The electorate has been polled, but to what extent have they been Polar Bear-ed? We still don’t know.
A month and a half after election day, the New York primary results are finally certified, despite the count having been conducted as a three-ring circus.
What we do know is Mets Rookie of the Year phenom, and so-called Polar Bear Pete Alonso, garnered votes across New York’s myriad Congressional and State Senate races. And he wasn’t the lone athlete to find his name tossed in the hat for higher office.
But today, the New York Post revealed that over 80,000 NYC absentee ballots were not counted.
The news raises legitimate concerns about the efficiency of absentee voting (but certainly not the legitimacy, ahem) before a consequential November election.
But that’s a column for another time.
The real question, the most important question for sports fans of course, is … how many of those disqualified votes were for Pete Alonso, dammit?
I did a deep, “investigative” dive into the numbers this morning and found a smattering of write-in votes cast for athletes, including Alonso, who appeared in two New York State Senate races.
A few votes for Alonso in the entire city? I know New York is a Yankee town but the numbers just don’t add up.
The first basemen did get more votes than Aaron Judge, whose congressional campaign was probably hurt due to an actual injury in spring training.
Alonso also edged out back-to-back Cy Young winner and fellow Met Jacob deGrom. Voters must have preferred Alonso’s youth and radical idealism.
In January, Alonso said he believed his Mets (yes, them) will be the team to beat in the NL East. In that way, he may be like any other politician, BSing his way through an interview. But, clearly, that proclamation played well with voters. He may have a future in this politics biz.
The only other (athletic) competitor written in in the N.Y. primary was athlete-activist, Colin Kaepernick. The quarterback, who spent his NFL days in San Francisco before being blackballed by the league, picked up a vote in the NY-13 Congressional election. That district serves folks in upper Manhattan, and a segment of the west Bronx.
The NY-12 Democratic Congressional race, a complete and utter shitshow, was called by the AP yesterday, six weeks after election day, with the incumbent narrowly defeating three declared progressive challengers — as well as Judge, deGrom, Howard Stern, Teddy Roosevelt, Tony Soprano, and Donald Trump Jr.
But Alonso is a guy that hit 53 home runs as a rookie and won the 2019 Home Run Derby. He is clearly electible, knows what the people wanna hear, and deserves a voice in the halls of Congress. Or, at least, a few more write-in votes.
So for Pete’s sake, New York, get your act together for November.
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