Fight Back New York

RACE #1 FIGHT BACK NEW YORK TARGETS HIRAM MONSERRATE

Our first target was Democrat Hiram Monserrate, a state senator from Queens who lied about his support for marriage equality in order to get support from the LGBT community during the 2008 election. He voted against the marriage bill in December 2009. Just one month later, he was expelled from the senate by his colleagues due to a misdemeanor conviction on domestic abuse charges. When Monserrate decided to run for his seat again in a special election in March 2010, Fight Back NY conducted research that showed that, despite his surprising popularity, he could be defeated by highlighting his personal and professional shortcomings that made him unfit to return to Albany.

Fight Back NY sent 95,322 individual pieces of mail (see below) to 15,887 prime voters in Monserrate’s district – a significant number considering 15,726 people turned out to vote in the special election. We also placed calls to over 10,000 households, from which we identified the voting preferences of over 6,000 voters, and then made get-out-the-vote (GOTV) calls to supporters of the pro-equality candidate, Jose Peralta, as well as to undecided voters. Our mail messages were not subtle (see below). Examples include, “Hiram Monserrate Betrayed Our Trust … Criminals belong in prison, not in public office.” It was a strong show of force in a short, month-long campaign that resulted in our first win – Monserrate lost to now-senator Jose Peralta 66 percent to 27 percent.

Fight Back New York's direct voter impact in Monserrate's district:

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