Former congressman Tim Bishop spoke to a gathering of Democrats last Saturday in Mattituck, imploring them to do everything in their power to win back the First Congressional District seat now held by freshman Republican Congressman Lee Zeldin.
He was, of course, preaching to the choir.
The breakfast get-together, hosted by the Southold Democratic Club at CJ’s American Grill in Mattituck and attended by about 40 people, was billed as a meeting to discuss winning back the eastern Suffolk congressional seat.
NY-1 is a swing seat, Bishop said, meaning it’s bounced back and forth between the two major parties. It went from Democrat to Republican in 2014 when Zeldin defeated Bishop, a six-term incumbent.
Because its current occupant is a freshman, it’s not considered a “safe” seat, he said. And to his mind — and to the group of loyal Democrats on the heavily Republican North Fork — “it’s absolutely imperative that those of us who care about good government and good policy get this seat back,” said Bishop, the former Southampton College provost who returned to academia after his 2014 loss. He is the Distinguished Professor of Civic Engagement and Public Service at St. Joseph’s College.
Bishop on GOP: ‘This is a party that cannot govern’
“It’s important to chip away at the so-called Freedom Caucus, whose 40 or 50 members have taken the House hostage,” Bishop told the group. “They have become the ‘no’ caucus. House Republicans can’t even pass a budget. They have a 40 member majority but there are 50 Republican members who won’t vote for it because it’s not conservative enough — but it’s so conservative that it’s a budget no Democrat will vote for,” he said.
“The result is a suffocating paralysis. This is a party that cannot govern,” Bishop said.
Bishop acknowledged that it’s unlikely the Democratic party will win back a majority in the House in the upcoming election. “But if we can pick up enough seats so that the Republicans have to come to the Democrats, we can cut through what is so debilitating to how we function as a society,” he said.
The members of the Freedom Caucus are believed to have safe seats, so Democrats must focus on Republican incumbents in “battleground” districts, such as NY-1. It’s not even about who is holding the seat, he said.
But Bishop had some specific criticism as well for the man who defeated him by 10 percentage points in 2014: on immigration and gun control, which the former congressman characterized as extreme and not good for the 1st CD.
He said Zeldin voted not to fund the Department of Homeland Security in 2015 because that agency administers federal immigration policy, established by executive order, that exempts from deportation certain undocumented immigrants who entered the country as children.
“What New Yorker would do that? Every other member of the N.Y. delegation, 27 members, voted to fund homeland security,” Bishop said.
Bishop also slapped Zeldin for his vote this month to fund an amicus brief in the U.S. v. Texas appeal in the U.S. Supreme Court. The Texas law would render the president’s executive order that protects parents of U.S. citizen from deportation.
“Look at who we are and where we are,” Bishop said. “Our economy on the East End is dependent on immigrant labor, like it or not. Fifty percent of agricultural work is done by undocumented immigrants. Trump and Cruz have both committed to deporting every one of the 11 million undocumented immigrants. If that happens, this district cannot function economically.“
Zeldin’s opposition to gun control is so extreme he won’t support a bill sponsored by fellow Republican Peter King that would deny someone who is on a terrorism watch list the right to buy a gun, Bishop said.
“What sane, reasonable person would want to sell a gun to someone who we’ve deemed so dangerous we won’t let him get on a plane?” Bishop asked.
Zeldin spokesperson: Bishop is a partisan mouth piece
Zeldin’s communications director had equally harsh words for the Bishop in response.
“It’s disappointing to see how much of a partisan mouth piece Mr. Bishop is devolving into,” Zeldin spokesperson Jennifer DiSiena wrote in an email.
“It does matter who the congressman is and it also matters what kind of job Congressman Zeldin is doing. Bishop had 12 years in office and didn’t get a single bill of his passed and signed into law, other than renaming post offices. He really has zero business lecturing anyone about lawmaking,” she said.
She pointed to the House passage of Zeldin’s Counterterrorism Screening and Assistance Act, passed Monday, as an example of Zeldin’s effectiveness as a legislator.
“Congressman Zeldin has been in office for just over one year and has had his Common Core proposal passed and signed into law; and a five-year, fully-funded transportation bill, including Congressman Zeldin’s Safe Bridges Act, passed and signed into law,” DiSiena said. Zeldin has had many other bills he introduced pass the House, including two bills to help veterans. He also secured an amendment to a transportation bill that would prevent the Federal Aviation Administration from taking negative action against East Hampton Town for the enactment of aircraft noise restrictions, DiSiena said.
“Since day one, Congressman Zeldin has been working across party lines on important issues facing his constituents,” she said.
To Bishop’s contention that Zeldin supports the plan to deport the 11 million undocumented residents in the United States, DiSiena replied: “Honesty has never been one of Mr. Bishop’s strong suits.”
Zeldin introduced his own bill to prevent terrorists from buying guns, DiSiena said. “Congressman Zeldin believes that we must do everything in our power to keep guns out of the hands of terrorists,” she said.
“Providing ‘the rest of the story’ has never been one of Tim Bishop’s strengths either,” DiSiena said.
“Bishop apparently hasn’t gotten the memo yet that his days of distortions and spin were ended and rejected in 2014,” she said. “He is trying poorly to hand over the reins to a new partisan hack now and that’s unfortunate.”
The Democratic candidate will be picked by Democrats in the upcoming June 28 primary. Vying for the nomination are David Calone, an East Setauket venture capitalist and former federal prosecutor who served as chairman of the Suffolk County planning commission for seven years and Anna Throne-Holst, the former Southampton Town supervisor who stepped down from that post at the end of her third term in December to make the run for Congress.
The Southold Town Democratic Club is hosting a debate between Calone and Throne-Holst on Tuesday, April 12, beginning at 7:30 p.m. in the Southold High School auditorium.
The event is free an open to the public, which is invited to send questions for the debate to southolddemsclub@gmail.com.
