Welcome to the Capital Connection, a weekly program questioning New York State leaders on a variety of issues.
Your host is Dr. Alan Sharton, political scientist and professor emeritus at the University at Albany.
Distribution of the Capital Connection is made possible with the help of New York State United teachers,
representing professionals in education and health care, online at nysut.org.
And Nisqasa, the New York State Coalition against sexual assault, working to support men and their decisions to end sexual violence with the My Strength is not for Herding Campaign, online at nyscas.org.
Welcome to the Capital Connection, I'm Alan Sharton. Joining us today is Albany Times Union Super Reporter Jimmy Veeelkein.
Jimmy Veeelkein covers politics from the capital, finding the fun and dysfunction in print, and at the Capital Confidential Blog.
He's also a contributor to WMHT's New York Now and CapitalNewYork.com. Veeelkein has been watching State Government since 2008.
First for the New York Observer and then for the Times Union. He previously covered breaking news and police as the Times Union's nighttime reporter.
Veeelkein has a degree in urban planning from Columbia University, and as a Clifton Park native loves working for the paper he grew up reading.
So Jimmy Veeelkein, thanks so much for being with us. How do you do it? How do you break all those stories that nobody else can get?
Well, you know, it's just interesting. You know, the capital is a very interesting place and I'm delighted to be there. But, you know, I think that the State Government is a very important part of our lives, and part of people's lives.
You know, I mean, not realize it both here in the Capital Region were probably more cognizant of it than elsewhere.
But, you know, it's interesting. I'm very privileged to have a front row seat at things as they happen. And of course, it's been a very busy week and kind of a busy month and gearing up to be several busy months at the State Capital in our State Government and Political Life.
On Wednesday of this week, I saw Governor Andrew Cuomo give his State of the State address. I should say presentation.
His third State of the State presentation in which he laid out a series of agendas, many of which were received as quite ambitious.
And I think which we'll have as I just said, a very deep and profound impact on the lives of everyday New Yorkers. So, a couple that really stand out.
The Governor wants to build three casinos in upstate areas. He didn't really get into too much detail in his public remarks, which lasted a little bit over an hour on Wednesday.
But three casinos, full-fledged casinos, not the slot parlors, which we call casinos, which we used to call race-sinos. But full-fledged Las Vegas-style casinos, where you can play table games with cars, roulette, etc., etc., etc., etc.
But he wants to put them upstate and have them be magnets for tourism, have them be in his own words, destinations for people from New York City, from downstate areas to come and to spend their money in the State of New York.
And further, the Governor hopes that once they see the great glories of upstate America, that they will be inclined to come back, inclined to do things in tourism, and hopefully really engender yet more tourism and more travel and economic activity within the State.
Yes, but getting down in dirty Jimmy Veeelkind, it seems to me that it's a brilliant stroke in other ways. One of them is, upstate New York has always felt a bit of an inferiority complex compared to the City.
And here is this guy, who was as New York as you could get, and he is saying, come on now, we're not going to build them in New York City.
We're going to build them upstate, otherwise the upstates will come to New York City, and we want them the downstates to come up to these places. That's exactly what he said.
Now, with that in mind, he sends a signal out, a political signal out to upstate New York, I'm for you, and he scores some political points. But there's a 30 year story behind us, isn't there?
We were sheldon silver the speaker in all of this.
Well, sheldon silver the speaker Manhattan Democrat has been very explicit that he doesn't want to casino in Manhattan, of course, the core of New York City, but that he was amenable to putting one in the five boroughs.
He was amenable to putting slot parlor at the aqueduct race track, which is sort of on the southeast fringe of queens.
But he said he's going to go along with this. I think for a couple reasons. One, he's going to get a lot of things, hopefully this legislative session that he wants, and why would he pick a fight with the governor?
The second thing is that Cuomo has said that this was the first, this will be the first phase of casino development, and that the second phase could, in fact, lead to casino development within New York City.
So we'll see, I think that that explains the speaker's acquiescence show.
Well, well, well, well, well, well, we're on the subject. Let's talk about the way in which all of this is working.
On the one hand, you have Cuomo and speaker silver. That's a relationship which some of us know to be a little bit more contentious than others know.
Silver knows how to fight. He knows when to hold him and when to fold him, but he can stand up to the governor and has.
The Republicans, it seems to me, and I'm Jimmy Veele-Kon telling you what I think you know, but maybe you'll argue with me.
And that is that the Republicans, Dean Skellos, happens to be there at Cuomo's sufferance.
I have to think that Cuomo, by not vetoing the redistricting bill, ended up keeping Skellos in power and allowing him to draw districts the way he wanted to, and now he's got this aberrant democratic splinter group, which is helping Skellos stay in power.
But Skellos knows doesn't even in the blue state, New York, that the game's up. And that if in fact he crosses this governor, he ain't going to be the chair of his conference or the president of the Senate.
I don't know. I think that that that's certainly you make a very good point. It's a very good analysis.
You know, I certainly think that the governor did not go out of his way to argue for Democrats to retake the majority in the state Senate.
I think that his posture on moderately.
Yeah, you know, I try to be diplomatic at times, but I think that the redistricting posture was one part of that.
You'll notice that the governor endorsed only I think three senators in the general election. David Carlucci, one of the members of the four now five member independent democratic conference, a young man from from Rockland County, Joe Adabo running in Queens, then kind of the Howard Beach area.
I think that he saw Joe Adabo was in trouble. I think that he saw a place where I think that might be part of it.
But I think that you know, you got an Italian guy from Queens, endorsing an Italian guy from Queens, whereas if Andrew Cuomo were to come in on behalf of perhaps a Democrat running in a more upstate area.
The marginal areas where they could with the Democrats could take the Senate. In other words, this is Andrew Cuomo's base. This is his backyard. He knew he could have a big impact and turned out that that everything worked out fine for Adabo.
It's also interesting that you know, Cuomo is not known for taking political risks. He's not known for throwing his weight behind someone who he doesn't believe has a very strong chance of winning.
And so I'm sure that his political team examined the race before he made the endorsement. And you know, that was that on the other hand, the Jimmy Vialkin.
There were people like catch a obscure Senate candidate. Look, he's got Drew Zambele holding for him. He knows what's up. They were looking at those numbers. I'm sure and knowing that catch it could win. And maybe she did in fact and got no help from the governor really.
Yeah, that is certainly true. But it was certainly in our slam dunk. You said if she should win. I mean, as we record with the governor though.
With the governor on her side, that would have provided the margin of victory. Right now it's even Stephen really. Well, yes. And of course we can't perfectly predict whether it would have provided the margin of victory.
I can. Well, okay. But that kind of thing remains to be seen. And the catch a grace is interesting. It's turning out to be kind of critical to what the balance of power will be within the chamber.
So we know we have catch a and Amador the Republican. That's right. Catch a unknown Democrat. Amador, the assemblyman who runs everybody assumes they've drawn the district the way they have to do the Republicans in order to win it.
And it's so close that the courts will be on this for quite a while now. Well, yes. And actually this week, five just this panel of the appellate division of the Supreme Court ruled that 99 additional ballots in the race should be open now.
Let me take a quick step back here after election day when you have a really close race. What happens is one candidate sews the other. This happens in every race. And what that does is it allows a judge to get involved in the recounted process or rather the counting process of all the paper ballots, the absentee ballots, the affidavit ballots that were produced in the course of the election.
And so they had this sort of six week counting process and everybody you Jimmy what an affidavit ballot is.
Where you show up to the polls and for whatever reason you're not listed in the poll book, but you say, hey, what the heck I've lived here and I am a resident of this district. I should be eligible to vote. There was some stupid problem. And so you fill out a ballot where you essentially affirm you swear by penalty of law that you are an eligible voter and you're required to provide certain information and fill out the application completely yada yada yada.
And now one of the reasons I'm sorry Jimmy that this is so important is that we know that some of the guys who are watching the polls and counting sometimes have a pretty good instinct for who should be allowed to vote and who shouldn't.
Right. And also there are lots of ways as we've found that you can find little technical details of the election law, the letter of the election law. And from that you can, you know, object to these votes.
So that's essentially what happened. You started counting these absentee and affidavit ballots and what you do is you sit in a room usually without windows that of board of elections and an attorney from each campaign is present and they'll look at the ballot and the first thing that they'll do they don't usually say this but it's what they do. They'll try and determine what was this vote for my guy or for the other guy and if it's for the other guy, then they'll really look at it closely and they'll say, well, can we knock this out in any kind of technical detail and then they try to knock it out.
And so once you do that, those ballots that have been found objectionable go to a judge and then you have a trial. And of course, if at any point the amount of ballots that are kind of off to the side are less than the margin of victory, then they just kind of stop the process because it becomes pointless.
So we don't have that now.
We do not right now. Right now. Right now. So so a judge in Montgomery County went through all.
I may point out, although I'm in trouble with one senior Republican judge for this. We're pointing out that the judge was a Republican.
Yes. And so they went to this judge in Montgomery County, my name guy, Timelinson. And he heard objections on eight hundred eighty seven of these objectionable ballots.
And he ruled that about half of them should be counted. So with all that, Amidors lead stood at 37 votes.
And he was seven votes, 37 votes out of approximately 33,000 cast. I want to say plus or minus. And so at the same time, the same judge ruled 450 ish ballots invalid.
And so, Kotchick down on the counts. That's the unknown.
Yes, she has appealed the decision and the court of the appellate division of the Supreme Court had ruled this week that 99 more ballots should be opened.
Now, I'm no mathematical wizard, but 99 is more than 47. And therefore there is a shot that as these ballots, 3047, it's 37. Forgive me. I'm going to say more than no more than 37.
No, no mathematical wizard here, but 99 is more than 37, which means that Kotchick has a chance to essentially undo Amidors certification.
And we're waiting now to see if these ballots are going to be counted, see what the results will be and they are counted. And further see if there are, if there is a further appeal, there's one more level of court, the court of appeals, the highest court in the state.
But because the palette justice is acted unanimously, it's not a guarantee that the court of appeals is going to hear the case. They could, in fact, punt they could say, nope, we're not going to hear any further arguments. Open the 99 ballots, let the chips fall where they may.
So it's an outbuyer.
So let me see if I get this straight. There were a 37. There's a lead for the Republican Amidor by 37. The Democrat, Kachik, has now prevailed to the point where the court, the appellate division of Supreme Court has said, OK, you get 99 more open ballots.
But if they have, if the 37, let's say she gets, you know, one more than 37 out of that group, right? She wins. Right.
And it's just fascinating. It is fascinating. What if it's a tie?
What if you didn't go out and vote that day? Right. If you didn't go out and vote that day. So, so that's interesting. And then that, of course, that the outcome of that race has an effect on the balance problem that you've known earlier.
So you alluded earlier that Senate Republican conference leader Dean Skellis, a man from a island, has aligned this year for the first time with members of the independent Democratic conference.
Now, I know I know I've spoken with your listeners about that before. But essentially this is a five, this is a group of five centers. It's led by Jeff Klein from the Bronx.
And they essentially seceded from the mainstream Democratic conference at the beginning of 2011.
There was friction between the two groups. There continues to be friction between the two groups. But part of it is that Klein is an ambitious man. He has always wanted to be the leader of the Democratic conference.
And he found that his ambition could not be fulfilled if he stayed in that. That means that there are no racial.
Is there any Jimmy? Is there any racial issue between these two groups, the online Democrats and the, and the, the so-called new Democrats?
Yeah. Several people have have have taken that that analysis of it. The original four members of the independent Democratic conference were all white.
They have since been joined by an African American man Malcolm Smith. Who by the way was one of the reasons when in that top leadership that they got out in the first place.
So there's certain amount of hypocrisy being leveled hypocrisy charges being leveled at them. Yes, people have people have brought that up. And of course the mainstream Democratic conference has a very sizable number of African American Hispanic legislators.
And as a result, it has for the past three, four times now, it has selected an African American as its leader, first David Patterson, who I'm a become governor, then Malcolm Smith, as you pointed out, then John Samson, a Brooklyn and most recently, Andrew Stewart Cousins, a woman who lives in Yonkers and is now the leader of that Democratic minority conference.
Who is on this very show, Leslie? I almost was going to say it, but I figured I'd let you. I'll do self-serving.
And so, so Klein allied with the Republicans. And essentially those, those his, with brought those five votes in combination with the 30 elected Republicans.
So 30 plus five is 35. Now there's one Democrat from Brooklyn, my name's Simka Felder. He's an Orthodox Jew and he serves a predominantly Orthodox Jewish community.
That is pretty conservative. And that Williams Republican in a lot of ways, but he ran as a Democrat. However, as soon as his election was affirmed, he immediately crossed over to the Republicans. So now you're 36.
But you're at 31 without the IDC, the independent Democratic conference. So you've got 31 in that Republican conference. If Amidors witness sustained, they stand at 32.
32 is an outright majority of votes in the 63 vote chamber. And the Republicans, Dean Skellos, can say, hey, independent Democratic conference buzz off.
I don't need you, which they would deserve. Perhaps. And so, however, if Cachix win is sustained, Skellos needs those independent Democrats.
And of course, the independent Democrats and Skellos on several wedge issues have very, very different politics. They have very different sensibilities. And I think it's going to make for a very, very interesting dynamic this year in seeing what types of legislation actually get to the floor of the state Senate.
Because of course, we know that there are more Democrats numerically than Republicans in the state Senate. So you would think that some of the progressive agenda items that our illustrious governor is coming up, for example, an increase in the minimum wage indexing for inflation, a broadening of the definition of band assault weapons, something that Republicans are low to a low to to to expand because they feel it would necessarily disenfranchise lawful gun owners.
They think that the appropriate response to recent shootings and the appropriate gun control measures are to increase penalties for illegal guns and also to look at mental health policies.
So we have those two wedge issues, governor Cuomo called for something called the Women's Equality Act, not completely spelled out as yet.
But basically an ERA for the state.
Yeah, an ERA for the state and also a act that's called the Reproductive Health Act, which would make explicit in New York law abortion protections should the federal Roe v. Wade court decision ever be overturned or bridged this would put in state law.
The right to abortion and would really update state law from the 1960s when it when it was last written when when governor Nelson Rockefeller, I believe, allowed abortion to be legalized.
So it's very progressive agenda. I see that the New York Post POST, as I often say, which is a fairly very conservative newspaper and has been very optimistic about this governor, especially when he was in his cutting mode, have now gone after tooth and nail and said that he's now coming from the left.
And some of the people that they usually depend on to trash, people like the governor are turning really fast.
Yes. And so it's going to be very interesting. But of course, governor Cuomo has made a couple calculations. Some people say he sees 2016 and a possible presidential bid and a possible democratic primary bid to secure his party's nomination for the presidency as a reason for doing so.
Some people see 2014 and the need to again, sure of that democratic base, prevent dissenters, liberals, progressives who were perhaps disinamored with the governor from forming perhaps a third party challenge to him and perhaps siphoning off votes.
He's got 74% approval rating.
Anything's possible, Alan, 2014's a long way away. But but that's something that that's been brought up. And then the other point that some some of Cuomo's always said is that, you know, he was always wanted to do these things.
He has included them in campaign materials since his initial since initially announcing his candidacy in 2010. And so he has also said that he wants to be progressive, but he he had to deal with fiscal crises.
So apparently now with the Senate in this unsettled nature where we have numerically more elected Democrats that are Republicans, but where we have Republicans as the dominant partner in the controlling coalition because of this, this truth that they've brokered with the IDC.
We're going to have a really interesting year. I'm very excited to see how it plays out and very excited to see what policies that Senate goes for. Very excited to see how hard Cuomo is willing to push on several of these wedgie type issues.
I haven't a believe, by the way, that he owns the Senate. I have to believe that Dean Skelos knows, damned well, that if Cuomo hadn't helped them in the first place and if Cuomo is in there form, he has no chance to survive.
So I think when Cuomo argues as some of his people due to me that he has to contend with the Senate, just like his Papa did, they need the Senate to be the bad guys.
And that's why they're there. But I think it could be argued that anything he wants from Dean Skelos, he should get. He would get.
Well, we'll see. I also think that he really wants it.
It's interesting, dynamic, that you're seeing in the Republican Senate conference. You know, Senator Skelos is the state's top elected Republican.
And his formal response to the governor's state of the state presentation was, I think I can quote this from memory. We have traded rigid ideology for common ground.
Can you imagine that?
You know, I can't imagine anyone in Washington saying that nowadays. So that's quite an eye-popper. But at the same token, the biggest issue in which the Senate Republicans perhaps turned away from their own government.
And perhaps turned away from their more conservative allies and did a solid, if you so to speak, for the governor was on the issue of same-sex marriage.
Where four GOP senators broke from party ranks and supported same-sex marriage. And where Skelos allowed the bill to the floor, even though the majority of the members of his conference were against it.
What happened to those four members? Well, one retired, one lost at a primary, Roy McDonald, one Steve Silland was defeated in the general election.
And he was a third party challenger, named Neil DeCarlo, siphoned enough votes from him, using his conservative party line to allow Democrat Terry Gibson to squeak into victory.
And Mark Rosanti, Buffalo Republican, was able to win a election. So of the four, one returned to office. That sent a very chilling effect to Senate Republicans.
And there were three races on Long Island, in which the conservative party, which often cross endorses Republicans, and often provides a critical buttress for Republicans, both legislatively and otherwise, provided the margin of victory over Democrat.
So in other words, without that conservative line, it is believed and it can be read that the Republicans would not have been victorious in those three seats.
I think you're going to see Republicans cognizant of that and fearful. But perhaps they're also going to see 2012 as an historic Democratic here, as 2008 was.
You had Barack Obama leading the ticket. You had a strong turnout among Democratic voters. And you know, it was a rough year for the GOP.
They may also think that 2014, like 2010, might be a backlash reaction. Remember 2010, we had all these Republicans sweep into office in the House of Representatives.
The Assembly Republicans, I think, picked up a half dozen seats, perhaps more. I don't recall the exact number. We saw Republicans in the Senate retake the majority from the Senate Democrats.
So I think that they have a very detailed and complex calculation to make. I think they're going to make it issue by issue.
And I think that they're going to certainly be respectful of the governor. I don't think that pure obstruction is a viable strategy for them.
But I don't necessarily see them as completely acquiescent. And you know, we'll just have to wait and see.
Is gun control his number one issue?
I think that Andrew Cuomo would love to see gun. It's toughening of a gun measures. And he'd like to see it quickly. I think that he would like to be number one.
He'd like to be able to claim credibly as he has in the past that New York is the progressive beacon for the nation.
And certainly passing tougher gun control legislation in the wake of these horrible shootings that we've seen in Newtown and in Webster would let him do that.
I'm going to steal one or two seconds here on his lecturing of the federal government in which he got up there and says we won't forget if you don't come through with what we need here.
Because we were there for you and where are you when we and we won't forget you.
Hey, it's popular to bash Congress. Everyone knows that.
And especially when you're in New Yorker in this particular case. Hey, our guest has been the fabulous Times Union political reporter Jimmy Velkine.
I'm Alan Chartock. Hey, Jimmy. Thanks so much for being with us.
I would always a pleasure. Thanks for having me.
The Capitol connection is distributed with the cooperation of the public radio stations of New York State.
Ian Pickis is producer of the Capitol connection, a production of WAMC Northeast public radio in Albany.
Support for the Capitol connection comes from New York State United teachers representing professionals in education and health care online at nysu.org.
And Nisqaasa, the New York State Coalition against sexual assault, working to support men in their decisions to end sexual violence with the My Strength is not per hurting campaign online at nyscas.org.
Music
Music
Music
Music
Music
Music
Music
Music
