a challenge to Albany Mayor Jerry Jennings, who backed Brooks and is becoming more unpopular in the city by the day. It remains to be seen if Tracey Brooks will campaign again, but if she does, she'll likely make note of her 34% win in Albany County in the 2008 primary for Congress; Phil Steck will remain 1st Vice Chair for the Colonie Democrats and an Albany County Legislator, and so his voice in Albany County politics will still carry. Darius Shahinfar's political future is uncertain, and Joe Sullivan simply adds another loss to his long list as both a Democrat and Republican in Albany County politics.
Schenectady County
The second-largest vote-getter in the 21st clearly played the largest role, giving Tonko his most important county landslide on primary night. Given that he only won the entire district by a margin of about 3,500 votes against nearest rival Tracey Brooks, the numbers from Schenectady County speak for themselves:
Paul Tonko: 3,342 (59%)
Tracey Brooks: 969 (17%)
Phil Steck: 747 (13%)
Darius Shahinfar: 501 (9%)
Joe Sullivan: 66 (1%)
Total Votes: 5,625 (15%)
In the last half-decade of his tenure as State Assemblyman, the 105th AD that Tonko had represented since 1983 was re-drawn to include most of the City of Schenectady, obviously where the most voters in the county reside by far. Yet he has been representing the three western towns of the county since first entering the Assembly, helping explain the three-to-one margin he won agianst all three of his strongest Albany County opponents.
Rensselaer & Saratoga Counties
The 21st contained just portions of the eastern side of the Hudson River, but included the beefiest urban areas of the cities of Troy and Rensselaer. Here are the results from the other side of the river:
Tracey Brooks - 1,429 (41%)
Paul Tonko - 878 (25%)
Darius Shahinfar - 373 (11%)
Joe Sullivan - 60 (2%)
Phil Steck - 724 (21%)
Total Votes: 3,464 (9%)
Rensselaer County was framed as "the battleground" of the district from an early standpoint. The County Party Committee made no endorsement and none of the candidates were from the county. It's proximity to the City of Albany, where Brooks performed well, likely had something to do with her carrying the county with her widest margin of the night. And the fact that Paul Tonko was farthest from the district coupled with Phil Steck's former service as Assistant District Attorney in the county is the best explanation I can think of to explain why this was the only area of the district where Steck's showings were at all competitive with Tonko's.
While the district is often described as containing "portions" of Saratoga County, it's really only one portion: the Town of Watertown, the farthest town south in Saratoga County, wedges between Albany, Schenectady, and Rensselaer Counties. Here's the Watertown results...
Paul Tonko: 78 (34%)
Tracey Brooks: 95 (41%)
Phil Steck: 25 (11%)
Darius Shahinfar: 28 (12%)
Joe Sullivan: 6 (2%)
Total Votes: (8 distritcts) 232
...and they continue the pattern of Brooks wins in the big urban areas. Yet so few votes were cast here in comparison (the smallest number in the district) that any bragging rights are almost insequential, and I question why the Town of Watertown isn't included in the neighboring 20th Congressional district to keep the counties together. But, for what it's worth, Saratoga County was the only county in which Darius Shahinfar bested Phil Steck, albiet by three votes.
The Western Counties
Here is where the Paul Tonko victory really happens and becomes truly incredible. If you've been tabulating along, you can see a close race between Brooks and Tonko. But on election night, these were the districts that reported first. The first results came in first from the lowest populated and most rural county, Schoharie County:
Tracey Brooks: 124 (13%)
Paul Tonko: 632 (68%)
Darius Shahinfar: 72 (8%)
Joe Sullivan: 8 (1%)
Phil Steck: 89 (10%)
Total Votes: 925
In Tonko's first Assembly district drawings in the 1980s, he represented all of Schohaire County. All that time, and the people of the Schoharie valley never forgot Paul Tonko. The district breakdown linked to is even more amazing, as there are a number of precincts in the County where Tonko was virtually the only vote-getter, providing him with a buffer that helped put him over the top.
The remainder of the district containted all of Montgomery County, including the City and Town of Amsterdam, as well as the Town of Johnstown in Fulton County to the north, which contains the cities of Johnstown and Gloversville. While neither county has it's unofficial results posted to their websites yet, the final numbers can be determined by treating both counties as one district and subracting the rest of the county results from the final district-wide totals.
The math results in one of the biggest primary landslides in district history:
Fulton & Montgomery Counties
Paul Tonko: 2,018 (71%)
Tracey Brooks: 293 (10%)
Phil Steck: 274 (9%)
Darius Shahinfar: 221 (8%)
Joe Sullivan: 39 (1%)
Total Votes: 2,845 (8%)
That more than made up for the Brooks lead in Albany County against Paul Tonko. In Albany County, Brooks defeated Tonko by a margin of only about 500 votes. But in the Fulton & Montgomery Counties, Tonko pulled out well over three times that many votes over his closest opponent. Paul Tonko was first elected as a Town Supervisor in Amsterdam in 1975 and was Chairman of the Montgomery County Board of Supervisors for several years before representing the entirety of the County in the Assembly for a full decade of his 23 years in the Assembly. Put it all together, and the county's favorite son's continued support put him well over the top.
Some reporters in the mainstream media said that the western portion of the district was "important" to Tonko's victory on Sept. 9. That's got to be the understatement of the election cycle; the western portion of the district was critical to Tonko's victory, and he'd had them wrapped up since before he even announced. In that sense, it's debatable as to whether this actually was a competitive race to begin with, as Tonko was the odds-on favorite to win since Mike McNulty announced his retirement.
But Tonko would not have won without having made inroads in the larger counties with which to augment his support in the west, and with the second-highest level of support in the more populous eastern counties, Tonko stands poised to unite Democrats behind him with little to no delay as he brings his energy-focused campaign into the general election. In that, he was undeniably aided by the contention within the Albany County Democratic Party, which is itself a larger campaign that continues even past November 4.
Soundpolitic Blogger's Note
On that day, I predict that the numbers will again show a resounding victory for Paul Tonko, who will go down in history as one of the Capital Regions most respected and resilient political forces whether he serves only this one next term or as many as the current Congressman. I plan on putting in time on the ground with the Tonko campaign where they see help is needed most, and it may be needed in Schenectady County, the home of Tonko's Republican opponent, Jim Buhrmaster, who is also casting himself as an "energy expert" because he owns a home heating oil business with rather large name recognition.
But I will disclose that even though I want to help Paul's campaign, my vote in November will go for Phil Steck, who retains the Independence line. I've put in far more time with his campaign and still honestly feel he'd be the best representative in Congress. But I will not encourage other Democrats to follow suit, and I don't anticipate that large enough number would do so to result in a "spoiled" election. One of the biggest things you hear while canvassing for any candidate is that when you ask voters what party they are registered, this is the most common response:
"I don't vote for the party, I vote for the person."
And the person I'll be voting for is Phil Steck. But the party that will win in November will be the Democratic Party, and it's nominee is overwhelmingly, by the numbers, Paul Tonko. |
