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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. We'll begin today by checking in on how our local House of Representative members have voted in the Jim Jordan speaker nomination. Some of you know we are beginning to follow on the show the local swing districts already ahead of next year's Congressional elections, because control of Congress was basically determined in the New York suburbs when around five districts swung from Democrat to Republican last year. They will all be hard-fought again next year with control once again at stake.

This is one of the reasons it matters so much. Speaker, the majority party elects the speaker. The speaker decides what legislation can get to the floor for a vote. That means even bills that might have majority support overall, and some of you know they've been going through debates on exactly this kind of thing. Some of the bills that might have majority support overall won't even be voted on if the speaker doesn't think it's good for their party.

In brief, Long Island Republicans Andrew Garbarino, Nick LaLota, and Anthony D'Esposito all made news this week by voting against Jim Jordan, so did Republican Mike Lawler of Westchester and Rockland. Here's D'Esposito speaking for the Long Island 3 on WOR.

Anthony D'Esposito: It was about making sure that Jim Jordan-- and that's why I joined with Andrew Garbarino and Nick LaLota, Jim Jordan needs to understand the needs and what makes things tick here in New York and on Long Island, and the things that are important to us that have gone ignored.

Brian Lehrer: We'll talk about what some of those things are. Congressman Anthony D'Esposito there on WOR radio this week. Republicans in our area, swing districts voting for Jim Jordan were Tom Kean Jr. in New Jersey, everyone's favorite George Santos from the North Shore of Nassau County and Northeast Queens, and Marc Molinaro from a little more Upstate, roughly the Catskills West to the Poughkeepsie area. Here's Molinaro on C-Span.

Marc Molinaro: I've had multiple conversations with Jim. I've expressed my desire to have the issues that Upstate New York cares about; fighting inflation, energy independence, a commitment to fighting crime, and to securing our border. He's assured me that members like me and the people I represent will have a voice at the table. He understands that we need to govern, and for that, I'll be voting for him.

Brian Lehrer: Congressman Marc Molinaro on C-Span. Why this divide, and how might or should it inform 2024? With me now, Nick Reisman, POLITICO New York reporter covering New York state government generally and politics, and co-author of their morning newsletter, the New York Playbook. Nick also is writing about Governor Hochul making a diplomatic trip to Israel right now, and Mayor Eric Adams making a diplomatic trip to Long Island.

Hi Nick, thanks for coming on for all this. Welcome to WNYC today.

Nick Reisman: Hi Brian, thanks for having me.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, your call's welcome on your local member of Congress in your swing district in New York or New Jersey, 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. Do you care if the Republican who represents you votes for or against Jim Jordan for speaker? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. Or any other political analysis, you be the political analyst, or political questions regarding these swing districts for next year and the current issues facing the Congress, speaker in particular, the looming government shutdown, which we're forgetting about for the moment in the country more or less because of the war between Israel and Hamas, but that's going to come right up again in the middle of November.

Democrats, for that matter, do you care if your members in swing districts represented by Democrats vote for a moderate Republican or only for Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692 with Nick Reisman for POLITICO. Big picture, we played those two clips; D'Esposito on one side, Molinaro on the other. How do we understand which local Republicans voted for Jim Jordan and which did not? Do they fall into patterns?

Nick Reisman: Well, to a certain extent, Brian, I think they do, and that is because all of these lawmakers for the most part, with the exception of Congressman Garbarino, are freshman Republicans who are running in districts that President Biden did quite well in, in 2020 and is expected to most likely do well again in, in 2024 when he's leading the Democratic ticket in New York when he runs for re-election for the presidency next year. Typically speaking, in presidential election years, more Democrats in New York will be coming out to vote, and that could hurt these Republicans who are running down-ballot.

To a certain extent, they have to have someone at the top of the Republican Party structure not named Donald Trump first and foremost, but someone who can do a couple of things for them. One, have a political fundraising and political apparatus and infrastructure that can help them win a second term. For Democrats who want to unseat somebody like Congressman Lawler or Congressman D'Esposito on Long Island, this is the opportunity to do it when they are running for re-election for the first time as freshmen.

For these Republicans, they want someone like Kevin McCarthy or Steve Scalise who has built up over the years a formidable fundraising and political operation nationwide that they can help tap into. Someone like Kevin McCarthy or someone of that stature can come to their district or come to The Hamptons and hold a major fundraiser for them, and that can really help boost their re-election if they've got that money and can rely on that figure of national significance.

Jim Jordan, Republican of Ohio, one of the co-founders of the Freedom Caucus does not have that kind of infrastructure. It is a very different infrastructure on that further rightward-leaning end of the Republican political spectrum, I think it is pretty fair to say at this point. Jim Jordan doesn't bring that to the table for somebody like Mike Lawler. He's looking for a speaker candidate who, right now at the very least, will do no harm, if you will to these reelection chances.

That's someone who would potentially acquiesce on issues like lifting the cap on state and local tax deduction, something that a number of suburban lawmakers in both parties had raised concerns with in New York. That is for the most part why a number of these, they call them Frontline, you can call them Battleground, vulnerable Republicans are most concerned about this speaker's race because there is that policy concern and there is that very real political concern as they face voters about 12 months from now.

Brian Lehrer: If these four didn't vote for Jim Jordan for speaker in the two ballots that were held in the last couple of days, who did they vote for? Do you have that?

Nick Reisman: Well, right now we're seeing on Long Island, some of the Long Island members including Nick LaLota, D'Esposito, and Garbarino, they'd actually voted for former Congressman Lee Zeldin who as we all know, ran for governor last year. He's still a very popular figure among grassroots Republicans in New York.

Zeldin I actually had spoken to a couple of weeks ago right as all of this was coming to a head, and there was a discussion at that point whether it would be Congressman Steve Scalise or Congressman Jim Jordan. This was before Scalise had dropped out, and there was some talk from some rank-and-file Republicans that they would vote for Lee Zeldin.

Fun factoid, as we're all learning here, you do not necessarily have to be a sitting member of the House of Representatives to actually be the speaker, so Zeldin in theory would be a viable candidate. Zeldin, in a classic politician way, all politicians do this to a certain extent, didn't completely rule it out when I asked if he would entertain being speaker of the House now, but he seemed to be in so many words saying, it's going to be a member of the Republican conference who will be Speaker of the House.

For the most part saying, he doesn't want the job. He thinks it's going to be someone who is currently in that House Republican Conference. Of course this was several weeks ago, and that is a million years ago in terms of the political changes that we have seen over these last couple of days with all these votes. Zeldin for the most part was a protest vote for these New York Republicans to tread water as they wait to see who can actually hit that magic 217 number in the House Republican Conference at this point.

Lawler voted for, I believe former speaker Kevin McCarthy to restore him. That doesn't seem to be likely at least at this point. I think New York [unintelligible 00:10:03] going forward, you're going to see a bigger push to try to empower Acting Speaker Patrick McHenry, to try to give him more powers and enhance those powers to get him speaker on an interim basis to try to at the very least just move business forward in the House.

Brian Lehrer: Let's take a call from Laura in Warren, New Jersey. That's in Tom Kean Jr.'s district, swing district in New Jersey where the now freshman Republican voted for Jim Jordan this week. Laura, you're on WNYC. Thanks for calling in.

Laura: Oh, hi. Thank you for taking my call. Yes, I'm an independent voter in New Jersey, registered Independent. In New Jersey, you can vote in either primary if you're registered as an Independent. I was planning on voting in the Republican primary anyway, and I told Tom Kean that he will have my vote if he votes against Jim Jordan.

I was very upset because Tom Kean has been campaigning on how much he's supportive of Ukraine. What will happen to Ukraine aid if Jim Jordan follows along with Trump in wanting to make sure that Russia wins the war in Ukraine? It's very depressing that he's doing something so against what he said he's in favor of which is supporting Ukraine.

Brian Lehrer: It's not well known that there might be a Republican primary against Tom Kean, is there?

Laura: Well, if somebody else runs, and I suspect if he voted against Jim Jordan, there would be people from the right who would run against him in the Republican primary next year.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you. Thank you very much. Nick Reisman, I know you cover New York politics in particular for POLITICO New York. You have anything to say about the Tom Kean district?

Nick Reisman: I would just say on the primary aspect of things, especially for some of these New York Republicans on Long Island, one of the reasons why they are maybe not facing as much pressure to vote for Jim Jordan is because the party apparatus in Nassau County, in particular, is quite strong.

Even if there were a primary challenge that's filed against some of these Republicans, I think they feel pretty confident that the local GOP on Long Island would have their backs as it were in a hypothetical congressional primary, even if that's centered solely around their vote for or against Jim Jordan for speaker.

Brian Lehrer: I guess that goes to something that's been in the news, and I don't know if you've seen any local expressions of it, which is, reportedly at least Jordan or Jordan's machine, or Jordan's allies threatening Republican members of Congress who did not vote for him during these first two rounds with some political retribution.

I think that's fairly unusual in a speaker's race, but may be representative of the hardball tactics Jim Jordan is known for. Have you seen any expression of that locally?

Nick Reisman: Congressman Nick LaLota has confirmed that he's received some, I guess it's fair to say, threatening messages about not voting for Jim Jordan for speaker. To a certain extent, it seems like that is actually hardening a lot of the resistance to Jim Jordan's speaker candidacy. He actually lost a vote. Nick lost a vote by one during that second round of voting. He went from 200 votes to 199, suggesting that there are members of Congress who are getting these messages and saying, 'Well, I'm not going to vote for him now", based almost entirely on that because it's completely turned them off.

To a certain extent, these guys, especially if they're coming from areas of the state that have very strong local GOP committees, they are not as concerned about some primary or some political repercussion based on their vote here.

Brian Lehrer: Could there be primaries of these candidates or these members of Congress from the right because, again listeners, the premise here is we're talking about a group of Republican freshmen who were elected in 2022 from swing districts, largely districts that voted for Biden for president but nevertheless chosen Republican for House of Representatives.

It means, presumably the battle is for who owns the center, or just who owns more turnout in their party's bases. They're ones who are trying to signal something centrist by not voting for Jim Jordan with what he represents. Is it also possible that with the encouragement of Jordan or for any other reasons, that these same members are going to face primaries from the right of their party because of who turns out in primaries in the first place?

Nick Reisman: I will contradict myself, that is entirely a danger for any Republican officeholder at this point. I think there is a concern among Republicans, especially if there is some power-sharing agreement that ultimately comes out of this leadership impasse in which a handful of Democrats or the Democratic conference votes with a handful of Republican members of Congress to elect some consensus speaker or some unity speaker. That's been derided as the so-called West Wing scenario based on the Aaron Sorkin show that some people say is not necessarily realistic a reflection of politics these days.

That is a real danger for Republicans if there is any bipartisan solution that comes out of this, just because they are quite fearful, and Democrats are to an extent too. I don't want to say that this is solely on the Republican side, but Republicans their calculus is that they don't want to lose the general election certainly, but they also do not want to lose a primary and open themselves up to a primary challenge.

If a more rightward-leaning candidate were to win one of those GOP primaries inside the Hudson Valley or Long Island, most likely a Democrat in a general election would be thrilled to see something like that happen because it is then going to be a race to the center, and that Republican primary victor who had the track so far to the right in the primary is going to have to go back more to the center to appeal to independents, to appeal more to people who are going to be voting most likely for President Biden, and try to convince them to split their ticket, which increasingly is quite difficult to do.

Brian Lehrer: You just touch briefly in that answer on something that is hypothetically possible, but probably practically impossible, impossible in a practical sense in Congress. We have a caller who wants to elaborate on it because it is important. Alan in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC. Hi, Alan.

Alan: Thanks, Brian. I think it'd be really helpful for everybody in the debate to look back at the part of the Constitution that talks about selecting the speaker. It's the same clause that talks about the allocation of taxes according to population not party before there was an income tax. There's nothing in the Constitution about party.

The idea that picking a speaker from the majority party in the House would allow them to only allow votes that could be won with members of their party is utterly alien to the constitutional language, and there's not enough discussion about that. I think there should be a starting from basics.

Brian Lehrer: Alan, thank you for bringing that up. With respect to the speaker vote itself, Nick, a lot of our listeners will remember we were just having this conversation on this show and many other outlets that talk about national politics.

Last week when Kevin McCarthy was trying to hold onto his speakership, should some Democrats cross over and vote for McCarthy, try to get some kind of a deal from him for something whether it's SALT tax which you mentioned before, or some other things, to avoid the prospect precisely if somebody further right like Jim Jordan becoming speaker, and using his powers in ways that Democrats would find even more abhorrent than the way McCarthy used his.

The way that ended as we all know, is the Democrats hung together, and nobody voted for McCarthy for Speaker, deciding instead that this is the Republican's problem, we're not going to save their bacon. That's not our job.

I don't know if we're seeing the opposite conversation now at all with respect to any of these Republicans in the swing districts who did not vote for Jim Jordan this week who we've been talking about. Again listeners, if you're just joining us, four members of Congress who are freshmen Republicans from the New York area did not vote for Jim Jordan for speaker this week. Three from Long Island; D'Esposito, Garbarino, and LaLota, and one from the Hudson Valley, Mike Lawler. Is there any possibility that there could be a coalition for Hakeem Jeffries for speaker that they would join? That's all it would take because-- it's almost all it would take because he's pretty close with all 212 Democrats consistently voting for him. You have to get to 217 right now. Is there any scenario where they would vote for Hakeem Jeffries, consider that good for their reelection prospects in these swing districts that also voted for Biden for president, and try to extract some kind of promise from the Democratic leader?

Nick Reisman: It's interesting. The caller's point by the way is really well taken. The founding fathers I don't think really envisioned this level of political party partisanship to the point where whole aspects and branches of the federal government would be frozen as a result of that. Brian, to your point, we do have in recent years in New York State an example of coalition government.

A lot of people who have followed New York State government may recall the Independent Democratic Conference. It was a breakaway conference of at any time, about five to eight Democrats who formed this rump caucus with Republicans in the state Senate. Republicans and this small group of Democrats essentially joined together and formed a governing majority.

Essentially, you had Jeff Klein and Dean Skelos in this power-sharing agreement. They shared the title of Senate president, and some of the Independent Democratic Conference members actually held committee chairmanships. They had their favored legislation come to the floor for a vote but there were some real bumps in the road with that governing coalition.

There were issues involving abortion rights legislation in the state Senate that Republicans and IDC members were at odds over. Increasing the minimum wage was a very heavy lift in the state Senate as a result of that. Then of course, after the election of Donald Trump in 2016 and with Andrew Cuomo facing his own primary in 2018, there was a lot of pressure by Democrats to end that arrangement in the state Senate.

Now, some former IDC members I've been talking to actually in the last couple of days had said that this was in large part due to the hardening partisanship in Albany, and in state capitals, and in the nation's capital, and nothing like this could ever work again. To a certain extent, I think that is the case. The IDC of course was its own special case entirely, which we won't necessarily have to attack here. I think--

Brian Lehrer: One thing worth saying about that special case that relates to the current situation, and what we were talking about before, the risk that these Republicans from the swing districts in our area who don't vote for Jordan might get primaried. That's exactly what happened to those Democratic New York State senators. They got primaried in 2018 and almost all of them lost their seats.

Nick Reisman: That's right. Now all of them are out of office and the only one who stayed in and was able to retire on their own term was state Senator Diane Savino, who now works for Mayor Adams. You're right. The incentive in politics--

Brian Lehrer: She was representing Staten Island, so-

Nick Reisman: That's right.

Brian Lehrer: -not a district where Democrats would have a lot of clout, but go ahead.

Nick Reisman: Exactly. To your point, the incentive now in politics, in elected office is to not work across the aisle, to not work in a bipartisan fashion, to not empower the other side. It goes even beyond the incentives because you can turn around and say, "Well, you're empowering a Republican who opposes abortion rights and LGBTQ rights, and you're empowering a Republican who doesn't want to fund the Ukrainian war effort." A Republican voter could turn around and say to a Republican officeholder who's empowering Democrats all of the opposite things there on that list of policy concerns.

All of this wraps up into a concern that they would lose their seats in a Republican or Democratic primary. That's where we're stuck at. Now, some states obviously have open primaries, New York does not however. Only Democrats can vote in a Democratic primary and Republicans who are registered as Republicans can vote in a Republican primary.

Brian Lehrer: No to give short shrift to the other very important point that the caller was making about this, it's not just about crossing over to elect a speaker that it's not in the Constitution as the caller says that the speaker has to be elected only by members of their own party, it's also about legislation which comes back to the prospect of Jim Jordan versus even other conservatives like a Steve Scalise or a Kevin McCarthy being in the speaker's chair. They can cross over also on legislation.

We've had things under Biden like the bipartisan infrastructure bill, for example, but they are stuck right now on what looked like was going to be a bipartisan Ukraine aid bill. After the vote to extend government funding only until mid-November, Ukraine was left out to get enough Republican votes. There was generally the thinking that there would be enough Democrats and enough Republicans, and it would get brought to the floor by McCarthy to vote to continue aid to Ukraine, but then McCarthy was kicked out and there's been no speaker to bring that vote to the floor.

Ukraine aid is in limbo right now, even though it has a majority in Congress when you add enough Democrats and enough Republicans together. Jim Jordan would be less likely than many other potential speakers to bring that to the floor. He's been an opponent of aid to Ukraine. Again, it goes to that question of legislating, not just electing a speaker. There's nothing in the Constitution that says only Democrats should be the ones to pass bills when there's a Democratic majority and a Democratic speaker and vice versa for Republicans, but it gets harder with a potential speaker like Jordan.

Nick Reisman: It gets harder too when you have these very narrow majorities like we're seeing right now in the House of Representatives. Obviously, Republicans gained the majority last year mainly because of the elections in New York, because of those suburban swing districts. Democrats are going to be targeting these districts going into next year.

If you also look to your point about this legislation, someone like Steve Scalise for instance. I'm not saying Steve Scalise specifically, but someone like a hypothetical speaker, Steve Scalise would be probably more willing to entertain concerns from New York members on a host of issues like Ukraine aid or say, funding the 9/11 victims' compensation fund.

Steve Scalise probably he can count, he can look at the political calculus for these New York lawmakers and realize that they need something to bring back to their districts in order for them to show democratic and independent voters who would be perhaps open to voting for a Republican for the House of Representatives, that they were able to get X, Y, and Z done for their districts.

Jim Jordan, and who knows, maybe he would change as Speaker of the House knowing that he's got a much larger constituency than simply the House Freedom Caucus going forward. Someone like Jim Jordan is not seen as someone who can build a bridge across the other side of the Republican aisle if you will, because now the Republican Party itself is almost this coalition between hardliners and more frontline members who are worried about their reelections.

Brian Lehrer: It makes me think of Donald Trump when he was campaigning as such a flamethrower in 2016, and a lot of people said, "Look, if he gets into office then he's going to have to govern as a professional." We know Trump governed like Trump and only has become more Donald Trump-ish over the years. Same thing with Jim Jordan, potentially, or that same question would at least apply.

I saw Charlie Sykes from The Bulwark on TV saying, "Look, Jim Jordan has no history building things politically speaking or policy-wise. He only has history trying to burn things down, politically speaking." Could Jim Jordan make that transition? Would he have any interest in making that transition, or would he be catering to the wing of the Republican party nationally that wants to see a government shutdown, that actually thinks if the government is doing nothing the citizenry is better off?

Well, that would come back to bite almost every American eventually, but how long would Jim Jordan try to ride that horse? That's a question in play. We're going to take a break and continue with Nick Reisman from POLITICO New York, and I will give you some breaking news when we come back. That's political news that might be of interest to those of you who would like to see Donald Trump go to jail. Stay with us. [music]

Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. We're talking Thursday morning politics, and here's that breaking Trump-related news. I'll start with the POLITICO version because our guest, Nick Reisman is from POLITICO. A former Trump attorney central to his bid to subvert the 2020 election has pleaded guilty. She is the first of his close advisors to do so.

Moving on, NBC News version telling us who that is. Ex-Trump attorney Sidney Powell pleads guilty in the Georgia election interference case a day before her trial was to start. A little more from The Wall Street Journal telling us why this is important. It says, Sidney Powell has taken a plea deal in Trump's Georgia case. The former Trump legal advisor will testify for the prosecution in exchange for no jail time.

Nick, I know your job is covering New York State government and New York State politics. I don't know if you have anything to say about that, but it's potentially very interesting. Sidney Powell, for those who don't know the name, is a lawyer who was really at the core of the political effort to flip the 2020 presidential election. She got criminally charged in connection with that.

Very close to Trump at the time, even though people in Trump's inner circle, many of them considered her to be really pretty crazy, fringey even for them, but she knows a lot and she was in the inner core. Now Sidney Powell has taken a plea that requires cooperation with the prosecution. Any quick thoughts on what the implications might be for Donald Trump or anyone else on that long list of defendants?

Nick Reisman: I would just add that obviously this just adds to the legal headaches that former President Trump is currently facing, including a criminal trial here in New York involving the Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, as well as the civil case that's unfolding surrounding his business interests that State Attorney General Tish James is bringing as well. The legal troubles continue to pile up for Trump, and there really doesn't seem to be much of an end in sight.

Brian Lehrer: If you're just joining us, my guest is Nick Reisman who covers New York State government and politics for POLITICO New York, and co-authors their morning newsletter, the New York Political Playbook. We're really talking about the local House of Representatives members from swing districts and how they voted in the Jim Jordan speaker nomination.

To summarize again, long Island Republicans, Andrew Garbarino, Nick LaLota, and Anthony D’Esposito all made news this week by voting against Jim Jordan, so did Republican Mike Lawler of Westchester and Rockland. On the yes side, Marc Molinaro from further north in the Hudson Valley and out west into the Catskills, and out toward around Ithaca, Molinaro in what is still considered a swing district, did vote for Jim Jordan, and Tom King Jr. in New Jersey in that swing district did vote for Jim Jordan.

Let's go to a caller from Molinaro's district. Russell, up in North Chatham, you're on WNYC. Hi Russell.

Russell: Hey Brian. How are you doing?

Brian Lehrer: Good. What you got?

Russell: Well, when I saw the news about four swing district New York Republicans voting against Jordan, I quickly looked to see if Molinaro was one of them. Of course, he wasn't because he's in the pocket of Elise Stefanik and Donald Trump and has basically been lying to us from the beginning.

I am in Columbia County, which is on the other side of the river, and we were redistricted into that gerrymandered weird district that stretches from pretty much from the Massachusetts border all the way out to Ithaca.

Brian Lehrer: For people who don't know where that is, I've been in that area a lot. I love it up there. Let's say the very top of the Taconic is roughly where you are.

Russell: That's exactly where we are, at the top of the Taconic. Another way you can put it is we're halfway between Albany and Tanglewood, Lenox, Massachusetts.

Brian Lehrer: Good reference.

Russell: You can pinpoint the location. Columbia County has been pretty solidly democratic for a number of years now. We were Antonio Delgado's district. We were blindsided in the last election because we actually had two general election votes in a row; first to fill Delgado's seat, which Pat Ryan ran, and then he was redistricted out of our district, and then the one against Molinaro.

We're blown away by Molinaro's absolute stern support of the MAGA radicals.

Brian Lehrer: Very interesting.

Russell: The other thing that I wanted to mention--

Brian Lehrer: Go ahead, Russell.

Russell: The other thing I wanted to mention is this issue of swing district legislators being worried about being primaried. I have to say that I really admire the willingness of the four guys who voted against Jordan, their willingness to be primaried because basically, they're not just taking a stand against Jim Jordan. They're not just taking a stand in defense of the constitution, but they're basically saying they're willing to lose their jobs to protect the country.

Anybody who in order to keep himself from being primaried like Molinaro is not willing to do that, is basically saying, "Hey, I'm more important than the whole rest of this country."

Brian Lehrer: Russell, thank you very much for your call. We really appreciate it. Of course, it might be giving them too much credit, Nick to say that they voted against their political interests to save the country. It's not necessarily that kind of profile and courage for the ones who voted against Jordan.

As you were saying, these might be political calculations on their own parts to try to preserve their seats once they get to the general election next year. Of course, Russell brought up the redistricting because that 19th congressional district up there was represented for a while by Anthony Delgado, who then got tapped to be Governor Hochul's lieutenant governor.

Then it got redistricted to be more Republican, and the districting process is happening again in advance of 2024. That's a risk that Molinaro is taking. I guess in a way it's a risk that they're all taking, but in Molinaro's case, he's taking a risk that it's going to remain a Republican enough district that this isn't going to come back to haunt him.

Nick Reisman: It's a roll of the dice certainly, but they're playing now like these districts aren't going to change. Just for some background, the state's top court, the Court of Appeals next month is going to be hearing a democratic-backed challenge to the currently drawn house lines in New York State. These are lines that had actually been drawn by a special master who had been appointed by a judge after a Republican-supported challenge a year ago.

These lines are being challenged once again by Democrats. The court's going to hear this. If the court tosses out the lines, it goes to the so-called independent redistricting commission, and then if the independent redistricting commission deadlocks, then the process is going to be eventually kicked to the democratic controlled state legislature, which could in theory, draw more friendly boundaries for democratic candidates and incumbents.

A lot of dominoes have to fall until then, but yes, there is a very real chance that these districts could change once again, and they could change to be somewhat more favorable for Democrats in what's going to be a pretty big year for New York House races.

Brian Lehrer: One more call from one of these districts. Richard in Westchester in Congressman Mike Lawler's district. Hi, Richard. You're on WNYC.

Richard: Hello, Brian. Thanks for taking my call. Yes, I sent a note to Mike Lawler. I said that this is an opportunity for the Republicans to free themselves from Trump. He has been strongly supporting Jordan, and if he's shown to be ineffective in doing that, that'll be good for the Republican Party.

I think the country needs a responsible Republican party. I grew up when Eisenhower was president, and even Nixon did some things that were good. I think Democrats need to know how to win elections and then bring the country to a friendlier place. Trump has to be defeated, and I think that this could be a contribution to defeating his influence over the Republican Party and whatever bad influence he projects over the whole country.

Brian Lehrer:  Did you get a response from Lawler when you wrote his office?

Richard: It was a robo-response. Actually, I got an earlier response from him when I wrote to him, and the second time around, I don't think there was a direct response to that that was--

Brian Lehrer: Richard, thank you. Thank you for your call. We're going to run out of time soon. Let me touch a couple of other things with you briefly. One is that in this whole conversation and in your article on it, Nick, the name Nicole Malliotakis didn't come up, congresswoman from Staten Island and a little bit of Brooklyn. Is that not considered a swing district anymore?

Nick Reisman: Well, I don't want to get myself in trouble and say that it's no longer in play for Democrats, but it has been so solidly Republican with some [unintelligible 00:40:53] there where a Democrat can win that seat, but it increasingly seems to have not necessarily been in play for the Democrats.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee doesn't seem to have been focusing a lot of their attention on Nicole Malliotakis and her vote for Jim Jordan. She was actually one of the first New York Republicans to come out and said that she was going to be voting for Jim Jordan for speaker. There just has not been as an intensive focus on Staten Island considering that it seems like Malliotakis, at least at this point has something of a lock on that seat.

Of course, that can change. We'll see what happens. It's a long time between now and next year, but at the moment, there just hasn't been a lot of focus or attention on that seat.

Brian Lehrer: All the seats that we've been discussing are swing districts in the immediate New York City metro area are held by Republicans right now. Are any Democratic seats considered in play swing districts? I know some Republicans would like to go after Jamaal Bowman, and argue that he's too far to the left for his district, which includes part of Westchester, but I don't know if that's politically realistic or not.

Nick Reisman: Well, the Bowman seat is most likely going to be a very interesting primary potentially between Jamaal Bowman and the Westchester County Executive, George Latimer, should he decide to get into that race. A lot of that might play out in terms of how redistricting eventually looks.

The one seat the Democrats are going to have to definitely work to defend this year, probably the only one in New York is going to be Pat Ryan's seat, as one of the callers mentioned earlier. Pat Ryan is a freshman. He's in the Hudson Valley, which is a very purplish part of the district. It's neither red nor blue.

He is expected to once again, run on the issue of abortion rights. It was one that he really did successfully trumpet in the aftermath of Roe v. Wade being overturned when he won that special election against Marc Molinaro in August of 2022. Ryan told me a couple of weeks back actually, that he plans to once again, make abortion rights and his support for abortion rights to be front and center in that race.

It'll be interesting to see if that is still going to be a very important issue for Democratic voters in the Hudson Valley. I suspect it most likely will for many of them, whether it is able to counteract whatever the Republicans throw at him, that remains to be seen.

Brian Lehrer: I just want to acknowledge that Governor Hochul who is in Israel right now, has just lost her father. Her father died while she was on that trip.

Nick Reisman: That's right. Her father was 87. John Courtney died suddenly while she was on this solidarity trip to Israel. He had been living in Florida. He had actually left her a voicemail message that she listened to before getting on the plane. That was one of the last times that she had communicated with her father.

She had actually learned of his death, according to the pool report that I received, when she was visiting the western wall. She left a note for him and said a prayer at the wall soon after she found out.

Brian Lehrer: Nick Reisman, POLITICO New York reporter covering New York state government and politics, and co-author of their morning newsletter, The New York Playbook. Nick, thanks so much.

Nick Reisman: Thank you, Brian.

 

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