More than 60% of likely Nassau County voters disapproved of Gov. Kathy Hochul’s job performance and have an “unfavorable” view of candidate Zohran Mamdani, according to a new Republican Party poll.
The poll by McLaughlin & Associates showed 61% disapproved of Hochul’s job as governor while a whopping 67% said they had a “very” unfavorable view of Mamdani, the Democratic nominee for New York City mayor.
The Democratic duo is so unpopular on Long Island that local GOP candidates are now tapping into the fear factor by using images of the pols in mailers for local elections.
“Hochul’s approval rating is worse than it was three years ago when she ran against [GOP gubernatorial candidate] Lee Zeldin,” said pollster John McLaughlin, who also conducts surveys for President Trump.
“New York has gotten less safe according to voters’ perceptions,” he went on
“They are suburban voters. They don’t like congestion pricing,” McLaughlin said, referring to Hochul championing the new $9 toll for drivers to enter Manhattan south of 59th Street.
Suburban Democrats have already been distancing themselves from Mamdani, a socialist who some insiders fear will be ballot poison in the moderate suburbs.
Both Mamdani and Hochul are appearing in GOP mailers attacking Democratic candidates and that moderate Long Island Democratic Reps Tom Suozzi and Laura Gillen have disowned the mayoral candidate, who is now a Queens assemblyman.
Hochul and Mamdani both appear as twins in GOP attack ads attacking Democratic candidates, Nicole Aloise and Joe Scianablo, running for district attorney and Hempstead supervisor, respectively.
Republican District Attorney A Anne Donnelly is running for re-election and GOP candidate John Ferretti, the acting Hempstead Supervisor following a vacancy, is seeking to win the Hempstead seat.
In the McLaughlin poll, only 23% in Nassau had a favorable opinion of the candidate while 10% remain undecided.
The poll suggests that Jewish voters are alarmed by Mamdani’s Israel-bashing.
A staggering 80% of Jews in Nassau registered an an unfavorable view of Mamdani — 67% of whom have a very unfavorable view, the survey found. Only 16% of respondents had a favorable view.
“There’s a real fear of antisemitism with Mamdani,” McLaughlin said. “Mamdani is not going to play well in Plainview.”
Hochul fared nearly as badly.
Only 38% approved of the job Hochul has been doing while 50% strongly disapproved of her job performance, the poll found. Some 59% of Hispanics in Nassau were sour on the job Hochul is doing leading the state.
A majority of Jews — another historically Democratic-leaning constituency — also had a negative view of Hochul’s job performance, while 44% had a favorable view, the GOP survey found.
McLaughlin quipped that Republicans would welcome Hochul coming to Nassau to stump for Democratic candidates in the coming weeks.
“We’d pay for it,” he said.
Hochul is up for re-election next year. Upstate Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik is weighing a bid to run against Hochul.
Nassau County Democratic leader Jay Jacobs said the GOP’s survey of Mamdani’s deep unpopularity in the suburb of 1.4 million resident is accurate, based on his own party’s polling.
But he disputed the findings for Hochul.
“I think there is a mistake when it comes to Gov. Hochul,” said Jacobs, also the state Democratic chairman and a close ally of the governor. “Our polling shows better results for Hochul but there’s work to be done.”
He said many voters aren’t aware of Hochul championing the classroom ban on cellphones in schools or funding the free school lunch program, and when they are informed there approval rating will improve.
Jacobs acknowledged that Mamdani democratic socialist agenda of higher taxes and wanting to boycott Israel and arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for war crimes are off-putting, particularly among Jewish voters.
He said Mamdani is “extremely unpopular” in Nassau — but he’s not running there.
Jacobs claimed the Republicans are using Mamdani and Hochul in ads to “distract from the real issues” and their own failings, noting property taxes continue to go up.
“This is what Republicans do,” he said.
The Nassau Republican survey of 400 likely voters was conducted from Aug. 19-21 and has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.9 percentage points.
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