Race to fill vacant Queens Assembly seat underway
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Democratic candidate Sam Berger and Republican candidate David Hirsch face off in the race to fill the vacancy in Assembly District 27. Photos via campaigns
By Jacob Kaye
The race to fill the Northeastern Queens Assembly seat vacated by former lawmaker Daniel Rosenthal earlier this summer is well underway.
Early voting in the race for Assembly District 27 between Democrat Sam Berger and Republican David Hirsch began over the weekend – though trips to the polls in the district have been sparse. Early voting will run through this coming weekend ahead of the election on Tuesday, Sept. 12.
It’s been a short campaign, running not much longer than a month – Rosenthal officially stepped down in mid-July but the Democratic Party and Republican Party did not officially select their respective candidates until the start of August.
The low turnout during the first five days of early voting is expected to continue throughout the early voting period and into election day, which is calendared for the week after a holiday weekend in September during an off year.
But who might benefit more for the low turnout is anyone’s guess, political observers tell the Eagle.
Berger, a 25-year-old law school graduate, has received the backing of the Queens County Democratic Party, Rosenthal, a number of unions and leaders of the Orthodox Jewish community, including the conservative Orthodox newspaper The Jewish Press. He’s also out-fundraised Hirsch eight to one.
Hirsch, a 32-year-old ordained rabbi, was tapped to run in the election by the Queens County Republican Party and backs a number of policies championed by the minority party, including eliminating the bail reforms passed several years ago.
Though the seat has been held by Democrats for years, Republicans are hopeful that a strong showing by the GOP in the 2022 race for the governor’s office may yield favorable results in next week’s election.
But Tuesday’s election will likely look far different than the 2022 general election and the Assembly district that includes parts of Whitestone, College Point, Flushing, Kew Gardens Hills, Pomonok and Utopia could see a very different electorate turn up at the polls than those who voted a little less than a year prior, others say.
“Anything can happen in a low turnout election,” said Brian Browne, an adjunct professor of political science at St. John’s University.
Berger, who recently graduated from St. John’s University School of Law, told the Eagle on Thursday that inspiring his run for the Assembly seat is his young family – the married Berger has two children. It’s central to his pitch to voters, he said.
“I believe my strength, even though I am young, is that I'm looking toward both my generation and the future generation, and that I'm willing to work with everyone,” Berger said. “The future means a lot to me right now because my children are so young and I want them to grow up in a place that's prosperous.”
Despite his age, Berger said that running for elected office had not been on his radar until recently. It wasn’t until Rosenthal, who was first elected to the seat in a special election in 2017, began to consider stepping down that Berger said he considered stepping up.
“I met with Dan and we talked about what the job is and I said, ‘Okay, if this is where I can be, and I can help people, then this is what I want to do,’” Berger said. “I'm not doing this with any aspirations of making some powerful political career. I'm doing this because I want to help my community, I want to help my district.”
The young Eastern Queens native was endorsed by Rosenthal, who recently took a job with the UJA-Federation, before he was even given the nomination. Notably, party nominees are selected by the district leaders serving in the Assembly district. Of the four district leaders in the 27th District, one is Rosenthal and another is Paula Berger, the candidate’s mother.
Despite the endorsement from Rosenthal, Berger said he wanted to set himself apart from the previous office holder and that their policy positions don’t necessarily align on every issue.
“Our views on things are rather similar, although I may lean a little bit more conservative than he did, a little bit more moderate,” Berger said. “But I am looking to be able to set myself apart as being a more vocal voice for common sense and finding common ground.”
“I understand that I am young, but if I don't come out, and if I don't stand up for this, I believe that that would be doing my district a disservice,” he added. “It's coming into Albany and looking at things with a fresh set of eyes, it's coming in with a different perspective, a newer perspective.”
When asked by the Eagle if there was any specific legislation he’d consider introducing in the Assembly if elected, Berger declined to give specifics. However, the candidate said that if elected he would voice his opposition to the “not on our dime” act, a bill from Queens Assemblymember Zohran Mamdani that would prohibit nonprofit organizations from “engaging in unauthorized support of Israeli settlement activity.”
Berger has brought in around $141,300 in campaign funds, as per the latest campaign finance filings.
His campaign account is far larger than the one held by Hirsch, who has brought in around $7,850.
Speaking with the Eagle on Thursday, Hirsch said that the disparity in the candidates’ fundraising numbers can be chalked up to the fact that Berger’s campaign got started before Hirsch’s campaign and before Rosenthal had officially stepped down.
Hirsch also dismissed the fundraising prowess of a candidate as the sole arbiter of determining said candidate’s performance in an election.
“Fundraising isn't everything – it's about the passion of the campaign,” Hirsch told the Eagle. “I have teams of eager volunteers all over the district – every single day, I have volunteers in different neighborhoods going door to door.”
“Money isn't everything,” he added.
Hirsch, a Queens College graduate and ordained rabbi, has pitched himself to voters by telling them that he’ll serve as an alternative to the Democratic majority in Albany – in their endorsement of Berger, The Jewish Press noted that the district would be better served by someone working in the majority.
Among his top legislative issues are the state’s bail laws, which he says need to be changed. In his interview with the Eagle, Hirsch also knocked New York City, State and federal Democrats for their handling of the migrant crisis.
“We need to send the message to Albany that we've had enough of these bad policies,” Hirsch said. “Voting Republican, voting for me will signal that change.”
“It will also put all the Democrats who claim to be moderate but cave in to the leadership on these bad policies, that come 2024, your seats will be threatened if you don't start defying the leadership and acting in what's the best interest of your district,” he added.
Hirsch, his supporters and several political observers believe that the district is ripe to elect a Republican after GOP gubernatorial candidate Lee Zeldin won the district over Governor Kathy Hochul last fall.
But Browne says the two elections shouldn’t be compared.
“Zeldin was out there for a long time running, using a lot of resources, there were TV commercials, crime was a big issue – I don't know if you can entirely draw analogies with a gubernatorial election and a special election held a week after Labor Day in an off year,” he said.
Still, low voter turnout – less than 100 people had voted early per day through the first five days of early voting – adds a bit of uncertainty to the outcome of the race, Browne said.
But low turnout isn’t new to candidates running in special elections in the 27th Assembly District.
Rosenthal won his special election for the seat in 2017 after running unopposed – around 10,000 votes were cast. Rosenthal’s predecessor, Michael Simanowitz, also won the seat in a special election held in 2011. Simanowitz, whose death created the vacancy in the seat Rosenthal would fill, won the race where less than 10,000 voters cast ballots.
“If history is any guide, it'll be a small group of people who will launch the political career of the next representative of the 27th Assembly District,” Browne said.
