A victory in a New York special election on Tuesday injected Democrats with fresh optimism that the party might have found some of the basic ingredients to neutralize immigration and the border as political issues, which party officials have privately seen as among their deepest areas of vulnerability in 2024.
The success in the race for a House seat by former and now future Representative Tom Suozzi — a Democrat whom Republicans had pilloried as “Sanctuary Suozzi” — came in a corner of the country, Long Island, that had been increasingly hostile to Democrats in the last two years.
And Mr. Suozzi won after he frontally and repeatedly addressed a topic that his party has sometimes tried to shy away from.
With border crossings surging to record highs in recent months and more than 170,000 migrants arriving in New York City, Republicans had hoped to use immigration to paint Mr. Suozzi as unacceptably beyond the mainstream.
The leading G.O.P.
Persons:
Tom Suozzi —, —, Suozzi, frontally
Organizations:
Democrat, Republicans, Democrats, Fox News
Locations:
New York, Long, New York City