Election 2020

Following his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, 22 active and retired lawyers, most of them Representative Lee Zeldin's constituents, filed a complaint with the Attorney Grievance Committee for the Supreme Court, Appellate Division, in Albany, charging violation of "the most fundamental ethics rules."

Representative Lee Zeldin, one of President Trump's most loyal allies, is facing calls for his resignation in the wake of the Jan. 6 armed attack on the United States Capitol, an act of domestic terrorism intended to overturn the certification of electoral votes that was underway.

Representative Lee Zeldin, who as a member of Congress swore to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and 125 of his Republican colleagues in the House of Representatives filed an amicus brief last week supporting a lawsuit that asked the Supreme Court to disenfranchise some 20 million voters in four states.

Representative Lee Zeldin will serve a fourth term, his re-election in New York's First Congressional District having been certified by the Suffolk County Board of Elections last Thursday.

Nancy Goroff, a Democrat who challenged Representative Lee Zeldin in New York's First Congressional District race this year, and Laura Ahearn, who ran for the State Senate seat being vacated by a retiring Kenneth P. LaValle, formally conceded their races this week after the absentee ballot counts were complete.

With approximately 100,000 paper ballots remaining to be counted, work came to a halt at the Suffolk County Board of Elections on Saturday after a worker tested positive for Covid-19.

The count of absentee, affidavit, and unscanned ballots began last Thursday. Newsday reported on Saturday that the part-time employee had shown symptoms of the virus before the positive test, and that the County Health Department had ordered seven other employees into quarantine.

President-elect Joseph Biden is expected to nominate Antony Blinken, who has a connection to East Hampton, to the cabinet position of secretary of state. Mr. Blinken's father is Donald Blinken of Lily Pond Lane in East Hampton Village, who is a former United States Ambassador to Hungary.

The activist group Progressive East End Reformers has set Dec. 1 at 3 p.m. as a tentative date to mobilize to support President-elect Joe Biden's apparent Electoral College victory. The group's gathering would take place at the Bridgehampton Community House.

The count of absentee ballots sent by voters in New York's First Congressional District is expected to begin Thursday, an official at the Suffolk County Board of Elections said on Tuesday. 

Reaction on the South Fork was muted, at least publicly, when the Associated Press and major news networks announced on Saturday that former Vice President Joe Biden had won the presidential election, voters having rejected the norm-shattering reign of President Trump after one term.

Though Representative Lee Zeldin has a commanding lead in his re-election campaign in New York's First Congressional District, Nancy Goroff, his Democratic Party challenger, has yet to concede, telling supporters on Sunday that the contest is far from over. The same is true in the race to replace State Senator Kenneth P. LaValle.

If you're going to talk to someone in the aftermath of what's shaping up to be the most confounding presidential election in two decades, Julian Zelizer is your man.

The counting of some 75,000 ballots cast by mail in New York's First Congressional District will not begin until next week, but as of yesterday Representative Lee Zeldin appeared headed for a landslide win in his quest for a fourth term.

Voting this year for the first time, local teens weren't just #adulting — a popular hashtag that means taking grown-up life seriously, and a term that teens may not even be using anymore these days. Instead, they headed to the polls equipped with information and intent, determined to make their voices count.

If you're voting Tuesday, you have until 9 p.m. to cast a ballot at your regular polling place. Not sure where to vote? You can look it up at here, and here's a list of polling places by election district in East Hampton Town and eastern Southampton Town.

Huge lines of mostly Democratic voters have been waiting for hours for their turn at the polls across the country, and even here in New York State. Why?

Nancy Goroff should be the East End of Long Island’s next representative in Congress.

Since Saturday, when New York State's early voting period began, hundreds of voters have been lining up daily to cast their ballots at the East Hampton polling site at Windmill Village on Accabonac Road, and the Stony Brook University Southampton campus, the only two sites for early voting on the South Fork.

Hundreds, if not thousands, of voters lined up and cast ballots on Saturday and Sunday on the South Fork as New York State's early voting period opened up. Long lines -- starting well before polling sites were to open their doors -- were common in East Hampton at Windmill Village on Accabonac Road and in Southampton at the Stony Brook Southampton college campus, the only two sites for early voting on the South Fork. 

An altercation between a Town Lane resident and a man attempting to take her lawn signs that was caught on video on Friday provides an apt jumping off point for a look at the rules governing political signs.

Polling stations during the early voting period and on Election Day will be populated only by staff, poll inspectors, and, of course, voters, an official at the Suffolk Board of Elections said this week. "You cannot interfere" with voting, a Suffolk County Board of Elections official said, and the county will "have police cars with a bipartisan team of board of elections employees in every town if there's a problem."

As a campaign season characterized by mudslinging and often outright mendacity draws to a close, it was unusual to see the two candidates vying to represent the New York State Senate's First District engaged in a civilized discussion of the issues.

Representative Lee Zeldin and his Democratic challenger, Nancy Goroff, clashed in a 90-minute debate on Monday, each accusing the other of lying about their records and demanding they remove negative campaign advertisements. 

With the coming retirement of State Senator Kenneth P. LaValle, eastern Long Island voters have a renewed opportunity to gain a more active and responsive representative in the New York Legislature’s upper chamber.

Early voting ahead of Election Day, Nov. 3, begins on Saturday and continues through Nov. 1. In East Hampton, it will be held at the Windmill Village housing complex at 219 Accabonac Road, and in Southampton on the Stony Brook Southampton campus at 70 Tuckahoe Road.

Two matters for voters to decide in the form of propositions are included on the Nov. 3 ballots for most Suffolk residents. The first would lengthen the term of office for county legislators. The second would allow the county to avoid repaying money it borrowed from a sewer-tax reserve fund. We recommend “no” votes on both propositions.

Nancy Goroff, the Democratic candidate to represent New York’s First Congressional District, has picked up the endorsement of two prominent Democrats in the state, Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone and Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo. 

The 314 Action Fund, which works to elect scientists, doctors, and professionals in the STEM fields (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics), issued results of a poll on Tuesday showing a tight race between Representative Lee Zeldin and Nancy Goroff, who is on leave from her position as chairwoman of Stony Brook University's chemistry department. 

Representative Lee Zeldin and his challenger, Nancy Goroff, answered questions posed by climate and environmental activists in an online forum on Tuesday night, three weeks before Election Day and 11 days before the start of New York State's early voting period. 

Democrats on the East End are turnign to a new voter base: second-home owners. According to the Suffolk County Board of Elections, 876 people with mailing addresses in New York City were registered to vote in East Hampton Town as of August 2020; 672 were Democrats.