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Race for Brooklyn's new Asian-majority City Council seat is defying traditional party divide
By
Michelle Bocanegra
Published Nov 5, 2023
Modified Nov 5, 2023
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Photos taken from the Zhuang and Tan campaigns.
By
Michelle Bocanegra
Published Nov 5, 2023
Modified Nov 5, 2023
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The hard lines of traditional party politics are fuzzy in Brooklyn’s new Asian-majority City Council district.
Despite virulent attacks against each other, Democrat Susan Zhuang and Republican Ying Tan mostly agree on policy. There’s beef between the Republican and Conservative Party candidate, Vito LaBella, a non-Chinese Brooklynite who accuses Tan of lacking the “temperment” for office. And despite having an advantage with voter registrations, Democrats aren’t exactly expecting a coronation.
“If you look at voting data from elections, there are — or rather there must be — Chinese Democrats who end up voting on the Republican line,” said Albert Suh, a Democratic strategist and vice president of Trip Yang Strategies.
“So the idea of, ‘oh, they're registered Democrats, of course they're going to vote for the Democratic candidate,’ doesn't necessarily apply in a lot of different Asian American communities, and particularly with the Chinese American communities,” he said.
Suh added, “It isn't a traditional Democrat/Republican race.”
The race in the 43rd Council District, where 54% of voters say they’re of Asian descent, has become one of the most competitive races in an off-election year and one of the most difficult to predict.
Though Republicans have made inroads in southern Brooklyn — and gains with Asian voters nationally — unaffiliated voters also make up a third of the district, which includes parts of Sunset Park, Bensonhurst and Borough Park and features one of the highest concentrations of Chinese residents in New York City. New Yorkers of Chinese descent make up the highest rate of unaffiliated voters citywide, based on state Democratic Party data.
Zhuang, a Democrat who served as chief of staff to Assemblymember William Colton, is facing off against Tan, a Queens Republican and community activist who is highlighting strong familial ties to the district, despite living in another borough. LaBella, who also lives outside of the district’s boundaries in Bay Ridge, is running on the Conservative ticket after losing the Republican primary to Tan.
Beyond the progressive excitement and anticipation within Asian communities around adding more representation to City Hall, Republicans are also eyeing the district as an opportunity for conservatives to gain more traction in the city’s legislative chamber.
“We are really looking for public safety, quality education. We believe in family values,” Tan said. “And if we can activate all these Asian communities of voters to coming out to vote, I think we have a very high possibility to flip the seat to be Republican.”
But that isn’t a given, either.
“I don't necessarily think it’s that the Republican messaging is resonating with voters,” Suh said. “It's that Chinese voters and Asian voters in general simply don't feel included in a deep way by the Democrats.”
The race has been replete with personal attacks between candidates. Zhuang and Tan have each accused the other of not having real loyalties to the district — attacks each candidate disputes. Zhuang has cited her Republican opponent’s out-of-district residence and Tan has returned the barb by accusing her of abandoning the city for Indiana, where she began studying for her master’s degree in 2018.
“I never abandoned my city,” Tan said, adding she stayed in New York through the height of Covid-19.
Zhuang, who said she returned to the district in 2022, responded: “She will not get the votes in Brooklyn because she belongs to Queens.”
Though candidates in the 43rd District have publicly squabbled over each other’s purported failings , they don’t stand far apart on policy.
Zhuang, the Democratic candidate backed by the New York City Police Benevolent Association, has criticized progressive calls to “defund” police departments, as has her Republican opponent, Tan.
Each say they would like to see limits to the city’s right to shelter rules amid an influx of migrants into the city, and both candidates oppose the closure of jails on Rikers Island by 2027 — a controversial plan set in motion by former Mayor Bill de Blasio.
“Where are we going to put those people?” Zhuang asked of Rikers detainees in a recent debate on CBS News. “They're going to release to the streets? We already have the issue in the community with lack of housing, lack of resources and now they will need to bring more people in. We don't have the resources here to take more.”
Both Zhuang and Tan opposed a new migrant center in Sunset Park, leading separate demonstrations this summer urging the city to reconsider. Zhuang has said she supports Mayor Eric Adams’ move to challenge the city’s right to shelter — saying the rules were meant for the native homeless population, “not built for homeless around the world.”
“As an immigrant, first generation immigrant … and also, for everyone, public safety, they worry about their safety about going outside,” Zhuang said over the phone this week. “That's very important for every single family. And I'm a mother, my kids go to school in District 20 and I will worry if my kids get hurt on the way back to school or on the way back to home.”
Suh said that the two candidates’ alignment on several policy areas may be because they’re both “very deeply engaged in the Chinese community.”
“They're approaching these issues in the way that the broader Chinese community is approaching these issues, and not the way that either party is dictating that they approach these issues,” Suh said.
The sentiment that Asian voters have largely been left out of political discourse has only festered over the last several years, particularly among frustrated officials of Asian descent who have been outspoken about the need for more representation.
In addition to Chinese voters in the city, unaffiliated voter rates are also high among Korean American communities and, more generally, in Asian immigrant communities across the five boroughs, Suh said. Languages like Mandarin and Korean are largely excluded from mailers and polling, the latter especially being a larger expense that only bigger campaigns can afford.
“The Asian American community is the fastest growing here in New York and many parts beyond. And yet, the Asian American community does not really have a full level of voice in any level of government, including New York City government and the City Council,” said state Sen. John Liu, a former Council member who was among the first two Asian Americans elected to the upper chamber in Albany in 2018.
The City Council currently has the highest number of Asian American officials it has ever had. The last Council election in 2021 swept in five members of Asian descent — Julie Won, Linda Lee, Sandra Ung, Shahana Hanif and Shekar Krishnan.
But to many officials and voters, modern politics still has a lot of catching up to do.
“Our party better start giving more of a sh-t about #aapi voters and communities,” said Rep. Grace Meng in a tweet in 2021.
Correction: Due to an editing error, a previous version of this story misidentified Democrat Susan Zhuang in the main image.
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