Election post mortem

Warwick frequently bucked the state trend to vote Republican, By Linda Smith Hancharick Warwick — Warwick voters, for the most part, stuck to their Republican roots in last week’s election, a time when the country as a whole leaned a little more to the left. In state races where the Democrats are strong in New York, a majority of Warwick residents voted for the Republican candidates for comptroller, attorney general, state Senate and Assembly. Warwick voters gave the nod to Republican Sue Kelly for U.S. Congress, but went Democratic with U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton. Warwick voters overwhelmingly chose Eliot Spitzer to be the state’s next governor with 33 percent more votes than his Republican counterpart, John Faso. The rest of the state agreed. Spitzer, unofficially, received about 69 percent of the vote statewide to Faso’s 29 percent. Six years ago, Warwick voted for Republican Rick Lazio over Clinton by 3,300 votes. Lazio, a Congressman from Long Island, entered the campaign late after the presumptive, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, dropped out because of health problems. Perhaps there will be another chance for these two candidates in two years. This year, though, Clinton also took Warwick, but it was closer than throughout the rest of the state. Warwick voters cast 5,198 votes for Clinton and 4,402 for her challenger, former Yonkers Mayor John Spencer. Statewide, the margin was much greater, with Clinton getting 67 percent of the vote to Spencer’s 31 percent. That was it for the Democrats in Warwick, although the numbers are closer than they have been in the past. In the race for comptroller, Christopher Callaghan took Warwick with 4,403 votes to Alan Hevesi’s 4,334. Statewide it wasn’t nearly as close and Hevesi, despite his chauffeur problems, won easily with a nearly 17 percentage point margin. The attorney general race was similar. Republican Jeanine Pirro took Warwick by nearly 10 percentage points over Democrat Andrew Cuomo, 5,371 to 4,364. However, Cuomo beat Pirro statewide by more than 17 percent of the vote. For U.S. Congress, Kelly, the Republican incumbent, garnered more votes here in Warwick than her Democratic opponent, John Hall, 5,107 to 4,552. However, statewide, the results were different. Although Kelly has not conceded and the Board of Elections will not consider the results final for any of the races until all absentee ballots are counted, Hall has apparently eeked out a win by about 2 percent of the electorate. Our local representatives in Albany are going back. Hometown favorite Annie Rabbitt easily beat her challenger, Democratic county Legislator Michael Paduch both here in Warwick and district-wide. Rabbitt’s margin in Warwick was more than 1,700 votes and 17 percentage points. Throughout the 97th Assembly district Rabbitt garnered 3,200 more votes and won by 10 percent of the votes. Senator Thomas Morahan handily defeated his Democratic challenger Nancy Low-Hogan. In the 38th Senate district, Morahan won 63 percent of the vote, 52,600, to Low-Hogan’s 37 percent, 31,377.