members of the new york senate meet at the senate chamber at the capitol. | ap photo/hans pennink by bill mahoney 10/25/16 05:36 am edt albany <u+2014> in an election season so often described as "unprecedented," democrats in the new york state senate better hope the description is accurate. that's because the party needs a showing at the polls that hasn<u+2019>t been achieved in over a half-century to guarantee its members will control the chamber in 2017. story continued below on the surface, the numbers don<u+2019>t seem too daunting. candidates running on the democratic line won 31 seats in the 63-member senate in 2014. and this year, democrats will likely enjoy a down-ballot bump that comes in elections that overlap with presidential races. in new york, turnout for both parties is higher in presidential years than in years when a gubernatorial race tops the ticket, but the jump is larger for democrats than republicans. this bump is frequently large enough to make a difference in close races. consider, for example, the differences between the only two elections held under the legislature<u+2019>s current district lines. there were 29 seats that featured two major party candidates in both 2012, a presidential year, and 2014, a gubernatorial year. in 28 of these, democrats performed better in the presidential year. the only exception was in the binghamton-area senate district 52, where incumbent republican tom libous was indicted four months before the 2014 election and received 62.2 percent of the vote compared to 65.5 two years prior. in these 29 seats, the democrats<u+2019> performance was an average of 5.1 points higher in 2012 than in 2014. the difference in new york city<u+2019>s suburbs, where most of this year<u+2019>s competitive races are being contested, was 5.9 points. the point differential has repeatedly translated to shifts in the chamber's balance in recent years. democrats won three more seats in 2012 than in 2010, four more in 2008 than in 2006, and two more in 2004 than in 2002. so it seems feasible that democrats, who fell one seat short of obtaining a majority in 2014, can crack the 32-member threshold for a senate majority in november. but that won<u+2019>t necessarily be enough for them to actually govern the senate. when candidates running on the democratic line won a majority of the chamber<u+2019>s seats in 2012, the then-five-member independent democratic conference formed a governing coalition with the gop; the idc will almost certainly have six members in january due to marisol alcantara<u+2019>s primary victory. and simcha felder, who won in 2012 and 2014 on the democratic line, has spent the entirety of his albany career conferencing with republicans. the idc has been coy about its intentions in 2016, so there are seven members who can<u+2019>t be counted on to ally with their co-partisans. assuming no more members defect to the idc, candidates running on the democratic line will need to win 39 seats to guarantee mainline democrats have a majority next year, or an improvement of eight seats from 2014. there haven<u+2019>t been any swings of that magnitude in decades. when democrats rode president obama<u+2019>s coattails to the majority in 2008, they were victorious in only four districts they hadn<u+2019>t won in 2006. that four-member shift was the largest for either party in any of the past 25 elections; even in the watergate elections of 1974, democrats increased their ranks by only three members. here<u+2019>s a breakdown of the shift toward democrats in each election in recent decades: (note: if you<u+2019>re reading this via email, click the link below to see the above image. the above chart doesn<u+2019>t account for changes in the size of the senate, which most recently increased from 62 to 63 members in 2012). it<u+2019>s been 52 years since either party gained eight seats in a year, but fortunately for democrats, that was arguably the one election cycle that<u+2019>s most comparable to this one. due partially to attacks that presented republican presidential nominee barry goldwater as dangerously unstable and highlighted racist groups<u+2019> eagerness to support him, lyndon johnson was able to carry democrats to massive down-ballot gains in 1964. but there are some differences between the senate now and then, particularly in the degree to which political operations have been professionalized to a point where a massive overhaul is less likely. in 1964, for example, the senate gop<u+2019>s fundraising operations were pretty much dependent upon how much money the state party funded by gov. nelson rockefeller decided to chip in; since then, the centralized senate republican campaign committee, a network of independent expenditure committees, and scores of single-member albany fundraisers each year guarantee that no incumbent in a close race will lack for funds. and mapmakers now use computers to draw districts beneficial to the senate gop, reducing the possibility of surprises that might have happened half a century ago. republicans are confident differences in policy issues can help avoid the usual presidential-year swing this year. "new yorkers value bipartisanship, checks and balances and democrats and republicans working together to get things done,<u+201d> senate gop spokesman scott reif said. <u+201c>the radically partisan agenda fueled by [new york city] mayor [bill] de blasio and supported by senate democrats does not resonate with most new yorkers, who know that our members will be there to protect the interests of everyone so we can make this a more prosperous state. not only aren't the new york city democrats going to be able to pick up the seats they need, we're going to grow our majority.<u+201d> democrats, meanwhile, view the top of the gop ticket as extremely helpful to their cause. <u+201c>these are the same senate republicans who think it<u+2019>s a great idea to have a bigot and misogynist like donald trump on the top of the ticket,<u+201d> said spokesman mike murphy. <u+201c>and this is a once-in-a-lifetime election." murphy said he expects and looks forward to working with the idc next year. a free synopsis of our pro morning email about new york education policy and politics a free synopsis of our pro morning email about new york energy policy and politics a free synopsis of our pro morning email about new york health care policy and politics a free synopsis of our pro morning email about new york real estate policy and politics our morning email with must-read analysis and breaking news on state news and politics a morning email with must-read analysis and breaking news on city news and politics. a weekly round-up of legislation in city council for politics and policy professionals. a reported briefing on money in politics, executive moves, and trends in communications, lobbying and consulting. our twice-a-week digest of news on courts and the law in new york azi paybarah and jimmy vielkind's must-read briefing informing the daily conversation among knowledgeable new yorkers.
even with presidential bump, senate dems need an extraordinary swing to get control
bill mahoney