Posted on 02/09/2012 8:15:11 AM PST by marktwain
ALBANY — Democratic Rep. Carolyn McCarthy’s Long Island district is on the chopping block as state leaders begin redrawing congressional boundaries, the Daily News has learned.
State Senate and Assembly negotiators are looking at merging McCarthy’s Nassau County district into a Nassau-Queens district now held by fellow Dem Gary Ackerman, sources close to the planning said.
McCarthy’s current district “collides” with Ackerman’s, making it a perfect candidate for merger, insiders said.
The lines are expected to be drawn in a way that favors Ackerman in a potential primary.
McCarthy, 68, was first elected in 1996, three years after her husband was killed and her son injured by Long Island Rail Road shooting madman Colin Ferguson.
While she pushed an aggressive gun-control agenda, McCarthy has never been considered a major player in the New York delegation.
Her potential political demise is not considered personal.
Insiders said McCarthy comes into play because Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, as the Daily News first reported, wants to protect Republican Bob Turner’s Queens-Brooklyn seat that belonged to Democrat Anthony Weiner until he resigned amid a sexting scandal.
Silver believes the Dems can win the seat back at the polls in November.
A glut of downstate districts make the region an easy target for downsizing as New York loses two congressional seats in 2012 based on Census results.
“The problem is there are too many mouths to feed down there and not enough population,” one source said. “Districts are going to have to grow.”
Seventeen of the state’s 29 current House members represent New York City or Long Island.
If McCarthy’s district is eliminated, an upstate Republican district is expected to be axed as well to even out the partisan bloodletting.
Insiders say a decision on which Republican would go has not been made, but would likely result from the slicing up of the sprawling district belonging to Ulster County Democratic Rep. Maurice Hinchey, who is retiring.
One likely target is Republican Rep. Ann Marie Buerkle, whose central and western New York seat could be redrawn to include Democrat-heavy Ithaca, which currently falls in Hinchey’s district, insiders said.
GOPers have also privately raised the possibility of not giving up anyone from their party, which would send the matter to court.
Reps for the Assembly and Senate declined comment on the ongoing negotiations.
Still, she is the darling of the MSM, so this is likely a good thing.
I’d like to see McCarthy and Ackerman both gone.
Well, I’d sure love to see this enemy of the Constitution out of congress.
The irony is, that if New York had respected the 2nd Amendment, there almost certainly would have been law abiding, armed passengers on board the LIRR train that day. One or more of them likely would have taken Ferguson out, certainly before he had a chance to reload. He certainly wouldn’t have been able to fire, unobstructed for 3 MINUTES.
Gun control likely killed her husband and seriously injured her son, yet she champions it.
Maybe she could rescue it with "that shoulder thing that goes up."
I hope the hoplophobic moron loses her seat.
My goodness! It almost seems that the DemoRats have painted a target on one of their own (irony intended).
She’s an extreme case of a Democrat getting elected on “The Narrative.” They love running candidates whose claim to fame is something completely outside the candidate’s control.
This woman should be replaced. After her husband and several other passengers were massacred by a gunman on the LIRR, she took up the chant against the 2nd ammendment. If one of the passengers on that train were armed its possible several of those passengers would still be alive.
Maybe we can get MCCarthy voted out of office.
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