With the special election in the rearview, eyes are moving to the state Senate race in District 7, which covers the same swath of the North Shore as CD 3. Anna Kaplan lost the district to Jack Martins in 2022. Now three Democrats have jumped into a primary hoping to challenge Martins.

Kim Keiserman is leader of the Port Washington Democratic club and a trustee of Baxter Estates. A first-time candidate, she has proven to be a formidable fund-raiser who has racked up a slew of impressive endorsements including Robert Zimmerman and Delia DeRiggi-Whitton. Despite her party bona fides, Keiserman bucked the establishment in 2020 when she worked with Melanie D’Arrigo to primary challenge Tom Suozzi from the left. With Suozzi now being the hero of the Democratic party, persuading Democrats and independents who support Suozzi to trust her could be challenging since she is running in a district that exists entirely within Suozzi’s CD 3 turf.

Josh Lafazan is a former Nassau County legislator from Syosset. His foray into politics began at the age of 18 when he was elected to the Syosset School Board. Lafazan has recently run back-to-back campaigns for CD 3. In 2022, he came in third in the Democratic primary. In January 2023, he jumped back into the CD 3 race after the initial revelations of Santos’ lying scandal surfaced. Lafazan dropped his second bid for Congress after losing his county legislative seat in November.

While Lafazan is a known quantity in Nassau politics and has a higher profile than his opponents, voters might be suffering candidate fatigue from his four successive campaigns over 2.5 years.  His history of running on the Conservative Party line might also be a hard sell to the Democratic primary voters. Losing another race at this point could be a permanent blow to his political future.

Brad Schwartz is a Roslyn native who ran for the District 7 seat in 2018 but stepped out of the race prior to the primary with Anna Kaplan. Schwartz is a former television editor and producer with a doctorate degree in public policy. He had a long struggle with Lyme Disease that motivated his interest in fixing healthcare and government. As of the last filing his committee had raised $116K, slightly less than Keiserman ($128K) but more than Lafazan ($56K). In 2018, Schwartz had grassroots support and some notable endorsements including Assemblyman Chuck Lavine. But the Nassau Democratic Party leadership chose to back Kaplan instead. If the party endorses one of his primary opponents again this time around, it could be another uphill fight for Schwartz.

Andrea Levine

Port Washington