Republican elected officials have criticized former President Donald Trump’s guilty verdict in almost uniform fashion: A corrupt, left-wing-fueled ploy to neutralize President Joe Biden’s likely challenger in the upcoming presidential election. Meanwhile, Democrats contend the trial and verdict confirm that every American is entitled to a jury of their peers, and no one is above the rule of law.
What’s not yet clear is how the verdict — and the efforts to spin it from both parties — will affect voter turnout in November.
WSHU’s Desiree D’Iorio spoke with Larry Levy, executive director of the National Center for Suburban Studies at Hofstra University, about the unique role that Long Islanders play in national politics.
WSHU: Give us the lay of the land on Long Island voting patterns in recent history.
LL: In recent history, Long Island has actually been an outlier to national trends. The Democrats and congressional races, and then going back to the 2020 presidential races, did very well in suburban areas like Long Island and across the country. The suburbs of the major cities in this country are the places that determine national elections. There may be plenty of red MAGA people there, there may be a lot of deep blue progressives, but there is a preponderance of moderates that swing back and forth, and the suburban counties in seven states are the ones who are going to decide who gets the keys to the White House and the gavels in Congress.
That didn't happen in 2021, 2022, and 2023 on Long Island. There were a lot of reasons for that. Most of them were local issues — local and state issues around crime, around immigration, and other issues — and the Republicans having a better message, a better organization, and in some cases, better candidates. 2024 is a whole different kettle of fish. You have a national election where the candidates at the top of the ticket will probably have more to do with who gets elected than any other issue. And yeah, they'll pound away at abortion, they’ll pound away at immigration and inflation and the Israel-Hamas war and anything else that shows up in polling as potentially moving voters. But it's what people feel when they come out, in the large numbers that they do in presidential years, about those candidates at the top of the ticket that will determine what happens down below.
WSHU: How do you see the verdict playing into that here on Long Island? It seems that the partisans are deeply entrenched, and it’s the undecided voters where the verdict could make the most impact.
LL: Right now, we're reading that analysts on both sides of the aisle don't believe it's going to have much of an impact. And I look at the same data, and I can't understand what they're talking about. We have an electorate where a good 80% aren't going to change their opinion no matter what happens. It doesn't matter. They're so entrenched on one side and another. But there still is anywhere from 10 to 20% of the electorate that you still consider swing voters on Long Island and other suburbs that will make a difference. Polls show that.
The same numbers that folks are citing as not having a big impact — that only 15% of voters say that the verdict would have an impact on their choice — well, in a close election, if 5% change their mind, to me, that's enormous and could have a tremendous impact. That said, there are an awful lot of other issues that weigh into the decisions of these swing voters. It depends on their personal circumstances. It depends on the messages that the party is bringing to them, and how often those messages are pounded into their ears. Even though six months may not seem all that far away, in politics, six days can make an enormous difference, as we saw in Hillary Clinton versus Donald Trump in 2016.
So this is not necessarily going to be determinative and decisive. But when you have something that's never happened before — a former president convicted of 34 felonies in the middle of a presidential campaign — it can't not have a major impact. The question is, how big and what other countervailing forces or issues will mitigate that?
WSHU: I was out in Tom Suozzi’s district, which used to be George Santos’ district, during the special election in February. And I heard a few recurring issues from voters there, like immigration, cost of living and especially political corruption — the idea that plenty of politicians of all stripes are just like Santos, but he just happens to be the one who got caught.
For voters like I’m describing in NY3, do you see the verdict as being a motivator to come out and vote?
LL: The conviction will probably re-energize Trump's most ardent supporters. But there's a real question of whether they needed to be any more energized than they already were. All during the trial, I heard a drumbeat of, “Of course, this is rigged” and “I'm a political prisoner.” So they've been prepared to support their guy, and it shows up in polling.
Democrats were clearly energized by this. But there were so many other issues that the Democrats have been split on. They’re fractured by the Israel-Hamas war. The divide between progressives and moderates on several other issues. They still have work to do.
Whether this is a unifying force for the Democrats remains to be seen. But if the party leaders figure out a way, if the campaign managers figure out a way to come up with a message that does bring people together, making this part of their argument about democracy and constancy in government, having people that you can trust, then it could become a unifying force.
Trump supporters are already unified and energized around him, and he's going to get a bump in fundraising and in the size of his rallies and all that, but the number of people who are going to be added to his vote total — among swing voters — really remains to be seen. I don't see it.
The Democrats have a chance to use this as a unifying force to overcome their problems, bringing the party together.
WSHU: Any other comments as we grind toward Nov. 5?
LL: Donald Trump has always been a mixed bag for Republican candidates, all the way down to dog catcher in Nassau County where Hillary Clinton beat Trump by nearly 10 points and Biden did the same thing in 2020. Having a weak candidate at the top of the ticket was a problem for Republicans in many places that were at least considered competitive. And Trump is still a problem in a number of these communities.
But Joe Biden’s numbers are not nearly what they were in 2020. So the question is whether the conviction will get people to switch from one candidate to the other, or to get undecideds to go for one candidate or another. The verdict is a potential problem for candidates like Anthony D’Esposito, Mike LiPetri and Nick LaLota in races that are still arguably competitive.
How does the verdict play — not with the MAGA Republicans that may be in those districts which aren’t a huge number, proportionally — but how does it play with moderate swing voters or soft Democrats who are considering voting for them, but might be turned off enough by the conviction? Or other issues like abortion, that voters will say, “You know what, I've had enough of Republicans.” Right now, it's a bigger problem for the Democrats, because Biden is polling proportionately worse on favorability and other measures than Trump is in a lot of these communities. The question is whether something as seismic as this can turn that around.
