Nov 6, 2024 2:09 PM
Updated:
Here are the results of nine of the election races that the Haredi Shtetl was most closely watching.
President of the United States: Donald Trump (R) beat Kamala Harris (D)
- In a surprisingly convincing comeback victory, Haredi favorite Donald Trump triumphed and will become the next president. Not all the states have been tallied as of Wednesday morning, but Trump has reached the threshold of 270 electoral votes needed. Early reporting shows that the Haredim voted almost exclusively for Trump.
19th Congressional District: Josh Riley (D) beat Marc Molinaro (R, incumbent)
- Josh Riley beat Marc Molinaro by a single percentage point after losing to him by less than two points last time. Rabbi Zalman Leib Teitelbaum, who leads one of the two major Satmar factions, endorsed Molinaro in the summer.
18th Congressional District: Pat Ryan (D, incumbent) beat Alison Esposito (R)
- Pat Ryan went on to win comfortably – by over 40,000 votes, according to AP – after the Aaronite Satmar enclave of Kiryas Joel and the surrounding Hasidic communities endorsed him..
17th Congressional District: Mike Lawler (R, incumbent) beat Mondaire Jones (D)
- Mike Lawler won by a comfortable margin of over 15 percentage points, with the widespread support of Haredim. As an incumbent he had become very popular with local Hasidic and non-Hasidic communities alike.
New York State Senate District 42: James Skoufis (D, incumbent) beat Timothy Jon Mitts (C) and Dorey Houle (R)
- James Skoufis comfortably won another term by over 12,000 votes, with Dorey Houle’s chances spoiled by Tim Mitt’s taking about 5% of the vote that might have gone to her. After Skoufis eked out a win in 2022, he made a point of courting the Kiryas Joel leadership. That seems to have been successful, with the Aaronite Satmar endorsing him.
New York State Senate District 38: Bill Weber (R, incumbent) beat Elijah Reichlin-Melnick (D)
- Bill Weber defeated Elijah Reichlin-Melnick for the second time in two years, this time by over seven percentage points. After Weber had lost in 2020 and Reichlin-Melnick lost in 2022, both candidates had made significant overtures to the Haredi communities.
New York State Assembly District 41: Kalman Yeger (D) won unopposed
- Kalman Yeger has been elected Assembly Member for District 41 which covers a swath of southern Brooklyn. Though it has large Haredi communities, Yeger is its first Haredi representative. He ran unopposed to replace the 44 year incumbent Helene Weinstein who just retired. Yeger, currently a New York City Council member, will be stepping into her shoes, though not yet her committee assignments.
New York State Assembly District 48: Simcha Eichenstein (D) won unopposed
- Simcha Eichenstein, from the Bobover community ran unopposed to return for another term as the representative for District 48. He and Aron Wieder will be the two Hasidic Assembly members in Albany next year.
New York State Assembly District 97: Aron Wieder (D) beat John W. McGowan (R, incumbent) and Thomas F. Sullivan (C)
- Aron Wieder beat incumbent John McGowan in Monsey by seven percentage points, helped by Thomas Sullivan taking away nearly 4% of the vote for the Conservative Party. Touting his experience as a local Rockland County representative, Wieder managed to balance his Democratic and Haredi allegiances, despite the increasing rightward shift of his Hasidic community.