New York may once again blunt the Democratic Party’s hopes. It’s worth a shot, at least.
The subtext throughout the Washington Post’s piece on Donald Trump’s “midterm road show” is that his campaign stops in places such as Nebraska, Texas, and Alabama are little more than self-care for the unpopular narcissist in the Oval Office. When it comes to the president’s trip to Syracuse, N.Y., where Trump rallied alongside former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson, the Post’s reporters were explicit. Trump’s trip to the Empire State was “less strategic,” its journalists wrote. After all, one regional conservative broadcaster with whom they spoke feared Trump’s presence might drag the GOP’s candidates down with him.
Perhaps. Yet, as CNN’s Harry Enten recently deduced, the nation’s most Jewish state has become redder on the margins amid the Democratic Party’s headlong lurch toward a pathologically anti-Israel posture. That has boosted Republican candidates, particularly in districts surrounding New York City, but the effect is visible statewide:
A bright spot for the GOP… In the state (NY) with the most Jewish voters, the GOP has historically strong midterm polling with them.
Hochul’s polling 38 pts worse among them than in 2022.
On the House ballot, Dems are doing 36 pts worse.
Mamdani’s image is well underwater. https://t.co/QdTWPHjCDe
— (((Harry Enten))) (@ForecasterEnten) October 14, 2026
An accidental incumbent governor, Kathy Hochul underperformed in her 2022 election. In winning the governor’s race by just six points against Lee Zeldin, Hochul’s 5.7 percent victory represented the worst statewide performance by a New York Democrat in years.
The national environment in 2022 was far more favorable to the GOP than it is in 2026, and Zeldin’s vote share in that year’s polling consistently outpaced support for this year’s Republican gubernatorial nominee, Bruce Blakeman. And yet, in 2022, where was Hochul in October’s surveys? In the final six polls of that election cycle, the incumbent governor topped out at 50 percent, 47 percent, 52 percent, 54 percent, 48 percent, and 54 percent. On election day, she won with just under 53 percent of the popular vote.
There’s less polling of the governor’s race in New York this year than four years ago. But of the six gubernatorial polls since early September, Hochul’s vote share has been 50 percent, 58 percent, 48 percent, 53 percent, 52 percent, and 53 percent. Quinnipiac’s 58-percent outlier notwithstanding, Hochul’s polling performance isn’t much more impressive than it was in 2022.
The tailwinds boosting Democratic candidates across the board could certainly help her beat her polling average on Election Day, which would render the softness we’re seeing in Hochul’s ballot tests illusory. But if it’s real, the GOP should deploy all its resources to New York, including the president, and expect that boosting candidates like Blakeman also helps the GOP’s aspirants farther down the ballot.
Hochul’s relative unpopularity fueled a “mini red wave” in New York City’s suburbs and exurbs, making the Empire State, along with Southern California and South Florida, one of only a handful of bright spots in what should have been a great year for Republicans in 2022. New York may once again blunt the Democratic Party’s hopes. It’s worth a shot, at least.