Recent polls have shown that the lead previously held by Democratic Governor Kathy Hochul has been rapidly narrowing as Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-NY) has been hard at work over the past few weeks, and as a result of this, the gubernatorial race for New York has been reclassified this past Saturday as a “toss-up”, as reported by RealClearPolitics.
This recent, and quite massive, shift comes just a week in the wake of polling data aggregator moving this particular race from “likely Democratic” to “leans Democratic.” Hochul sat squarely ahead of Zeldin by a margin of well over 24 points, as reported this past August in various polling, and another poll from September highlighted that the governor then only had a 17-point lead, but the most recent data sets seem to indicate that the Republican candidate has caught up rapidly and pushed to make it a highly competitive race out in the historically deep blue New York.
“Our race was just moved to TOSS UP by RealClearNews!” exclaimed Zeldin in excited celebration via social media on Saturday. “We have just 24 days to go until we FIRE Kathy Hochul & save our state. It’s not too late for Hochul to come out of hiding & do multiple debates with me across New York, starting immediately!”
These events in New York mark the second time a governor’s race from a historically Democratic state has been relabeled as a “toss-up” over the past few weeks. Just last month, the Center for Politics out of the University of Virginia altered its Crystal Ball rating for the governor’s race out of Oregon from “leans Democratic” to “toss-up.”
The shift to “toss-up” for the New York race takes place just a week in the wake of another poll coming from the Trafalgar Group which highlighted that the race had then been neck and neck. One of the most prominent reasons that Hochul seemed to be lagging in regards to support from her own party just as Zeldin has kicked off a massive surge is the quickly escalating problem of crime taking place in the state. Robert Cahaly, the Trafalgar Group chief pollster, expressed that crime is easily the top issue for voters throughout New York. “It’s the only state we’ve seen crime exceed the economy,” he expressed.
As expressed in the social media post from Zeldin, the Hochul campaign has not chosen to take part in more than a single debate that the governor wishes to hold just two weeks prior to the election happening. In response, Zeldin outright refused to debate at all if the incumbent refuses to take part in more than one, which means that the citizens of New York could end up not seeing the pair of candidates on stage at all before the election.
“I am rejecting Kathy Hochul’s offer to one single debate at the very end of October,” expressed Zeldin as part of a press conference, as reported by the New York Daily News. “I believe that it’s important for Kathy Hochul to come back with an offer to do multiple debates in multiple parts of this state.”
“I am not playing along with her games, I am not going to be playing along with this strategy that is an insult, disrespecting the voter of New York,” he concluded.