The Levy factor

By Anthony Figliola

Having seen Steve Levy’s tenacity and unrelenting drive to reach all goals set before him, Rick Lazio should be aware of the “Levy Factor.”

Many years before the 2003 election for Suffolk County Executive, Steve Levy, a little-known state Assemblyman from Holbrook, decided he wanted the job. But Democratic Party leaders at the time, knowing they couldn’t control Levy, had decided on a former Republican town supervisor turned Democrat for that post. But as is commonplace in politics, the wind changed and many rank-in-file Democrats – with a nudge from Levy – were opposed to supporting a former Republican, leaving the field wide open.

So Levy put his years of strategizing and political maneuvering into action. Only one problem, a well financed yet unknown Nassau Deputy County Executive stepped into the race. How would Steve Levy react to this news?

As they say in poker, “he went all in.”

Levy worked the phones, made house calls and wrote letters to Democratic committee members asking for their support at the party’s nominating convention. He branded his opponent as an outsider and joined forces with the Democratic leadership that had tried to marginalize him just months before.

The strategy proved successful for Levy and his supporters, lovingly referred to as “Levy-ites.” However, he did have a primary challenge, which he won handedly. He then went on to coast into the county executive’s office, easily defeating a weak Republican opponent.

Four years later, he negotiated a deal with party leaders, which landed him on every ballot line garnering over 97 percent of the vote. This set the stage for Levy’s run on the Governor’s mansion as an independent fiscal conservative.

The moral of the story is that Levy understands trench warfare and has an uncanny ability to bring non-supporters to the table and cleanse them of their opposition. What Levy does best is sell the goods by putting the shoe leather to the pavement, knocking on doors and sometimes busting them down if he has too.

Rick Lazio would be wise to take stock of Levy’s past accomplishments and political strategies; it could help him defend his territory. However, each day that goes by more Republican leaders are turning into “Levy-ites,” which may cost Lazio the Republican nomination.