Frankenseat Showdown Splits Staten Island
NY-11’s redistricting battle has become a litmus test for Staten Island pols. BP Vito Fossella is leading the fight while DA Michael McMahon rides the pine.
NOTE: This piece first appeared on NYNewsPress.com.
By Frankie Pressman with Richard Luthmann
A ‘Frankenseat’ Lawsuit to Dismember Staten Island
New York City’s lone Republican-held district is under siege by a brazen Democrat redistricting gambit. Marc Elias – dubbed the Democrats’ “lawfare kingpin” – has launched a “Frankenstein” map coup to hack apart Staten Island’s 11th Congressional District and “bury the borough’s GOP voice.”
His lawsuit demands ripping Staten Island into pieces and stitching its halves onto two Democratic strongholds: lower Manhattan’s tenement blocks and Brooklyn’s Coney Island projects. The goal is clear – erase NYC’s last Republican seat by force of court order.
Elias’s legal team hand-picked four plaintiffs to claim Staten Island’s current district “dilutes” Black and Hispanic votes. Never mind that incumbent Rep. Nicole Malliotakis is the first Latina to hold the seat – the suit insists minority voters are disenfranchised because Malliotakis wasn’t their “candidate of choice.”
Republicans blast the case as a “blatantly unconstitutional” racial gerrymander.
“Democrats attempt another gerrymander of NY-11 by linking Staten Island to Manhattan… this is a naked attempt to disenfranchise voters,” state GOP Chairman Ed Cox warned.
Critics see Elias’s maneuver as partisan lawfare draped in a Voting Rights costume – a raw power grab using race as a pretext.
“They’re using race as a cover story, but reverse discrimination is still discrimination,” says civic advocate John Tabacco, who is preparing to intervene in the case. “At the end of the day, it’s not about black, brown, or white – it’s about green, the color of raw political power.”
In other words, a so-called voting-rights lawsuit is poised to sacrifice Staten Island’s community integrity on the altar of Democratic gain.
Frankenseat Showdown Splits Staten Island: Fossella Emerges as Staten Island’s Champion
While outside operatives try to carve up Staten Island, Borough President Vito Fossella is loudly defending his island’s voice. Fossella – a Republican who once represented NY-11 in Congress – blasted the Elias map as a déjà vu nightmare.
“This is a blatant attempt to hijack our congressional seat,” Fossella said.
This new lawsuit, in his view, is just another scheme to slice the borough’s influence to pieces. He’s rallying residents of all parties to oppose what he calls a blatant hijacking of their representation.
“Make no mistake, all Staten Islanders – Democrat, Republican, or otherwise – should be up in arms about this,” Fossella urged in a recent op-ed, decrying the court bid to override local voters.
Fossella’s credibility in this fight is bolstered by his resounding re-election as borough president just weeks ago, winning 68.5% of the vote and a 56,000-vote landslide margin.
He argues that if the case isn’t tossed entirely, it at least belongs before a Staten Island judge – not a Manhattan jurist with no stake in Richmond County’s community. Staten Island’s courts and voters, Fossella maintains, have already proven capable of drawing fair lines that keep the borough whole.
The Democrat lawsuit would do the opposite, cleaving the island in two and submerging each half in far-flung urban districts that share none of Staten Islanders’ unique character or concerns. Fossella has lambasted the plan and vows to fight it with every tool at his disposal.
In this battle, the borough president has become the island’s champion – framing the issue not just as one congressional seat, but as a defense of Staten Island’s very identity and voice in Washington.
Frankenseat Showdown Splits Staten Island: Machine Politician McMahon Sits on the Sidelines
In stark contrast, Staten Island’s top Democratic officeholder has remained conspicuously quiet. District Attorney Michael E. McMahon – a former one-term congressman and longtime machine Democrat – is offering no resistance as Elias’s lawsuit targets his own constituents’ representation. McMahon built his career by going along to get along: he climbed the ranks as a loyal Pelosi-Clinton Democrat and was protected by Cuomo-era backroom deals.
For years, party bosses brokered cozy cross-endorsement pacts to keep the McMahons in power – even the local GOP leadership agreed to run no Republican against DA McMahon or his judge wife in recent elections. That history of “backroom deals, cross-endorsements, and Cuomo-era protection” earned McMahon a reputation as a consummate go-along politician.
Now, as Albany Democrats attempt a power grab on Staten Island, McMahon’s silence speaks volumes. He has not joined Fossella or Malliotakis in denouncing the “Frankenseat” map, nor has he moved to defend the borough’s interests in court.
Instead, Staten Island’s chief prosecutor appears to be sitting idly by while outside forces dismember his community’s congressional district, a seat he previously occupied.
McMahon’s indifference has drawn scathing criticism. Investigative journalist Richard Luthmann – a longtime McMahon nemesis – accuses the DA of presiding over a “weaponized” justice system that serves political cronies. Luthmann has openly branded McMahon as the “criminal-in-chief” of a corrupt network and blasted his dwindling empire as it reels from scandal.
“The McMahons had a good run – but the jig is up. Mike McMahon’s a scumbag…they’re both scumbags,” he added, referring to the DA and his wife, retired judge Judy McMahon. “McMahon can’t make the argument with a straight face that it’s easier for him to administer justice on Staten Island if he has to go hat in hand to both Brooklyn and Manhattan as an afterthought to get federal money.”
Such explosive remarks underscore how far McMahon has fallen out of favor, even within his own borough. As progressives in his party turn on him and his old patronage shield crumbles, McMahon has offered no pushback against the Elias map that would effectively nullify Staten Island’s votes.
To critics, the DA’s passivity amounts to tacit approval – a betrayal of his constituents for the sake of staying in the good graces of his party’s power brokers.
A Litmus Test for Staten Island’s Political Soul
The NY-11 “Frankenseat” fight has become a defining litmus test for Staten Island’s political class. On one side stand those willing to fight tooth and nail for the borough’s rightful voice – figures like Fossella (and Rep. Malliotakis) who call the lawsuit a partisan attack on their home.
On the other side are those content to “go along to get along,” even if it means surrendering Staten Island to a cynical map massacre. The split is casting stark relief on character and loyalty.
“This is a case in contrasts – Staten Island vs. Manhattan, outsider lawyers vs. hometown voices, judicial fiat vs. democratic choice,” Tabacco observed of the high-stakes showdown.
For Staten Islanders, the battle is about more than lines on a map; it’s about whether their leaders will stand up against an orchestrated power grab or acquiesce to it.
Borough President Fossella has made clear where he stands – rallying his people against what he calls Democrat “lawfare” and urging that Staten Island “have the strongest voice possible” in Congress. In doing so, he’s drawn a sharp line that any local official crosses at their peril.
Meanwhile, DA McMahon’s mute acquiescence serves as a cautionary tale of machine politics at its worst: prioritizing party and personal position over community representation.
The outcome of this redistricting brawl will reverberate far beyond one district. It will signal whether New York’s courts bless a “Frankenstein” racial gerrymander or uphold voters’ will.
And back on Staten Island, it will long be remembered who fought for the borough’s place at the table – and who folded. In this showdown, the island’s political soul is on the line, and there is little middle ground between championing Staten Island or capitulating to Marc Elias’s lawfare enterprise.
