Republican conducts quiet senate campaign

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If you are a fan of TV shows including “Person of Interest” and “White Collar,” you might have seen Aleksander Mici playing roles like a driver and a bouncer. These days, he has his sights set on a more ambitious part: state senator for the 34th district, which includes Riverdale, part of Westchester and a wide stretch of the east Bronx.

While Oliver Koppell’s unsuccessful Democratic primary challenge to incumbent state Sen. Jeff Klein dominated headlines for most of the year, Mr. Mici has conducted a quiet campaign on the Republican line, knocking on doors, standing outside subway stops and making other occasional public appearances.

In light of the Democratic Party’s dominance of the borough, Mr. Mici’s run might seem quixotic. But the 38-year-old, who has a law degree from Fordham University, insists on being taken seriously.

“A lot of people talk to me about results: ‘You’re not going to win! You’re going to lose!’” he said. “I focus on the process a lot more than on the result. The result will take care of itself if you go through all of the steps.”

In 2012, Mr. Klein ran on the Democratic, Republican, Independence and Working Families party lines. But after Mr. Koppell relentlessly attacked him as being disloyal to the Democratic Party, the incumbent did not seek the Republican nomination this year. (New York law allows candidates to run on multiple lines.)

While the Senate Republican Conference is aggressively supporting challengers throughout the state in a bid to win a majority, the conference’s leaders have withheld public support of Mr. Mici.

Over the summer, Mr. Klein promised to end the two-year ruling coalition between his breakaway group of Democrats, the Independent Democratic Conference (IDC), and Senate Republicans. Mr. Klein said he would form a new coalition with Senate Democrats after the November ballot.

At the time, state Sen. Co-majority Leader Dean Skelos, who has ruled the Senate with Mr. Klein, issued a statement saying he is confident Mr. Klein will in fact maintain the IDC-Republican coalition once election season is over.

Mr. Mici says he has never communicated with Mr. Skelos. A spokesman for the senator did not answer an inquiry for this article.

Still, Mr. Mici says he has received help from volunteers for Rob Astorino, the Republican candidate for governor, who is himself running an underdog race against the incumbent. Mr. Astorino’s campaign did not answer an e-mail requesting confirmation of the support.

Conservative critique

Mr. Mici’s main message is essentially a Bronx take on Mr. Astorino’s campaign, which has centered on criticizing Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s policies as damaging the state economy.

“People and capital have been leaving the state because of confiscatory taxation, a punitive regulations regime and bad job climate. It’s the worst place to retire,” Mr. Mici said.

“The Bronx is the poorest county in the state,” he continued. “People have been trying to do one thing in the Bronx the past 70, 80 years: get the hell out of here.” 

Just as Mr. Astorino has blasted Mr. Cuomo as unethical, citing alleged infractions like the governor’s controversial involvement in the Moreland Commission on Public Corruption, Mr. Mici depicted Mr. Klein as untrustworthy.

The challenger said the senator “is in office to basically further his own career through the pursuit of alliances in the Senate. That’s all he’s been doing. He hasn’t been dealing with the major problems that we have in the state.”

Mr. Klein campaigned against Mr. Koppell on a record including gun control legislation, funding for universal pre-kindergarten programs, a freeze on rent hikes for seniors and other accomplishments.

While Mr. Klein waged a vigorous campaign to fend off Mr. Koppell’s challenge, winning the September primary by a roughly two-to-one margin, he is yet to dignify Mr. Mici’s candidacy with any sort of response. The senator has also ignored a challenge from Green Party candidate Carl Lundgren.

Out of power

It has been generations since the Republican Party had a significant presence in the Bronx. Kenneth Sherrill, professor emeritus of political science at Hunter College, said as the party’s main constituency of “ethnic whites” began leaving the borough in the mid-twentieth century, the Bronx County GOP’s power waned.

The last Republican to hold office in the Bronx, Guy Velella, exited the state Senate in 1982 amid corruption charges. More recently, the party suffered another scandal when former Bronx County Republican Chairman Jay Savino pled guilty in a bribery scheme to get Queens state Sen. Malcolm Smith on the Republican line for mayor last year.

Mr. Savino’s successor, John Greaney, said he is trying to improve the party’s image by bringing in new leadership. Mr. Greaney added he is working on a two-year plan to boost the number of registered Republicans in the Bronx, organize volunteers and identify candidates for office.

“You’ve got to build it. You’ve got to run. You can’t expect to do it overnight,” said Mr. Greaney, who previously worked for former Borough President Fernando Ferrer, among other government jobs. “You’ve got a black eye. You’ve got Velella and you’ve got Jay.”

Leadership deficit cited

Mr. Sherrill said Bronx Republicans’ corruption scandals are not their biggest problem, explaining, “In New York politics, corruption scandals are like the rain. They fall on Democrats and Republicans alike.”

The professor emeritus said along with demographic trends, in which the Bronx’s minority populations lean heavily Democratic, the Bronx County GOP still suffers from a lack of leadership on the part of recent Republican mayors.

“They did nothing to develop local Republican leadership and actually did very little to encourage people to think of themselves as Republicans,” he said of former Mayors Rudy Giuliani and Michael Bloomberg. “They thought it was in their interest to position themselves as above parties.”

In April of this year, the number of active registered Republicans in the Bronx was 38,946 — compared to 500,691 active registered Republicans — according to the New York State Board of Elections. There were 5,388 active Republicans in the 81st Assembly district, which includes Riverdale, and 38,666 active Democrats here, according to the Board of Elections in the City of New York.

“They have to start rebuilding from the bottom up and that’s going to take a long time,” Mr. Sherrill said of Bronx Republicans. “That may not ever happen, or it may not happen for 20 to 40 years.”

Mr. Mici said reviving the Bronx County GOP is a “very, very hard job” and acknowledged his own candidacy is a long shot. Still, he maintained an optimistic tone while discussing his and his party’s prospects.

“When the odds seem the most impossible, that’s when things happen, if you work hard enough,” he said.

Aleksander Mici, Jeff Klein, Oliver Koppell, John Greaney, Kenneth Sherrill, Guy Velella, Shant Shahrigian

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