He’s the fly in the Dems’ ointment.
Queens Republican Bob Turner did such a good job of defeating his Democratic challenger for disgraced Rep. Anthony Weiner’s 9th District seat last month that the state GOP is willing to bet he can do it again next fall.
Instead of sacrificing the seat to congressional redistricting as originally planned, the GOP is eyeing ways to redraw the district’s boundaries, and make Turner harder to beat in 2012.
Assembly Dems and Senate Republicans are horse-trading in Albany over which two districts to cut thanks to a statewide population loss that forces New York state to drop from 29 congressional districts to 27.
In the past, the parties have evenly split such losses — at least one for each party — and tried to share the pain equally between upstate and downstate. Under the old gentlemen’s agreement, the GOP would likely have sacrificed Turner’s downstate seat while the Dems would give up an upstate stronghold.
But Turner’s decisive win last month over David Weprin caused the GOP to rethink its strategy.
Among the Democratic seats that could go on the chopping block are those occupied by Rep. Maurice Hinchey in the 22nd District encompassing the Catskills and counties along the Pennsylvania border, and Rep. Louise Slaughter, who represents the 28th District in the Niagara Falls region.
The GOP may drop Ann Marie Buerkle, a first-term congresswoman for the 25th District around Syracuse.
“She’s not doing well right now with the fund-raising,” said one party insider.
Turner’s district includes a heavily Jewish area that straddles Brooklyn and Queens, and conservative white neighbor-hoods in the Rockaways. Democrats outnumbered Republicans there 195,984 to 62,423, yet Turner captured 54 percent of the votes to Weprin’s 46.