Welcome to New York Week #1! This candidate is trying for a second time to win this district, after a narrow loss in 2020. She has had a long career in public service in various roles, including a long stint in the Army and decades as a guidance counselor. Majority Savers heads to New York’s second district on Long Island to profile Jackie Gordon, our candidate here!
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Jackie Gordon for New York-2
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Candidate Background
Jackie Gordon has been about public service all of her adult life. She has served our nation in various ways since immigrating here from Jamaica early in her life and settling in Queens. I have to thank her campaign website and Red to Blue for a comprehensive profile of this candidate!
- She has served in the Army or Army Reserve for nearly three decades. She served as a platoon commander during Desert Storm, and she made three other deployments besides that one. She retired from the US Army Reserve as a Lieutenant Colonel.
- Gordon has served as a guidance counselor for a technical high school on Long Island, mentoring thousands of children at a very critical time in their lives. Farmingdale has a serious asset in Jackie Gordon.
- She has served on the Babylon City Council for 13 years, during which she has worked on making sure veterans and service members got the support that they need. She even raised well over a million dollars for charitable organizations such as the Wounded Warrior Project.
Signature Issues
Gordon would likely be pragmatic liberal if elected to Congress. Remember that this is a district that TFG won twice, which means she has to moderate her positions to stand a chance of getting elected. She would likely vote with Biden nearly 100% of the time. Her positions on abortion, health care, and defending democracy are very similar to other candidates I have covered. Here’s what is unique.
Education: Her experience at the technical high school means that she is uniquely suited to see that not everyone needs to go to college to succeed. She would promote vocational and technical training if elected. She would still focus on reining in college spending and fully funded a PreK-12 education.
Veterans Issues: As a combat veteran, Jackie Gordon knows the challenges veterans face when they return home. Her goal is to connect veterans to the resources that they need. This includes cutting the red tape at places such as VA hospitals and charitable organizations. She has been active in various organizations serving veterans for decades.
Tax Reform: As a denizen in a state with high state and local taxes, Gordon would likely vote to reinstate the SALT deduction that was stripped during TFG tax deform. She would also close tax loopholes and make sure that the rich and corporations pay their fair share of taxes.
Elections History
Recent Elections —
2020 President: TFG (R-inc) 50.1%, Joe Biden (D) 48.6%
2020 House: Andrew Garbarino (R) 52.9%, Jackie Gordon (D) 46.0%
2022 Race Rating: Likely Republican
2022 PVI: R+4
This district used to be the stomping grounds of Rep. Peter King, a very hawkish conservative with ties to the IRA (Irish Republican Army, not the Inflation Reduction Act). He never had a close race in his career, except for his first one in 1992 and his last one in 2018. This was in spite of a district that Gore carried and Obama carried twice. He was that entrenched in the district.
In the era of TFG, the district flipped back to supporting Republican presidents. TFG won the district 53-44 in 2016 and 51-47 (old version) in 2020. That meant the district would be more secure for GQP candidates, even in the face of blue wave elections. Even the 2018 blue wave failed to dislodge King, though it did scare him into retirement in 2020.
Andrew Garbarino won the right to replace King in the primary in 2020. His opposition was none other than Jackie Gordon, who ran a vigorous campaign against him. Even though Biden improved in the district when compared to 2016, Gordon got no closer than the candidate did during the 2018 blue wave election, losing 53-46. Now Gordon challenges Garbarino again in a better district that moved left.
Political Tour of the District
This district is deeply polarized, with pockets of deep blue precincts interspersed with pockets of deep red precincts. There are a few swingy areas too, just to round out the district. Gordon will have her work cut out for her in a district TFG won twice, albeit narrowly.
Here’s where this race will be won in the 2nd district.
- Amityville Area: The precincts around the Amityville area are deep blue and majority black, which means that it is important that Gordon find every voter in this area and turn them out to compensate for other areas in the district. Poor turnout would not bode well for her.
- Islip/Brentwood Area: The area around these two towns is not quite as blue, but still vital to Gordon. These majority Hispanic precincts need to turn out at a higher margin than before if Gordon is going to win this district. She also cannot afford any erosion in the margin here.
- Patchogue/Brookhaven Area: This area of Long Island as more of a swing area, but it still leans Democratic. This is where Gordon needs to match the Biden total or overperform in order to win. She cannot afford for Garbarino to do better in this area or she will lose once more.
Here’s where we need to keep the margins down, or we lose.
- Babylon Area: This area is the home turf of Gordon, and it leans red at the present moment. It is swingy enough that it should be vigorously contested as she will likely overperform in her home town. This is the best area of the rest of the district for her.
- Lindenhurst/Nassau County: These areas are fairly red, although a few blue precincts sneak in in Nassau County. Gordon is likely to struggle in this area, but she must contest it all the same to keep the margins down to a respectable level. Conceding it to Garbarino will not work.
- Eastern Portion: Except for Patchogue and Brookhaven, the southern shore of Long Island is pretty conservative. Gordon needs to stem the bleeding in these areas and match the Biden margins at the very least in order to win. She’ll have to count on overperforming elsewhere.
Activism — Help How You Can!
Jackie Gordon is doing okay at fundraising, though she is naturally trailing the incumbent at this time. She brought in $440k during Quarter 2, which ended at the end of June. Garbarino raised $571k during the same time period, meaning Gordon is trailing. Hopefully her addition to Red to Blue will kickstart her fundraising efforts for the critical 3rd quarter of 2022.
Gordon is being swamped in the cash on hand department right now. She only has $558k to spend, which won’t get her far on Long Island. Garbarino has a much more healthy $1.6 MILLION to spend, as being in Congress has its privileges. It is unlikely dark money will be at play here unless the race tightens. That means we need to fund Gordon with donations to make this race more competitive!
DONATE TO JACKIE GORDON HERE
Equally as important to her is the volunteer army that will knock on doors and send out phone calls and texts and do a million other little things to make her campaign successful. With so many races in Long Island to choose from, hopefully enough people choose this race instead of other races in the area. https://secure.ngpvan.com/raqXuW8TFUSmmmo5uV1v_A2 send you to the “get involved” portion of her website, and from there you can sign up.
Gordon has one of the highest number of followers for a challenger that I have seen. She has a robust 40.1k Twitter followers, which shows that her social media message is clearly getting out to people. She is definitely worth a follow as she is fairly prolific on the social media platform. Here’s her message from primary night on August 23rd.
She is also fairly active on FaceBook at VoteJackie4NY, and on Instagram at votejackie4ny. I don’t use those social media platforms, but I have seen enough from glimpses profiling other candidates to know that much of the same material is found on Twitter as there.
This is going to be a tough race for both parties, as this district is fairly evenly divided. If it were an open seat instead of facing an incumbent, I would say Jackie Gordon would be favored slightly. However, under the new lines Garbarino is still the favorite. Gordon still has a decent shot at winning, which is why I am choosing to profile this race during New York Week #1!
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Jackie Gordon for New York-2
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