[music]

Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. With us now WNYC's Senior Political Reporter Brigid Bergin to talk about today's primaries, including some of the oddities we touched on before, like why the Democrats are voting separately for governor and lieutenant governor today, not as a ticket, as we've been saying, and why the Republicans don't have a lieutenant governor primary at all.

Also, what are some of these other things you're finding on your ballot that maybe you never even heard of that we touched on with some callers before? State committee member, choose one male and one female. Delegates to the judicial convention. The what? A race I saw on one Manhattan ballot for surrogate. It just said surrogate. Surrogate what? Is that someone who votes in my name when I can't do it myself? Is it my surrogate? On those oddities and more, hi, Brigid, happy primary day.

Brigid Bergin: Happy primary day, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, our phones remain open for informal unofficial, thoroughly unscientific primary day exit poll electioneering welcome here. Who are you voting for governor or anything else today? Now you can also call to ask Brigid questions about how this election is being done, or report anything unusual or interesting, or questionable, that you experienced as you voted. Brigid definitely wants you to help her report the story of Election Day on the ground.

What are you seeing? Who's saying what to you at the polls, anything like that? 212-433-WNYC 433-9692 or tweet @BrianLehrer. Brigid, I heard your stats on early voting turnout on Morning Edition today. Only 2% of eligible Democrats showed up on those early voting days in person. With so much absentee voting, and the actual primary day voting, today's voting just getting underway, what does it actually tell us?

Brigid Bergin: Well, I do think it tells us something about the amount of attention and potentially enthusiasm around this particular primary. Certainly, we saw a huge spike in absentee ballot usage during the pandemic. Back in 2020, more than 1.8 million people voted on absentee ballots, including about 680,000 people here in the city. Now that was for the 2020 presidential election. Presidential elections, of course, have the highest turnout of any election.

We've seen those numbers come down dramatically. Last year in the 2021 primary here in the city, only about 120,000 people cast absentee ballots, and then in the general, it was even fewer than that, 82,000 people here in the city. Those numbers are-- we're not expecting to see a rate of absentee ballot participation like we saw back in 2020.

One thing that's really interesting, Brian, that I think will help people when we see potentially some of those closer contests tonight, and that is thanks to a change in the law related to counting absentee ballots. We'll get to some of the mechanics of it for the voter but in terms of the counting itself, under a new state law, they will be able to process absentee ballots that have been received up to this point. Any of those-- meaning checking to make sure you signed it, and dated it, and that kind of stuff.

Ballots that have been processed by 8:00 PM tonight will be able to be counted and included in the unofficial election night returns. We are not going to have some tremendous amount of outstanding absentee ballots once we get these unofficial results tonight unless suddenly there was some surge that came in today.

Brian Lehrer: Even though people can still mail them today as long as they're postmarked today, they will be counted in the final tally, right?

Brigid Bergin: Absolutely. They have to be postmarked today, and they need to arrive at the Board of Elections Office by a week from today. Still, the number of absentee ballots that will be outstanding will be far fewer than what we have seen in previous elections and that's a big deal.

Brian Lehrer: I remember last year, in the rank choice voting first round especially, they were waiting for that time, which was like a week after election day before they would release the numbers for all the absentee ballots because they would only release those numbers altogether. Now, you're telling us any absentee ballot that was received already will be included in this evening's count.

On absentee ballots-- and I hear you that the numbers are down and I don't know if we can answer this yet, but are senior citizens who vote in such high concentrations usually, staying with absentee more than other age groups because of relative COVID risks for them? Then I also think, what about other demographics with scheduling barriers to voting: single parents, essential workers who have odd hours shifts, or more than one job, et cetera.

Maybe a more permanent shift to absentee voting is taking place in a way that expands democracy, but more in selected groups.

Brigid Bergin: I think that's a great question. As you said, it's a tough one to answer without doing a real analysis of the state voter file, of the city voter file to see who is voting via absentee ballot versus who is voting in person. Certainly, there are people who become permanent absentee ballot voters, and those are people who need to vote via absentee.

One of the policy questions that has come up in recent years is the shift from an absentee ballot system to a vote-by-mail system. We heard a little talk of that earlier, really towards the end of last year, that would be a system where everybody can vote by mail. That's not what we have here in New York, we have an absentee ballot system, you have to apply for it and-

Brian Lehrer: You have to have some kind of reason, right?

Brigid Bergin: Exactly, you have to have a reason.

Brian Lehrer: That's an acceptable reason.

Brigid Bergin: Right now, there have been some provisions changed to allow you to use this ongoing public health crisis related to the COVID-19 pandemic as one of those reasons. Generally, you need to either be unable to go to your poll site, unable to vote in person, have some form of illness, or technically you are supposed to vote in person or during early voting.

Brian Lehrer: Somehow absentee voting has become a culture war item, with Republicans rejecting it, but that's another show. On the Republican side, why don't the Republicans have a lieutenant governor primary like the Democrats do?

Brigid Bergin: Primaries are where you have a choice between candidates. You are choosing a nominee that will go on to the general election. For the Republicans, there's no choice because there is only one Republican lieutenant governor candidate, Alison Esposito. She has been running with Congressman Lee Zeldin, but there is a potential that she could become the running mate of another Republican gubernatorial candidate if Zeldin does not win the primary.

That is the reason why Republicans don't have a lieutenant governor choice, don't see that on their ballot.

Brian Lehrer: Brigid, we have somebody calling in who says he's a poll worker on his lunch hour, which I guess-

Brigid Bergin: Wow, that's early.

Brian Lehrer: -18 minutes before 11:00 in the morning, you could be on your lunch hour since the polls open at 6:00. It's Max in Boerum Hill who wants to give us a report from on the ground. Hi, Max, you're on WNYC.

Max: Good morning, longtime listener. Great to be on. Thanks for taking my call. When you get up at 4:00 in the morning, ten o'clock is not a bad lunch hour.

Brian Lehrer: There you go.

Brigid Bergin: I wanted to just say, first, turnout has been even lower than for the primaries last year. It's real slow out there. I was also just slightly disappointed to find that some of my fellow poll workers who I've known for a couple of years now seemed really underinformed about even who was on the ballot, coming to work at the polls today, and felt like they were learning about them for the first time. I was just a little disheartened with our civic life in this city at the moment.

Brian Lehrer: Well, okay, Max, thank you for that report. Enjoy your lunch and then back. Do you have to stay until nine o'clock tonight or do they do this in shifts?

Max: Yes. No, it's the whole day.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you for your service as a poll worker. To be sure with the polls opening at 6:00 AM and closing at 9:00 PM. Brigid, anything for you to react to there?

Brigid Bergin: Well, certainly the last part of what Max said this idea of being there until 9:00 PM tonight has been an issue of some controversy. There are some folks who have pushed for a system where you have split shifts to make it a little bit more manageable for people to serve as poll workers. That is just not something that in New York City we are doing.

In terms of-- I attended a poll worker training a few years back, I remember one of the things that I was most struck by was how much of it emphasized the mechanics of the poll site, how to lock this cabinet, how to put this tie on things. It was much less about who you were voting for, the positions, and much more about how to make sure you were running the operations. I think that that is a fair concern to be raised for poll workers for anyone who's in those sites. Also, there have been issues about the people who are getting those positions and the people who are doling out those positions.

Certainly, our friends over at The City, and my former colleague, George Joseph, has done some tremendous reporting, looking at some concerns about how-- as another caller had raised, the Democratic Party within Brooklyn has been operating, and that goes all the way down to who is in charge of ensuring that poll sites have poll workers. We know that State Senator Zellnor Myrie did a huge report last year looking at issues like poll sites, poll workers, had hearings across the state, including at Medgar Evers College in Brooklyn.

The people who came to testify at that hearing were raising these very same concerns. Talking about not having the resources they needed, struggling to reach anyone at the central board to get people to come and work their poll sites when they were open. It's an issue that it is hard for lawmakers to focus on when there isn't an election going on, which is why we need to talk about it, and then hopefully, in the post election time, maybe there can be something done to improve how we administer democracy.

Brian Lehrer: That's a challenge on your beat, right?

Brigid Bergin: Absolutely.

Brian Lehrer: Since you cover elections and the administration of elections, and everybody gets all excited about them around election day, like this, and then it's over and we know who won. These technical questions that you're raising, that really do matter to how democracy works, then everybody moves on to the next thing, and it's hard to get people all that interested. Hopefully, behind the scenes, they're interested to actually do the reforms, even if people aren't talking about it around the water cooler so much.

Of course, nobody uses water coolers anymore because after COVID, that's another show. Let's go through some more callers and who they voted for. Maria in Nassau County, you're on WNYC. Hi, Maria.

Maria: Hey, good morning. Thank you so much for doing this segment. This was a really-- what's the word, pragmatic choice, Tom Suozzi, and here's why. I think maybe he might be a good candidate to run for president next. Not that I think he's the most perfect candidate in the world, but the thing is I've never heard of any skeletons in his closet. I think that he could be someone who would appeal to very centrist Democrats or right-of-center Democrats and also Republicans.

I think he might be someone that could-- I hate to say save us, but save us. I say this pragmatically because I just think things are just going in such a direction that we need to be pragmatic. I would love to vote for Amy Klobuchar. I'd love to vote for Pete Buttigieg, but I just don't think they would get us across that line, but I think maybe he would, so that's my choice.

Brian Lehrer: Interesting. Maria, thank you very much. How about that? Suozzi being named as a potential centrist lane Democrat for 2024 by at least one Nassau County voter. Wyn in Manhattan, you're on WNYC. Hi, Wyn.

Wyn: Hi. I'll pull over. I have also been voting for more than 50 years.

Brian Lehrer: Like an earlier caller said about himself.

Wyn: Yes. I'm gravely concerned about the future of our democracy at this point. I think it is very much in jeopardy. I grew up, I was a Republican before I was a Democrat, as people sometimes say, and came from a conservative Republican family. At this time, it's incumbent upon the Democrats to reach out to the Republicans. We've got to bring them into the fold because they are very disenfranchised and I feel that many of them are very afraid.

I think that Governor Hochul, for whatever her drawbacks may be, that she's smart, and she has the ability to be pretty inclusive. I think the fact that she's a woman is a real asset at this time. I think we must reach out and bring everybody into the fold or we will severely lose even what we have today.

Brian Lehrer: Wyn, thank you very much. All right, another one for the power of the more centrist Democrats to hold power and unify people, from the point of view of those last two callers. Brigid, on some political analysis of this, we had a caller earlier who said she likes Jumaane Williams, but she wasn't going to vote for Jumaane Williams because she was afraid that Williams and Hochul would split a certain more progressive vote and Suozzi would sneak in to the nomination.

There's also a scenario that you could paint that if Jumaane Williams, considered an underdog, might get this nomination, because he's the one clearest progressive in the race, while Suozzi and Hochul, as represented by those last two callers, split a more centrist vote. Maybe she'll do well upstate, he'll do well in his home territory of Long Island, and Jumaane will do well in the city, which has so many voters, and get in. I don't know what's going to happen tonight.

Brigid Bergin: I think that there are lots of the crystal ball storylines to watch. Among the advantages that Governor Hochul brings to this race, obviously, incumbency, and the fact that she has name recognition statewide. She was originally a member of Congress from Western New York. I have spoken to folks who are in that part of the state. I think there's a little bit more energy there and an excitement about the potential of having someone elected to the state's highest office, who was not originally from downstate, as is often the case.

She obviously also has a huge money advantage, which has hampered the other candidates in terms of being able to run this race across the state. In addition, we've had this crazy, crazy primary cycle because of the redistricting mess, where we were on pins and needles trying to figure out when these elections were going to be up until just roughly a month before we are having this statewide primary and assembly primary.

I think that combination of factors does make it a lot harder for someone who is challenging. Governor Hochul, she's been governing this whole time. She went through a budget process for better or for worse. She's had huge decisions come down from the Supreme Court that have a huge impact on the state where she has been the person who has been the face of the state's response. I think those factors have given her a visibility that make it more challenging for some of these other candidates.

Brian Lehrer: We'll continue with Brigid in a minute. We'll have a little fun talking about some of the more obscure races. The implications are serious, but we can also have some fun talking about some of the more obscure races on the ballot today and how they're organized on your ballot. We'll take more of your calls too in our informal, unofficial, thoroughly unscientific New York primary day exit poll. Brian Lehrer on WNYC, stay with us.

[music]

Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC, with our informal, unofficial, thoroughly unscientific New York primary day exit poll. Who are you voting for for governor, lieutenant governor, or any other office? 212-433-WNYC 433-9692 or tweet @BrianLehrer. Also, your questions for our senior politics reporter, Brigid Bergin, on how the elections are being run, or anything else.

Brigid. I thought maybe you could explain, and we could have a little fun with some of these more obscure positions and why they are even chosen this way when almost nobody knows about them. Here are some examples I saw on a Manhattan ballot. You're ready? "Delegates to the judicial convention, vote for any 13." Seriously. The ballot had two groups of 13 people each who are apparently running together in each case, so 26 people on the ballot all together, choose any 13.

That was for delegates to the judicial convention. Then there was a whole other race for alternate delegates to the judicial convention and two more groups of 13 people each, choose any 13 out of those 26. What's a judicial convention and who are all these people?

Brigid Bergin: Well, I will start by saying if you have not, and you are trying to figure out what all these positions are? I cannot highly recommend enough former Brian Lehrer show intern and former WNYC Rachel Holliday Smith's explainer over at The City where she goes through all of these different positions. It's just really helpful. I've tweeted it twice this morning, go read it. It's a great piece. Delegates to-

Brian Lehrer: By the way, I just want to give Rachel all the credit she's due. She was a producer on this show and then went on to where she is now.

Brigid Bergin: I thank you for correcting that because I too want to give her all the credit because I love her work. I love this story. Delegates to a judicial convention are people who are selected. These are unpaid party positions and they will attend a judicial convention later this summer, where they will then pick the nominees for certain judicial offices. Those names will be on the general election ballot and then they will be elected to certain judicial positions across the city.

What you are seeing there with those groups tend to be people who have decided to run as a slate. Sometimes there is a more reform-leaning group versus a more county-oriented or machine-- some people like to say, oriented group. It is very hard for voters who are not in the weeds, in the politics of their county organization to know who all these people are. Oftentimes these are people who are in various political clubs.

Part of the reason why you do hear a conversation again in this post-election period with people talking about potential judicial reform because it does feel a fairly opaque process for selecting-- what another caller said and we know is true, very important positions in our justice system.

Brian Lehrer: I said earlier to a caller, there may be no really good way to pick a judge because you have this opaque system where the public is almost completely ignorant of the candidates and their qualifications when it's through a judicial delegate nomination system like this, or when the judges themselves are on the ballot, people don't tend to study up on the judges, but the other alternative is to have party bosses appoint them or to have elected officials appoint them.

Then it politicizes the appointment of judges, even though everybody talks a good game about wanting judges who are just going to stick to the law, we see what we have on the Supreme Court right now with what looks a partisan divide. There's no really good way to pick a judge if what you are really looking for is somebody who's completely independent of politics because there's just no such thing.

Brigid Bergin: Yes. One of the challenges, particularly here in New York, is some of these positions, we're talking about electing people to terms of 10 years, 14 years. They are highly consequential decisions and yet they're decisions that are very difficult for voters who maybe only turn out in gubernatorial election years or presidential election years to prepare for because there's just such a volume to cover for these races. It's hard to get a lot of information.

It's also somewhat daunting when you get mailers for judges running for some of these positions. That can also be disconcerting.

Brian Lehrer: Right, because then it seems like they're politicizing, but then judges aren't allowed to state their positions on issues during campaigns. They're mailing campaign literature, but they can't tell you what you really want to know. It's another flaw in that process, another shortcoming. This is WNYC FM HD and AM New York, WNJT FM 88.1 Trenton, WNJP 88.5 Sussex, WNJY 89.3 Netcong, and WNJO 90.3 Toms River. We are New York and New Jersey public radio and live streaming at wnyc.org.

Quick reminder that Brigid and I will be back tonight at eight o'clock along with some other guests to do a primary night special that'll be in the eight o'clock hour tonight if you're interested. Brigid, let me go on to another of these relatively obscure positions on the ballot. This is another one that I saw when I was looking at a Manhattan ballot. Member of state committee, male, and member of state committee, female, choose one male and one female from those lists. What's a state committee? Why do we vote by gender?

Brigid Bergin: The state committee are people who make up the state parties committee. They are separated by gender and by assembly district. I think it's to ensure that we have representation within these committees. It's probably a rule that I think is with good intention, but probably will require some review in the years to come. Just to make it a little bit more complicated, Brian, depending on the borough you live in your state committee member may also be a district leader.

That's the case in Brooklyn, but that is different in Manhattan. These are all unpaid party positions. They are the way that a lot of people become involved with the political party in their respective boroughs. They're often-- sometimes they are held by people who have other elected office. Sometimes they are the launching pad, the beginning for someone to begin a political career, so they are positions that shouldn't be dismissed. I should also note they only appear on the ballot when there is a primary.

For example, every assembly district has a county committee member, a district leader, but if that person is not being challenged, you will not see that name on your ballot.

Brian Lehrer: Right. Not in November because these are positions within each political party. By gender-- there are some countries, this is a larger conversation for another day. We've had the conversation on the show. There are some countries that are moving more toward a gender quota system in their legislatures so that they're not as male-dominated as in the past. Is that why state committee members are voted on male and female slates?

Brigid Bergin: I couldn't give you the history of it, Brian. I do think that part of it is related to ensuring that the party has representation among male and female representatives.

Brian Lehrer: Even that is an old framing these days, right? What about they/them New Yorkers because Democrats in particular, being sensitive to non-binary identity, I wonder if they'll think about revising how they do that. Here's a question about voting today from Elliot in Manhattanville. Elliot, you're on WNYC.

Elliot: Hi. Let me just take it off speaker, I'm sorry. Hi. Can you hear me?

Brian Lehrer: Yes. Your speakerphone sounded better than most people's handsets, but go ahead.

Elliot: I got the phone a month ago, so thank you. Great guest, it's terrific to have Brigid Bergin on. I have a question about mechanics of voting. Polls are open for another 10 hours and I have an absentee ballot that I've filled out, but I still have it. The question is what can I do with it to get it counted?

Brigid Bergin: Well, what you can do is you could take it to your local Board of Elections office or you should be able to-

Elliot: [chuckles]

Brigid Bergin: You could put it in-- you could take it to the post office and make sure that it's postmarked, or you could also bring it to your poll site and they should have a box for absentee ballots to be dropped off. They have in previous.

Brian Lehrer: Oh, you can do that elections.

Brigid Bergin: They have in previous elections. I will double-confirm that and tweet out the answer if I am wrong, but that has been the case in the most recent elections. Those are options. You could also go to your poll site and vote in person, but because you have that, you applied for that absentee ballot, they are going to give you an affidavit ballot. You won't be able to vote on the machine. That is because that's connected to the change in law that we talked about earlier that allows them to count these absentee ballots sooner.

Because of that, they are requiring people to submit affidavit ballots. If you go to vote in person if you have applied for an absentee ballot.

Brian Lehrer: That's a bulwark against double voting, right?

Brigid Bergin: Correct. Just to ensure the process so that they can count the absentee ballots that they have received and processed. That is why that change is in place.

Brian Lehrer: Elliot, thank you. Everybody, go out and buy whatever model phone Elliot just got. Brigid, to wrap this up, I heard you on Morning Edition today soliciting people who had any horror stories from the polls, trouble voting, whatever to send you a note via Twitter so have you gotten anything interesting?

Brigid Bergin: I got some questions about those down ballot races. I have been hearing including-- I will shout out my husband, people have had their poll sides change and have gone to vote at their old poll sites not realizing that they need to go to a different poll site today. That's an issue people should be aware of before they head out to the polls. Everyone should have received a mailer from the New York City Board of Elections, but we all get so much junk mail.

You've probably gotten this mail a million times, maybe you didn't pay close attention to it. However, if you received it and your poll site changed, there is literally a bright red box on the mailer that says, "Alert: Poll site change."

If you're planning to go out to vote later today and you've got your mail lying around, maybe you want to check in the pile and see if you've got one of those big red boxes on your mailer. You can of course go online to findmypollsite.vote.nyc. That will tell you where you can vote, the hours of the site which is of course until 9:00 PM tonight, but also show you your sample ballot so you know what offices you'll see when you go to vote.

That is one of the things that can be most daunting to voters, if you show up at a poll site and suddenly, you find out you're not in the right place.

Brian Lehrer: What's your Twitter handle for people who still want to ping you with something today?

Brigid Bergin: My Twitter handle is @BrigidBergin and that's B-R-I-G-I-D B-E-R-G-I-N.

Brian Lehrer: From the double shift department, Brigid will be back with me tonight at eight o'clock. Jenna Flanagan from WLIW and Channel 13 will also join us as we do a primary night special that's in the eight o'clock hour tonight here on WNYC. Brigid, talk to you then.

Brigid Bergin: Thanks, Brian.

 

Copyright © 2022 New York Public Radio. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use at www.wnyc.org for further information.

New York Public Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline, often by contractors. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of New York Public Radio’s programming is the audio record.