NY 19TH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT — As a swing district, the New York 19TH Congressional is one of the most closely watched in the country and a new poll from Monmouth University has Democrat Antonio Delgado pulling ahead of Republican John Faso.

The poll, released October 29, puts Delgado ahead by 49% to 45% using the university’s “standard midterm model turnout.” That model predicts 3% of votes will go to the third party and independent candidates running in this cycle, and 4% of voters are undecided. When the pollsters used a model that factors in a surge in Democratic turnout similar to surges seen in several special elections in the past year, Delgado’s lead increases to 51%, with 43% going to  Faso.

Part of Delgado’s advantage comes from a growing lead among women voters, who favor the Democratic candidate by a 54% to 38% margin. Faso has a lead among men that is 51% to 44%.

“The Democrat has strengthened his standing in this race even though Republican interest has picked up over the past month. GOP ads have focused on Delgado’s past as a hip-hop artist in an effort to paint him as out of step with the district, but these attacks haven’t changed the overall trajectory of this race,” said Patrick Murray, director of the independent Monmouth University Polling Institute.

Last year Faso voted twice to advance healthcare legislation that, according to the Congressional Budget Office, would have lead to 23 million Americans losing health insurance over the next 10 years.  Some 37% of voters in the district say healthcare is the most important issue this year, with immigration being the most important issue with 18% of voters.

The author of the poll notes that the margin of error for the poll is 5%, so that the model that uses the Democratic surge is beyond the margin of error. The result for the standard turnout model is not.

Comments on Pittsburgh massacre

The two men met for their sixth debate at SUNY Sullivan on October 29. They were asked to comment on the 11 worshipers at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh who were shot and killed, allegedly by Robert Bowers, who was motivated by anti-Semitism.

Faso noted that the House in January passed legislation that would “help harden the environment and harden the buildings for non-profit organizations, including religious organizations… last year as well in Ulster county I hosted a forum with the FBI and local law enforcement with religious leaders throughout Ulster County to talk about how we can best protect soft targets such as houses of worship.”

 Delgado said the question is: how do we deal with gun violence? He said “We have to rally around areas where we know we have real consensus. You know 90% of folks in this country want universal background checks, 73% of [members of the National Rifle Association (NRA)] want universal background checks, up to 80% want safe storage laws, 97% want to ban bump stocks. More than half the country wants to keep military weapons of war off our streets, out of our churches, out of our synagogues. There are a host of issues that we can rally around as a community, and yet we still have a gun manufacturing lobby that has essentially taken over the NRA and prevented any real progress on this issue.”