I have never responded well to race-baiting. It’s a campaign that pokes at the worst instincts in us and makes us demonize people.  I didn’t like it when Jack Martins used it to scare voters about “MS-13 moving next door,” I didn’t like it when Trump scared us about the caravans from Mexico (that never came) and I don’t like Mazi Pilip’s ads that use the same graphic from Martins’ racist campaign no less, ads that are intended to scare us about migrants sent to NYC by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott.

I’m not saying the southern border isn’t an issue. There’s no denying it is one of the biggest issues facing our country today. But Pilip’s job as a candidate for congresswoman is to sell me a solution. What she’s offering instead is fear-mongering, and it’s vile.

Fear is at the root of all bigotry, and fear is weaponized by politicians who have no popular policies to offer. For someone who is campaigning to fight antisemitism (another form of bigotry and another of our country’s biggest issues) to traffic in such blatant race-baiting is a level of hypocrisy that shocks.

But the obvious hypocrisy doesn’t matter to Pilip. She’s fine with her GOP bosses putting up these racist ads. She touts fighting antisemitism while endorsing voting for Trump for president, a man who quotes Hitler and said there were “very fine people on both sides” in Charlottesville’s neo-Nazi march.  No amount of pretzel logic can make it make sense.

Her view on women’s healthcare is another area in which she’s doing a flip-flop. When asked about her position on abortion, Pilip’s first reply to the press was a coy, “I’m not telling you right now.” What was she waiting for?  Her party bosses to tell her what to say?  Who doesn’t know what their position is on abortion in a post-Roe world? Pilip didn’t want to tell us.

She’s a candidate who praised the overturn of Roe, who is running on the Conservative Party line in this election (a party whose platform proudly promotes a national abortion ban), and she has been running from the camera when asked if she will vote yes to codify Roe. Then, all of a sudden, she says “it’s a personal choice” and we’re supposed to believe she is someone who will protect women’s access to healthcare? Sorry, but I was not buying it from the start, and I am not buying it now.

In a CNN interview (notably AFTER early voting and mail-in voting have started), Pilip stopped being coy and finally said she would not support codifying Roe.  Now we know.  And we know Tom Suozzi will.

I know Tom Suozzi and his policy positions. I know he has campaigned on solving the immigration crisis, like he did before in Congress. He will not enable the party of national abortion bans or enable the man who asked the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by.” Tom Suozzi is for freedom. Freedom to read what we like, freedom to be who we are, love who we want, freedom to make choices over our own healthcare.

And he’s also free from the race-baiting, fear-mongering tactics that drive us apart and demonize our neighbors.

I voted early for Tom Suozzi.  I encourage you to do the same.

Nina Gordon

Great Neck