How Coronavirus May Affect New York's Elections

In the wake of the global coronavirus pandemic, states across the country have had to grapple with how to ensure the safety of its citizens while also ensuring democratic elections can still take place. There have been calls to cancel elections altogether and many have likened the threat the nation and the world are currently facing to a war effort, but the United States has always held elections, even during the Civil War and the Second World War. With no direction thus far from national leaders, states have been left to figure out for themselves what to do.

Earlier this month, Ohio’s Governor Mike DeWine took the then-controversial decision to postpone his state’s presidential primary out of safety concerns. Opponents took him to court and the final decision supporting DeWine’s decision came down only hours before polls had been set to open.

Now, with New York’s own presidential primary less than a month away (scheduled for April 28th), state lawmakers are weighing their own options both for that upcoming primary and beyond, as the pandemic shows no signs of slowing down in the near-future. Governor Andrew Cuomo does have the power to postpone the state’s presidential primary, like Governor DeWine did in Ohio, but under New York law, gubernatorial executive orders only last for thirty days, so he would need to wait until at least March 30th to do so.

Watchdog group Common Cause/NY, among others, is advocating that the presidential primary be consolidated with the state and local primaries, currently set for June 23rd. Common Cause also supports State Senator Alessandra Biaggi’s bill that would expand absentee voting. Currently, there are very strict regulations regarding who is eligible to receive an absentee ballot in the state of New York. The legislation from Senator Biaggi (D-Bronx) would allow anyone who has concerns about the spread of coronavirus to utilize absentee voting.

“Democracy doesn’t pause, it has to evolve,” said Common Cause/NY’s executive director Susan Lerner.

Senator Biaggi and other proponents of the legislation, such as Manhattan Assembly-member Yuh-Line Niou (D), Onondaga County Democratic Elections Commissioner Dustin Czarny, and Common Cause, believe that expanding the current absentee voting regime would be easier to implement in a limited amount of time than an entire vote-by-mail system. Some states, such as California and Washington, had vote-by-mail systems before the pandemic started, but that usually takes several years to properly implement. These advocates want the absentee voting expansion to be a stopgap measure for the current crisis and would then want to see a vote-by-mail system implemented at a later date. Additionally, New York’s state constitution would make it difficult to make such a drastic change in a short amount of time.

Potentially complicating matters is a DNC bylaw that stipulates states must hold their primaries on or before June 2nd or else face potential sanction, including a reduction in the number of delegates (for that reason, as many as 12 states will be voting on that date). That would mean that New Yorkers would have less of a say in the potential Democratic nominee for president (President Trump has already clinched the Republican nomination; no Democratic candidate has earned a majority of delegates yet). During the Common Cause press conference (via Zoom), Senator Biaggi said “it would be a very, very bad PR move to deny New York the right to have delegates during an election season,” when asked about this possibility.

The change could also have national implications. Last week, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders has previously said he will stay in the presidential race through the New York primary, even though odds are long that he could overtake former Vice President’s delegate and popular vote leads. This postponement could extend the Democratic primary by almost two months.

Senator Biaggi said that if a vote were to happen for her bill, it would likely come next week, when legislators return to Albany to hammer out a budget deal before the April 1st (Wednesday) deadline. Unlike its neighbors Pennsylvania and Connecticut, New York’s Legislature has not yet moved to a virtual voting system.

You can read Common Cause/NY’s full report on how New York’s electoral system can handle through the coronavirus pandemic here.