Big Jewish Turnout For Bloomberg

by Adam Dickter
Assistant Managing Editor

Three-quarters of Jewish voters supported Mayor Michael Bloomberg in his narrow third-term victory in last week’s election, according to a New York Times exit poll.

That would be a sharp increase from the estimated 53 percent of the Jewish vote the independent mayor garnered in his initial 2001 race, when he ran as a Republican against Democrat Mark Green, and is close to the 72 percent that he won in 2005, according to a Pace University study, running against Democrat Fernando Ferrer.

Retaining his strength among Jews at a time when the mayor saw an overall drop of nearly 200,000 votes in the low-turnout election compared to his second-term victory would mean the extensive spending on campaign offices and staff, including Yiddish and

Russian translators in Jewish communities, as well as advertising in Jewish community media, was well spent.

“He was the first one to concentrate [so heavily] on getting out the vote in the Orthodox Jewish community, and it paid off very well,” said radio host Zev Brenner, whose Talkline Communication Network targets an Orthodox audience.

But the mayor lost Brooklyn, the borough with the majority of the city’s Jews, to Democrat William Thompson.

Overall turnout in the city was down about 5 percent from the 2005 race, with 1,106,649 votes cast, or 25 percent of an estimated 4.3 million registered voters. In 2005, 30 percent of registered voters cast ballots, or 1,289,935. Bloomberg’s tally was 196,031 votes lower than that of his last victory.

The tally for Thompson was nearly identical to that of the last Democratic challenger, Ferrer. (Thompson picked up only 3,498 more votes).

At 18 percent, Jews made up a disproportionately large share of the turnout of about 1 million people. Jews are about 14 percent of the city’s population.

“The key element in [Tuesday’s] election was the low voter turnout,” said David Pollock, associate executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council. “The percentage [of Jewish voters] hasn’t changed in 20 years, even while the city’s Jewish population declined.”

Pollock, who has advocated for stronger Jewish voter registration, noted that the high turnout was driven by the growing elements of the Jewish community — Russian immigrants and the Orthodox. “We have to make sure this positive trend continues,” said Pollock.

Editor's Note: An earlier version of this story, as well as the print edition, misstated the percentage of the Jewish vote in 2005.

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