Jewish Republican Bruce Blakeman, the chief executive of Long Island’s Nassau County, announced on Tuesday that he will run for governor of New York.
The announcement sets up a Republican primary between Blakeman, who is Jewish, and Rep. Elise Stefanik, who has positioned herself as a bulwark against antisemitism since the outset of the Israel-Hamas War. The winner of the primary is expected to take on Gov. Kathy Hochul in the general election.
“Our state is struggling with high taxes, rising utility bills, and rising crime,” Blakeman wrote on social media. “New Yorkers deserve a proven leader who will Put New York First.”
Blakeman posted an accompanying video, which showed a clip of Zohran Mamdani on election night and later depicted him side-by-side with Hochul, signalling an intention to use Hochul’s endorsement of New York City’s mayor-elect against her.
Blakeman has been a harsh critic of Mamdani, a democratic socialist and anti-Zionist, calling the incoming mayor a “communist and an antisemite” at an event shortly after the election. Blakeman also said he would launch a marketing campaign to attract businesses and residents from New York City to Nassau County.
Blakeman’s profile has risen in Republican circles since he became Nassau County’s first Jewish executive in 2022. An ally of US President Donald Trump, Blakeman has implemented conservative policies in the county, like banning transgender women from playing on female sports teams in county-run parks and facilities, and striking a deal with ICE aiming to round up 3,000 undocumented immigrants.
Last year, Blakeman signed into law a controversial mask ban bill amid a wave of pro-Palestinian demonstrations, during which many protesters would wear masks to protect their identity.
“Take your mask off. Don’t be a coward,” Blakeman said at the time. “This is a bill that’s going to protect the public.”
While Stefanik’s campus antisemitism hearings propelled her to a larger platform, both she and Blakeman have been vocal about pro-Palestinian protests, and university presidents, they say, failed to protect Jewish students. A month after Oct. 7, 2023, Blakeman called for Hofstra University’s president, Susan Poser, who is Jewish, to resign over comments that he said created a “moral equivalence between Hamas’ terrorist slaughter” and Israel’s response. (The university released a statement saying that Poser condemned “the horrific and brutal attack” by Hamas, and she did not resign.)
Stefanik and Blakeman have also both drawn support from Trump, who refused to pick either candidate when asked about a potential showdown on Monday night.
“He’s great, and she’s great,” Trump said. “They’re both great people.”
Blakeman's relation with Trump
Blakeman accompanied Trump on his visit to the Ohel, the gravesite of the Lubavitcher Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson, on the first anniversary of the Oct. 7 attack.
The county executive rushed to the defense of Elon Musk after the billionaire gave what many perceived to be a Nazi salute at Trump’s inauguration.
“As the highest elected Jewish Republican in America and a dedicated Zionist, I can state with 100% accuracy that @elonmusk’s gesture was NOT a Nazi salute,” Blakeman wrote on X. “Shame on all those who denigrated this patriot who has been a reliable friend of the Jewish people.”
Blakeman is a member of the Jewish Center of Atlantic Beach, an Orthodox congregation in Nassau County. Keeping a kosher kitchen but not observing Shabbat, Blakeman joked in a 2022 interview with the Forward that he’s not AOC, referring to progressive Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, but rather AOB: “Almost Orthodox Blakeman.”
Blakeman was granted a civic leadership award by the Combat Antisemitism Movement last year.
In 2016, in his previous role as a Hempstead town council member, Blakeman brokered a sister-city agreement with the Shomrom Regional Council, an Israeli regional council consisting of 35 settlements in the West Bank.
“Today was a dream. This was something that [head of the Shomrom Regional Council] Yossi Dagan and I talked about three years ago, about strengthening the relationship between the Shomron and the United States,” Blakeman said. “These are people who are on the front lines. We sit in our homes, and we talk about supporting Israel and how much we love Israel. But they are truly on the front lines.”
During his time on the town council, Hempstead was also the first New York municipality to pass anti-BDS legislation, which was later adopted that same year, 2016, by Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
In 2014, Blakeman said that he disagrees with the use of the term “settlements” for Israeli communities in the West Bank.
“I look at them as communities, very vibrant communities,” he told a Long Island Jewish publication.