In a blow to Democrats, Republican candidate Bob Turner defeated Democrat David Weprin in a Sept. 13 special election, capturing the heavily Jewish New York City congressional district previously represented by Jewish Rep. Anthony Weiner.
The House of Representatives race was watched closely as a measure of attitudes toward President Barack Obama, with the Jewish vote a particular focus of attention.
Weprin, an Orthodox Jew and New York assemblyman, initially led in pre-election polls. But Turner, a retired television executive who was a creator of “The Jerry Springer Show,” pulled ahead of Weprin in recent weeks.
New York’s 9th Congressional District has the fourth-largest Jewish population of any congressional district, with about 173,000 Jews (roughly one-third of active voters).
Weiner represented the district, which is 57 percent Democratic and 18 percent Republican, from January 1999 until mid-June when he resigned amid a sex scandal.
Despite the big Jewish numbers, the district’s demographics are somewhat atypical, with sizable concentrations of Orthodox Jews and Russian Jews, who tend to lean more conservative in their voting behavior than Jews in general.
Turner worked aggressively to tie Weprin to Obama. A Turner ad blasted both men for supporting the right to build an Islamic center near ground zero. (Weprin has said that while he supports the right to build the center at the location, he would prefer that it be moved elsewhere.)
Weprin, for his part, aired an ad accusing Turner of having “tea party budget ideas” and campaigned by trying to distance himself from Obama, highlighting his criticisms of the president’s policies toward Israel. Last month, when asked if he would endorse Obama’s re-election, Weprin demurred, saying he was focused on his own race.
“This Republican win in an overwhelmingly Democrat district is a significant indicator of the problem that President Obama has in the Jewish community,” said Matt Brooks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition. “While party leaders scramble to deny and try to stem the erosion of Jewish support for Democrats, the real issue is this president’s policies on Israel, on jobs and on the economy.”
In the lead-up to the vote, former New York City Mayor Ed Koch, a Democrat, urged voters to support Turner to send a message of dissatisfaction with Obama over his policies toward Israel. Turner won by a margin of 54-46 percent, according to Sept. 14 figures.
David A. Harris, president of the National Jewish Democratic Council, argued that the stumbling economy — and negative views of Weiner — had made “keeping this seat in Democratic hands … an uphill battle.”
Harris cited a Siena Research Institute poll, conducted Sept. 6-8, showing that 7 percent of the district’s voters identified a candidate’s position on Israel as the main factor in determining their votes, with 16 percent of Jewish voters saying the same thing. By contrast, 30 percent of those polled said the candidate’s position on the economy was the most important issue.
Republicans, however, pointed to a pre-election survey from Public Policy Polling, a Democratic-aligned firm, that showed that 54 percent of district voters disapproved of Obama’s policy toward Israel. That poll found that among the 37 percent of voters who identified Israel as very important, Turner had been leading by a margin of 71-22 percent.
Other factors in the election included Weprin’s vote in the Assembly to legalize same-sex marriage, which drew criticism from the Orthodox community. Fellow New York Assemblyman Dov Hikind, an Orthodox Democrat, blasted Weprin’s stance on the issue and backed Turner; however, the Jewish Press, a Brooklyn-based Orthodox weekly, endorsed Weprin.
Many suggested the election sent a signal as to where the Jewish vote would go in the 2012 presidential elections.
“This message will resound for a full year,” Turner said at his victory party. “It will resound into 2012.”