Record-High Turnout For Andrew Cuomo's Rout Of Cynthia Nixon

NEW YORK — Thursday's Democratic gubernatorial primary drew a record number of New Yorkers to the polls, resulting in a turnout rate higher than any similar race in recent history. More than 1.5 million, or about 27 percent, of the state's 5.6 million active registered Democrats cast ballots in Gov. Andrew Cuomo's nearly 31-point rout of actress and activist Cynthia Nixon.

That rate is twice as high as almost every statewide primary since at least 2002, state Board of Election figures show. The next-highest came in 2006, when about 15.7 percent of active registered Democrats voted in Eliot Spitzer's gubernatorial contest against Tom Suozzi.

In Cuomo's eyes, voters flocked to the polls to validate his defense against President Donald Trump's right-wing agenda — in stark contrast to a left-wing, anti-incumbent wave that's stunned other experienced politicos.

"Why didn’t they stay home and watch TV? Why didn’t they watch the football game?" the indignant-sounding governor said at a Friday news conference. "You could lose a woman’s right to choose, your taxes are going to go up, he demonized immigration which is central to you. There have been discriminatory actions from a president that we haven’t seen in decades."

In a Friday morning memo, Cuomo's campaign noted that he won more primary votes — about 975,900 — than any gubernatorial candidate in history. He did so as turnout at New York City's African-American precincts almost matched the 2016 presidential primary and more than doubled in the city's Hispanic precincts compared to 2014, the memo says.

Cuomo won by 36 points in The Bronx and Queens' 14th Congressional District, where democratic socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — who endorsed Nixon — shockingly ousted U.S. Rep. Joe Crowley in June, his campaign said. He carried the five boroughs overall by 33 points and the suburbs by nearly 50.

Nixon aggressively needled Cuomo as too friendly to corporate interests and Republicans and too weak against corruption in Albany. But she carried just 13 of the state's 62 counties, all of them upstate.

With a huge campaign war chest, Cuomo successfully defined himself as the state's loudest voice against Trump, who ultimately pulled Democratic voters to the polls, said Hank Sheinkopf, a veteran Democratic consultant who's worked for the governor in the past.

"He occupied that ground, took it from her (Nixon) and she was left with very little," Sheinkopf said.

Turnout spiked even more in four of the six state Senate districts where insurgent challengers ousted former members of the Independent Democratic Conference, the now-defunct group of breakaway Democrats who shared power with Republicans for years.

Some 35 percent of Democrats voted in Manhattan's 31st District, where former city councilman Robert Jackson defeated Sen. Marisol Alcantara. And Zellnor Myrie's win over Brooklyn Sen. Jesse Hamilton attracted 32.4 percent in the 20th District.

Turnout broke 30 percent in The Bronx's 34th District, where Alessandra Biaggi ousted the IDC's former leader, Sen. Jeff Klein. And Sen. Jose Peralta's loss to Jessica Ramos in Queens' 13th District drew 27.4 percent of Democrats there.

Progressives claimed those victories as a successful strike at Cuomo and his establishment ilk. The governor reportedly brokered the April deal that returned the IDC senators to the mainline Democratic conference, but Nixon accused him of empowering the group for too long.

"Transactional politics in New York State might be completely dead," Maurice Mitchell, the national director of the Working Families Party, told WNYC's Brian Lehrer on Friday. "This grassroots mobilization of the left is ascendant, and traditional Democrats are either going to have to get on board or get left behind."

Cuomo's campaign, though, said he won by enormous margins in the city's six ex-IDC Senate districts, including a 48-point blowout in the 11th District, where former city comptroller John Liu ousted Sen. Tony Avella.

Trump likely motivated voters in those races, too, Sheinkopf said — the former IDC members were associated with Republicans and therefore with the president.

"Dissent will not be tolerated by the new regime," Sheinkopf said.

(Lead image: Gov. Andrew Cuomo addresses reporters Friday after his Democratic primary victory over Cynthia Nixon. Photo by Mary Altaffer/Associated Press)