Wednesday, August 17, 2022
In NY10, Dan Goldman receives both NYTimes and Hasidic backing
In what might be described as a delayed reversal of fortune, Dan Goldman, a former federal prosecutor who served as the Democrats' lead counsel in the first Trump impeachment trial, is now riding a wave of momentum as a frontrunner in the highly competitive race for an open House seat in Lower Manhattan and northwest Brooklyn.
Meanwhile, his bête noire, former President Donald Trump — who, despite Goldman's best efforts, was ultimately acquitted of two impeachment charges in February 2020 — is facing a mounting list of criminal inquiries, culminating last week in a high-profile FBI raid at his Palm Beach residence.
But even as Trump's legal and political future remains in question, Goldman, 46, suggested that the former president, who continues to stoke false allegations of election fraud as he weighs a possible comeback campaign, is merely the symptom of a growing extremism that Goldman hopes to counter if he makes it to Congress.
"Republicans are descending into an unforeseen and unpredicted place of complete anti-democratic demagoguery," Goldman said in an interview with Jewish Insider at an outdoor café in Tribeca, the Manhattan neighborhood where he lives with his wife and five children. "Where we are today is far worse than where we were two years ago, and that genuinely scares me for our country and for our democratic institutions and the rule of law."
Those concerns, among others, have fueled Goldman's first campaign for federal office, which he announced in June following the delayed finalization of New York's reconfigured congressional map.
With less than a week remaining until next Tuesday's primary, Goldman has recently emerged as the frontrunner in the race, where he is among a dozen Democrats jockeying to represent the newly drawn 10th Congressional District. On Saturday, he snagged a coveted endorsement from The New York Times — a major coup for the neophyte candidate, who had been polling neck-and-neck with two local elected officials running to his left. The newspaper's imprimatur may resonate with conventionally liberal Times readers in Park Slope, Brooklyn Heights and Cobble Hill, among other neighborhoods in the district.
Still, the qualities that appealed to the Times — which praised Goldman's "uncommon experience" while citing his "knowledge of congressional oversight and the rule of law" — had also been expected to weaken his standing in deep-red Borough Park, an Orthodox Jewish enclave in Brooklyn where Trump pulled in more than 80% of the vote in the 2020 election.
Political observers had speculated at the beginning of the race that Goldman's high-profile role as a Trump prosecutor — coupled with his gig as a legal commentator for MSNBC — might be a liability in Borough Park rather than a selling point. But Goldman, who is himself Jewish, persisted in courting the Orthodox community, retaining local operatives and meeting for discussions with Jewish community leaders earlier than most candidates in the race, according to Ezra Friedlander, a Democratic consultant who lives in the neighborhood.
Goldman's efforts paid off on Tuesday, when he notched a big endorsement from a coalition of 25 Hasidic leaders in the district, effectively consolidating support within the sizable Orthodox community, which could prove decisive. Turnout is predicted to be lower than usual in the late-summer primary, for which early voting began on Saturday.
"There is only one candidate who has the qualifications and understanding to represent the Boro Park residents in Washington," the Jewish leaders wrote, according to a translation from the original Yiddish by Hamodia, a newspaper covering the Orthodox community in New York City. "It is critically important for our community to have a representative in Washington who will stand on our side and represent our interests with devotion and understanding."
The announcement followed a separate endorsement on Monday from Simcha Eichenstein, an influential state assemblymember in Borough Park. Eichenstein, who did not respond to a request for comment from JI, told Hamodia that he had "gotten to know" Goldman "quite well" in recent months, describing him as "a rising star" who "keenly understands the needs of our community."
Mordy Getz, a Hasidic businessman in Borough Park whose Judaica store, Eichler's, is a well-trodden campaign stop for political candidates on the stump, met Goldman in July, and found he was attuned to "the needs of mom-and-pop stores and small businesses that comprise the majority of Boro Park businesses," he wrote in a recent WhatsApp exchange.
"He seems like a real mensch and a candidate who understands the needs of the community," Getz said. "Although it may seem challenging to overcome his role in Trump's impeachment in a community with a majority of Trump supporters, I think the recent news about Trump helps leadership realize that working with Trump opponents is inevitable."
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