Councilmember Dan Halloran’s ceremonial, in-district swearing-in was held in a packed Bayside Historical Society Officers’ Club at Fort Totten last Sunday, January 3. The ceremony invoked comparisons to Senator Frank Padavan’s swearing-in last February at Holy Cross.
Of course, Halloran himself pointed out that the Senator filled the Holy Cross auditorium, capacity 800, while the Officers’ Club only seats 150. Nevertheless, Halloran’s turnout was certainly impressive for a newly elected Councilmember.
What was especially noteworthy were the Democratic elected officials who showed up: Council Speaker Christine Quinn, Upper West Side Councilmember Gale Brewer, Majority Whip and Leader of the Queens Delegation Leroy Comrie, Councilmember Mark Weprin, former Councilmember David Weprin, and Congressmember Gary Ackerman.
It’s understandable why the councilmembers would attend, as a courtesy to a new colleague and a way of welcoming him into the club. What was more surprising was the presence of David Weprin and Ackerman.
Both Weprin and Ackerman are facing competitive elections this year in what is regarded as an unfavorable climate for Democrats in particular and incumbents in general. It makes sense for them to make a conciliatory gesture towards a newly elected Republican and his allies, many of whom are community leaders who crossed party lines to back Halloran’s campaign.
Weprin is currently running for his brother Mark’s Assembly seat, which Mark vacated when he won David’s old Council seat. The governor will soon call for a special election, to be held in February or March. In fact, Weprin appeared at a Community Board meeting last week, a rare sight for him.
Ackerman recently sent out a fundraising solicitation to Democrats noting the recent wins by two Republican councilmembers in his district, Halloran and Peter Koo, and that the GOP is turning its sights on him next.
Tea party activists in both Queens and Nassau would like to take Ackerman on and are reportedly in the process of recruiting a strong challenger. If 2010 is truly a wave election, along the lines of 1994 or 2006-8, longtime Democratic incumbents could be taken out if the wave crests high enough.
What a difference a year makes. The only elected official at Padavan’s swearing in was State Senator Marty Golden, a Republican from Brooklyn. Not a single elected Democrat attended. Dems probably felt the GOP was dying, so why bother showing up.
Padavan’s swearing in was during the GOP’s winter of discontent, the three months in between the defeats of the 2008 election and before Councilmember Eric Ulrich’s win in a special election, the first of the three Republican victories during 2009.
Indeed, at the time of Padavan’s inauguration, following his narrow victory as the last remaining Queens Republican, it seemed there was credence to the prediction one Democratic operative made that in five years there would not be any elected Republicans in Queens.
Now, for the next four years, there will be at least three, and most certainly more.
Democratic incumbents could not ignore Halloran’s swearing-in as the last hurrah of a defeated army in retreat, but rather a testament to the resurgence and reinvigoration of our two-party system.
Daniel Egers is Executive Director of the Queens County Republican Party, a Trustee of the Bayside Historical Society and President of the Friends of Oakland Lake, among other affiliations. The views expressed in this column are his own.
