Blakeman and Koslow vie for Nassau County Executive seat, where crime and immigration emerge as core themes

Nassau County Legis. Seth Koslow, a Democrat, is vying to unseat incumbent Republican County Executive Bruce Blakeman in a high-profile race centered on public safety and immigration.

Blakeman, a close ally of President Donald Trump running as a Republican and Conservative, says his top issues are public safety, keeping taxes flat and protecting Nassau’s quality of life.

Koslow, who’s running as a Democrat and moderate, has promised to disband Blakeman’s "special deputies program," audit the county’s spending to cut waste and invest unused funds in wastewater treatment solutions and flood mitigation, among several initiatives. 

Should Blakeman win, it would extend Republican control of the executive branch another three years (the shortened term is due to the state's new even-year election law upheld by the Court of Appeals), bucking a longstanding trend of Nassau voters electing a county executive from the opposing political party of the current U.S. President. Local elections, currently held the year after presidential contests, historically bring out thousands of Nassau voters looking to log their discontent with the president. Meanwhile, Koslow is running to give Democrats, who have a minority in Nassau's legislature, a meaningful seat at the table.

Four years ago, Blakeman defeated Laura Curran, a Democrat, by 2,150 votes for the top spot.

Whoever wins the seat in November will preside over the highest office in the county, setting Nassau’s multi-billion-dollar budget, wielding veto and executive power and selecting appointees to various agencies and commissions. The election comes at a time when, while the majority of Nassau residents say their quality of life is "good" or "excellent," about 75% say their cost of living has gotten worse.

Blakeman's platform

Blakeman, 70, was born and raised in Valley Stream to a political family. His late father was a state assemblyman, representing a portion of Nassau County, and his younger brother was a senior White House adviser to former President George W. Bush.

"I think that I have the management skills and the leadership ability to be able to simplify complex problems and find solutions," he said, outlining why he deserves a second term.

Since taking office in 2022, Blakeman has drawn national attention for taking on culture war issues, making it a misdemeanor crime to wear a mask or facial covering in public, signing an executive order barring transgender athletes from playing on girls and women’s sports teams on county property, and criticizing the press for what he views as unfair coverage. Those issues have all resulted in separate lawsuits, including one from Newsday.

Most recently, Blakeman embraced Trump's signature mass deportation plan, partnering with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to arrest and detain immigrants in the country illegally. 

Blakeman has followed through on several campaign promises, notably keeping taxes flat.

"With inflation rampant during my term as county executive, I haven't raised taxes a penny," he said.

At the same time, his proposed budgets have dipped tens of millions of dollars into the county's reserves, and his economic agenda has been saddled by setbacks. He pushed, for instance, to bring a $6 billion casino resort to the Coliseum site, and a $3 billion NYU medical center to Nassau Community College, but both projects are now dead.

"Although [Sands] will not be pursuing a casino in New York ... [they're] obligated to develop the site with residential entertainment and hospitality components," Blakeman said, adding that the company has paid more than $70 million to the county to date.

On NYU, Blakeman characterized the institution's withdrawal as a business decision, noting it still plans to expand into parts of Nassau County. Billionaire Ken Langone, the former chairman of the NYU Langone board, who has spoken positively of Blakeman, said the project "was just too complicated" to see through.

Shortly after his election in 2021, Blakeman said he would fix the county's property assessment system, which prompts hundreds of thousands of homeowners to go through an appeals process each year.

In an interview earlier this month, Blakeman said: "We fixed the assessment system ... It's a nonissue," pointing to an audit by County Comptroller Elaine Phillips, a Republican, that claimed the reassessment carried out by his Curran had significant errors and relied on "flawed" data. Blakeman has since added six employees to a quality control unit within the Assessment Department, a spokesman said.

Still, about 60% of Nassau homeowners formally appealed their property assessments last year, and about 80% who did won a settlement — shifting the tax burden on those who didn't appeal.

Blakeman entered public life in 1993, holding various positions such as Hempstead councilmember, presiding officer of the Nassau County Legislature and a Port Authority board member, where he led the agency through the aftermath of 9/11. He also has taken losses, running unsuccessful campaigns for state comptroller, U.S. Congress, New York City mayor and U.S. Senate.

"I always run as if I’m behind," he said. Laughing, he added: "And many times I have been behind."

Koslow's platform

Koslow, 43, an attorney who grew up in Baldwin, is a relative newcomer to public life. Before attending law school, Koslow sold commercial HVAC systems in Nassau County and New York City. He later worked as an assistant district attorney in Queens from 2013 to 2016, before starting his own law firm handling criminal defense and traffic court cases.

"My vision for Nassau County is a vision of safety, security, infrastructure that is safe for us," he told NewsdayTV. "I have seen too many people who have children that can’t live here after college or are afraid to move back here because it is so expensive. We have to have a plan in place where our children and their children can live here, grow here and work here."

If elected, one of his first acts would be to audit the county’s spending to spot inefficiencies, he said. "I’ve lived in Nassau County my whole life and I have no idea where the money goes," he said. "We pay a lot of money to live here, and I know people talk a lot about school taxes ... But a lot of it also goes to the county."

Koslow entered public life in 2023, winning a legislator seat to represent Freeport, Merrick, and parts of North Merrick and North Bellmore. 

Last year, he introduced a bill requiring the county to create a fund of up to $400 million to pay back drivers for red-light camera fees that a court deemed illegal last year. The legislature’s Republican presiding officer did not allow the bill to come before the floor, saying it would "destroy the fiscal stability of the county." Earlier this month, a judge ruled that Nassau did not have to pay back millions of drivers for the illegal fines because they were paid "voluntarily."

"We need to restore real checks and balances in Nassau County instead of sticking with the same broken politics where everyone falls in line behind one man — because when that happens, taxpayers get trampled," Koslow said in a statement, referring to Blakeman.

Over the last year, Koslow has spoken out against what he sees as financial mismanagement and cronyism in Nassau, calling out Blakeman for using tens of millions of taxpayer dollars to hire outside attorneys who donated to his political campaign. Early this year, Koslow said Blakeman had "turned Nassau County into an all-you-can-eat buffet for politically connected law firms." Blakeman has said hiring private attorneys has saved the county $400 million in financial liability from lawsuits.

On property tax assessment, Koslow said: "I don't know the best way to do it yet. What I've been doing is putting together a team of people to advise me on what our options are ... It's a problem that's going to take more than one term to fix."

Blakeman has received millions more in campaign contributions than Koslow. Nassau's Republican Committee doubled its financial support for Blakeman since his first-term win, donating $1.4 million to his campaign for reelection. 

In the final weeks leading up to his election four years ago, Blakeman had about $550,000 to spend. This time around, he has $2.7 million to spend before Nov. 4.

The county's Democratic Committee and its chairman have given $180,000 to Koslow's campaign. He has $152,000 left on hand.

"[Blakeman] is concerned about running for governor. He's concerned about working with Donald Trump. He's concerned about headlines," Koslow said. "I'm concerned about the future in Nassau County. I want to live here and retire here, like my parents did. I want my kids to grow up here, I want their friends to grow up here."

Asked about the rumors that he would run for governor next year, Blakeman told Newsday TV, "I think that anyone who closes the door on a potential opportunity is very foolish ... But really my focus is completely on being the best county executive I can be."

Combating crime

Both candidates have focused much of their campaign on crime, an issue that's top of mind for Democrats and Republicans alike, with Blakeman touting low crime rates and Koslow pointing at rising violent crime.

During the 2021 race for county executive against Curran, Blakeman cited a U.S. News & World Report list that ranked Nassau the safest county in the nation under her watch. In a debate that November, he said the magazine was "spoon-fed" numbers by Curran's administration that were "not true," sounding the alarm about what he called a "crime epidemic" without evidence.

But since taking office, Blakeman regularly references the same U.S. News & World Report ranking where Nassau still tops the list. Asked by Newsday about the inconsistency, Blakeman said keeping crime down after the county reopened from COVID lockdown was a greater achievement, and that U.S. News & World Report had since improved its methodology.

"That's what I'm told. Don't know it for a fact," he said. A spokesperson for U.S. News & World Report told Newsday its public safety methodology had not substantively changed.

With campaigns casting broad generalizations about whether crime is "up" or "down," data shows different patterns for various crimes.

Car thefts are down since Blakeman took office, with about 970 stolen cars in his first year and about 760 last year, according to Nassau County Police Department data. Commercial robberies are also down, nearing pre-pandemic levels, with about 150 last year compared to about 220 in 2022.

However, felony assaults have climbed since Blakeman took office, with 566 last year versus 474 in 2022. There also were more than 500 more break-ins during his first three years in office compared to the same period under Curran, according to data from the state Division of Criminal Justice Services, which includes crimes reported to the nearly 20 village and city police departments in Nassau County. 

Blakeman told Newsday that certain crimes were down under the last administration because of COVID, adding, "There were no businesses open ... I had to open up the economy, I had to open up the county ... It’s comparing apples to oranges."

If reelected, Blakeman vowed to hire 100 more police officers and hopes to hire 100 more correction officers, he said.

Koslow through a spokesman said he would follow the police department’s recommendation about how many new officers to hire.

“[Blakeman] talks about how he hires more police officers, but he doesn’t talk about how many police officers we lose due to natural attrition, whether its retirement, injury, death, transfer, whatever it is," Koslow said, adding that the police department had a shortage of 40 detectives.

Nassau's police department currently has more than 200 vacancies, and expects 150 officers to leave next year, Newsday recently reported.

"Without a plan in place to have more detectives, crime is going to keep going up," Koslow said. "As a former prosecutor, I understand that the police department — specifically our detectives — solve most of our crimes. If they can't solve crimes because they don't have enough staff, criminals will  be empowered. They are creative. They'll find new ways to commit crimes."

One of Koslow's first acts if elected would be to disband Blakeman’s special deputies program, he said, referring to a group of gun-licensed, volunteer Nassau residents Blakeman enlisted to support first responders if he were to declare an emergency. Nassau's Democratic caucus is suing Blakeman over the program, claiming he didn't have the legal authority to create it. Blakeman has countersued, saying Democrats sought to "punish, intimidate and harass" him.

"It’s a slap in the face to all our law enforcement officers who train for months and months, and then retrain over and over again, that we would even consider giving police powers to random residents," Koslow said.

In response, Blakeman argued, "Most of these people are military veterans and retired law enforcement," adding that, for now, the program was "nothing more than a list.”

In the case of a natural disaster or military invasion, Blakeman said, "instead of waiting for that to happen, and then scrambling to find people who’d be willing to do it without vetting them, without training them, I did it ahead of time.”

Immigration enforcement

Blakeman and Koslow share different views on immigration, with Blakeman renting out local jail cells to ICE for sweeping arrests as part of a countywide initiative and Koslow vowing to cancel that program, focusing efforts on violent criminals.

In February, Blakeman signed a contract with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, setting aside 50 jail cells in East Meadow for the federal agency to hold immigrants accused of being in the country illegally. Nearly 2,200 immigrants have been held there through September, according to population numbers obtained by Newsday, including a 42-year-old father of two who died in one of the cells last month. He also deputized 10 Nassau police detectives to carry out enforcement immigration on behalf of ICE.

Those detectives were trained by federal officials, but have not been deployed, Blakeman said in an interview with Newsday, because "they don’t need us right now."

Koslow said he would cancel Nassau's agreement with ICE if elected. "There’s no reason for it ... ICE has more resources and funding than Nassau County ever will."

The county’s ICE program erodes people’s trust in police, he said. If immigrants "won’t speak to our police department, they can’t do their job to keep us safe."

"Our community members, our children, are afraid to go to school, afraid to go to work, and afraid to go to a doctor’s appointment because they don’t know what’s going to happen," he said.

Instead, Koslow said he would focus local efforts on those accused of committing violent crimes. "If they are violent and they’re wanted by ICE ... I have no issue with the police working with ICE on those violent criminals," he said.

Blakeman has directed local authorities to work with ICE to arrest immigrants accused of a crime, big or small, and the federal agency says it arrested more than 1,600 people across Long Island with prior convictions from January through August. Blakeman has assured the public that local police were not going after noncriminals, but federal agents have been arresting people without criminal records across Nassau and Suffolk. 

"Letting a bunch of people into our community when we don't know who they are, where they came from, is a big mistake," Blakeman told Newsday, adding that the people most happy with Nassau's ICE partnership were Hispanic Americans.

Editor's Note: This article has been updated to reflect that the winner of this year's race for Nassau County Executive will have a three- instead of four-year term following the Court of Appeals' decision to shift elections to even years.