Gounardes wins and Dems gain
ALBANY — State Sen. Andrew Gounardes declared victory Wednesday over Republican Vito Bruno, a former nightclub owner, as absentee ballots continued to favor Democrats across the state.
Gounardes’ gain, coupled with Sen. Jim Gaughran (D-Nassau) also emerging victorious, was a crucial boost for Democrats as they eye a supermajority in the state Legislature.
Just before announcing his win, Gounardes said that his initial Election Day deficit of 5,210 votes had turned into a 1,100 vote lead with only 3,500 ballots left to be tallied.
“It is the honor of my life to serve my community, and today as the remaining votes are counted, I am enormously grateful to the neighborhoods of southern Brooklyn for reelecting me to represent them in the state Senate,” Gounardes said in a statement. “I will go back to Albany and continue to fight for our community while always remembering the values we share together: to help our neighbors in need and do what is right no matter what.”
During a combative campaign, Bruno slammed the incumbent first-term legislator over bail and criminal justice reforms, echoing a message used by Republicans across the state as they battled to regain seats in the solidly blue Senate.
On Long Island, Gaughran celebrated a triumph after absentee votes helped him overcome a nearly 14,000 vote Election Day difference.
“I am humbled to be reelected by the residents of the 5th Senate District and I thank them for their support,” Gaughran said during a press conference outside the Nassau Democratic Party’s headquarters. “I will keep fighting for my constituents, for Long Island, and for all of New York State, and I thank the voters for giving me the opportunity to continue to serve them.”
His Republican opponent Edmund Smyth conceded in a statement, saying Gaughran “has my unbargained-for support.”
Upstate, Democrat Jeremy Cooney also declared victory Wednesday in his race for the Rochester-area seat being vacated by retiring Republican Sen. Joe Robach.
The wins put Democrats two seats closer to a 42-seat veto-proof supermajority as several upstate and suburban races have yet to be called.
Meanwhile, in the Assembly, incumbent Democrat Mathylde Frontus eked out a win over a QAnon-supporting Republican challenger. Frontus declared victory over Mark Szuszkiewicz, a Coney Island native whose social media is littered with bizarre posts about Democrats and Hollywood elites being pedophiles working to undermine President Trump.
Dem Party Chairman Jay Jacobs knocked Republicans for celebrating Election Day gains before hundreds of thousands of absentee ballots cast across the state amid the coronavirus pandemic were counted.
“I want to remind everybody that on Election Night, it didn’t look so good,” Jacobs said. “There were people on the other side of the aisle taking all sorts of credit and being all excited about what they thought was going to be the outcome. And I said, ‘Don’t count your chickens, because we’ve got a lot of absentee ballots.’ Well, now those absentee ballots have come home to roost.”