COLLEGE SIT-IN: Josh Ettinger (left) and Tevon Hyman yesterday keep seats warm for the candidates ahead of tonight’s Hofstra debate. (
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Hofstra University takes America’s center stage tonight as it hosts a pivotal debate between President Obama and Mitt Romney — but some Long Islanders groused that the event won’t be history soon enough because of security obstacles and traffic woes.
“In the last week or so it’s been crazy,” said Hofstra business major Ian Kilgore, referring to a campus upended by debate preparations. “There are lot of suited men walking around.”
“And then the traffic flow from night to day has increased exponentially,” added Kilgore.
Jordan Allen, a 20-year-old sophomore, said the atmosphere on campus is “electric,” but added, “I just can’t wait for it to be over. We have midterms soon.”
Hofstra put out an advisory that there will be no commercial traffic on the heavily traveled Hempstead Turnpike between Merrick Avenue and Oak Street from 6 a.m. until midnight.
Owners of retail establishments — particularly eateries — worry they won’t have any customers today because of the roadblocks.
Sources said security is tighter than when Hofstra hosted the debate between Obama and John McCain four years ago because authorities now have to protect a sitting president. The Nassau County PD is budgeting for about $500,000 in overtime.
More than 1,000 guests — including several hundred students chosen via lottery — will be in Hofstra’s David S. Mack entertainment complex when Obama and Romney duke it out. About 3,000 credentialed journalists from across the world also will be viewing the event from a separate media center next to the debate hall.
“This debate could be a game changer and people at Hofstra are aware of that and it excites them,” said Lawrence Levy, dean of Hofstra’s National Center for Suburban Studies.
The protesters already started showing up yesterday, including a group led by the Rev. Johnny Ray Youngblood, pastor of Mount Pisgah Baptist Church in Brooklyn, which was there to complain that gun violence and “mass incarceration” are issues being ignored by both candidates.
The town-hall-style event at Hofstra is considered a key moment for Obama, who has to do something to improve his standing after Romney bested him at their first debate Oct. 3.
Polls released yesterday continued to show Romney surging in the battleground states and nationally.
Levy said it was fitting that the debate was being held in the nation’s “first suburb” because swing suburban voters have decided the last six elections, and will likely determine this one.
A new Gallup/USA Today survey showed Romney has jumped to a 51-46 lead in 13 swing states among likely voters.
And a Politico/George Washington University poll had Romney ahead of Obama, 50-48, in 10 battleground states key to winning the election.
Romney also tied Obama 48-48 in Iowa, according to an ARG poll. Obama was up seven points there last month.
Also on the campaign trail:
* Romney and allied GOP committees raised $170.4 million in September — $11 million shy of the $181 million collected by Obama and the Democrats.
* Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan, Romney’s running mate, scooped up several million more dollars last night during fund-raisers at the New York Hilton in Midtown. It was Ryan’s first fund-raising jaunt to the Big Apple as Romney’s vice-presidential pick.
* Romney canceled a scheduled Thursday appearance on the left-leaning chat show “The View.” His wife, Ann, will still appear.
At a secretly recorded Boca Raton, Fla., fund-raiser earlier this year, Romney called the show “high risk” because three of the four female hosts are liberals.
Additional reporting by Beth DeFalco