NY-1: Tim Bishop inches into the lead

by: devtob

Sat Nov 20, 2010 at 15:26:20 PM EST

The story has just one source, Bishop spokesman Jon Schneider, who tells the Express that Bishop now leads by 15 votes.

After an Election Night reporting snafu was corrected, Altschuler had been leading by several hundred votes.

Some background, below.

Tim Bishop's lead vanishes?

by: simonstl

Sat Nov 06, 2010 at 07:01:14 AM EDT

I can't find much in the media on this, besides this opening of a Newsday story:

In the close House race on the East End, Republican Randy Altschuler moved ahead of incumbent Rep. Tim Bishop Friday after a re-canvass of voting machines.

Altschuler leads Bishop, a Democrat, by about 400 votes, both campaigns said, citing data from the Suffolk County Board of Elections. That represents a swing of almost 4,000 votes because Bishop was ahead by 3,461 earlier this week.

and there's this bit in the Daily News' The Daily Politics blog.

Perhaps the voting machine apocalypse really is coming upon us...

New York Congressional Delegation Quarterly Filings

by: robert.harding

Thu Oct 15, 2009 at 23:00:29 PM EDT

DISTRICT	INCUMBENT	CONTRIBUTIONS	EXPENDITURES	CASH ON HAND
NY-1	Tim Bishop	$263,189.53	$66,589.32	$710,928.46
NY-2	Steve Israel	$436,670.74	$173,169.91	$1,796,209.25
NY-3	Pete King	$89,287.00	$46,633.81	$1,341,242.55
NY-4	Carolyn McCarthy	$144,167.32	$87,679.05	$413,644.81
NY-5	Gary Ackerman	$42,178.00	$53,197.42	$1,241,122.25
NY-6	Gregory Meeks	$133,147.79	$85,059.25	$165,228.01
NY-7	Joseph Crowley	$65,998.28	$156,605.20	$1,116,438.99
NY-8	Jerrold Nadler	$111,469.86	$132,155.61	$1,071,938.73
NY-9	Anthony Weiner	$182,250.91	$69,776.52	$332,734.80
NY-10	Ed Towns	$252,311.01	$155,940.48	$187,729.28
NY-11	Yvette Clarke	$85,609.00	$97,684.01	$12,396.19
NY-12	Nydia Velazquez	$62,682.62	$29,832.88	$674,887.73
NY-13	Michael McMahon	$205,001.01	$82,926.39	$766,817.56
NY-14	Carolyn Maloney	$345,120.27	$259,630.25	$1,704,244.49
NY-15	Charles Rangel	$434,322.00	$454,669.23	$1,108,907.01
NY-16	Jose Serrano	$35,794.50	$9,328.75	$55,506.16
NY-17	Eliot Engel	$67,204.00	$49,086.25	$196,223.91
NY-18	Nita Lowey	$183,780.64	$93,564.01	$817,034.71
NY-19	John Hall	$132,363.44	$74,095.55	$350,710.38
NY-20	Scott Murphy	N/A	N/A	N/A (Not Yet Filed)
NY-21	Paul Tonko	$60,380.00	$41,823.89	$75,550.68
NY-22	Maurice Hinchey	$66,741.44	$34,272.05	$98,467.32
NY-23	VACANT	N/A	N/A	N/A
NY-24	Michael Arcuri	$136,249.10	$67,602.73	$385,080.72
NY-25	Dan Maffei	$326,254.50	$126,899.93	$784,210.52
NY-26	Chris Lee	$142,802.69	$95,665.00	$390,613.64
NY-27	Brian Higgins	$100,290.00	$96,556.25	$825,367.69
NY-28	Louise Slaughter	$139,424.00	$77,127.13	$306,497.62
NY-29	Eric Massa	$289,499.02	$122,273.64	$503,188.18

The 23rd wasn't include for obvious reasons. That race can serve as its own post, since three candidates are vying for it and there is no incumbent.

One of the things that stuck out to me was the great quarter Eric Massa had. His district - NY-29 - is a rural district that isn't really a wealthy district. So when he can bring in over $289,000 in a quarter where most upstate representatives only brought in half of that amount, it shows that he is a strong incumbent. The Republicans are gunning for him, but he's tough.

Dan Maffei had a very strong quarter - the best of any upstate representative and fourth-best of any member of Congress in the state.

If there is one thing you can say about Rangel, he is a great fundraiser. He was second to Steve Israel in this quarter, but not by much. His expenditures were high, but he still has a lot of money in the bank (not that he needs to worry about that).

For the most part, these are solid and typical numbers. As a resident of NY-26, it is interesting to see Lee's numbers. I wouldn't read too much into his mediocre quarter, but the list of donors who have contributed to his campaign makes for a "Best of Wall Street"-type list.  

NY-1: Bishop A Republican Target For 2010

by: robert.harding

Tue Sep 29, 2009 at 23:11:39 PM EDT

Congressman Tim Bishop will be a target for Republicans seeking to put a dent in the majority for Democrats in Congress and try to decrease the large number of Democrats in the New York congressional delegation.

The 1st congressional district does have a Republican enrollment advantage of about 27,000 voters. There are a large number of unregistered voters in the district, which balances things out.

Here are the numbers as of April 1:

DEMOCRATS: 141,030
REPUBLICANS: 168,718
INDEPENDENCE: 18,967
CONSERVATIVE: 12,576
WORKING FAMILIES: 2,070
GREEN: 1,060
LIBERTARIAN: 109
BLANK: 124,896
TOTAL: 469,426

Bishop won in 2008 with 58 percent of the vote. He won in 2006 with 62 percent of the vote. So Bishop isn't exactly vulnerable. Obama narrowly won the district with 51 percent of the vote in 2008, so perhaps that is why the Republicans are adding this seat to the list.

Obviously, defending Bishop will be a priority. We don't need any surprises. Yes, Bishop won his last race by 16 points. But we don't want to sit back and assume that will happen again. So defending NY-1 and keeping Bishop in office will be a priority.

10 New York Dems Vote For Lawlessness, Monarchy

by: phillip anderson

Fri Jun 20, 2008 at 14:18:47 PM EDT

There's so much to despise in the bill these 10 NY Democrats voted on today, but Glenn Greenwald tries to pick the worst:

Perhaps the most repellent part of this bill (though that's obviously a close competition) is 802(c) of the telecom amnesty section. That says that the Attorney General can declare that the documents he submits to the court in order to get these lawsuits dismissed are secret, and once he declares that, then: (a) the plaintiffs and their lawyers won't ever see the documents and (b) the court is barred from referencing them in any way when it dismisses the lawsuit. All the court can do is issue an order saying that the lawsuits are dismissed, but it is barred from saying why they're being dismissed or what the basis is for the dismissal.

So basically, one day in the near future, we're all going to learn that one of our federal courts dismissed all of the lawsuits against the telecoms. But we're never going to be able to know why the lawsuits were dismissed or what documents were given by the Government to force the court to dismiss the lawsuits. Not only won't we, the public, know that, neither will the plaintiffs' lawyers. Nobody will know except the Judge and the Government because it will all be shrouded in compelled secrecy, and the Judge will be barred by this law from describing or even referencing the grounds for dismissal in any way. Freedom is on the march.

Is that what a democracy looks like? Are you telling me that we stood down a Soviet Union with tens of thousands of nuclear warheads aimed directly at us but that some half literate cave dwellers have driven us to basically gut the Fourth Amendment and bless the ones wielding the knife? And don't even get me started on how this whole vote went down.

When Democrats took over the Congress, they issued a document vowing to "end the 'dead of night' special interest provisions that turn bills into special-interest giveaways" and proclaimed: "Lawmakers must have the opportunity to read every bill before they vote on it. It's common sense."

Today, the House leadership has set aside a grand total of one hour to debate the FISA/amnesty bill, and gave its members less than 24 hours from the time it was released yesterday until they have to vote on it today. That's the same bill which the NYT this morning calls "the most significant revision of surveillance law in 30 years." They're going to enact massive changes to our spying laws without having the slightest idea what they're voting on. All they know is that the President demanded this, and that's enough, because -- as Kit Bond says -- "when the government tells you to do something, I'm sure you would all agree that I think you all recognize that is something you need to do." In this formulation, "the government" means "The President."

Disgraceful.

The following Democrats should remove me from their lists:

Ackerman (NY-5)
Arcuri (NY-24)
Bishop (NY-1)
Crowley (NY-7)
Engel (NY-17)
Gillibrand (NY-20)
Higgins (NY-27)
Lowey (NY-18)
McCarthy (NY-4)
Meeks (NY-6)