How is Staten Island so conservative?

Wu-Tang Clan

Every red neighborhood in all of NYC has one thing in common... Mob controlled.

Look at every neighborhood that went for Trump in Brooklyn,Bronx and Queens and they are all areas of historically Italian families and mob activity.

So as to why Staten Island is red, it's the most Italian of the Burroughs.

One of my best friends is born and bred Staten. They are conservatives all the way. They spend their youths pretending to be “b boys”, but they, by tradition, end up being good people and providers.

My friend despises working in the city. He and his family take frequent trips to several of the shores and they love coming down here and of course eastern Tennessee.

Long winded answer but my friend and other Staten kids (along with Long Island) always wanted to be different from the NYC that television sees. It’s always entertainment and such. Giuliani had the streets safe, but that ended at the end of Bloomberg. So, today they see their televisions much like we do. They’re fed up. They’re much like upstate NY.

I grew up on Staten Island (although I am not a native, my family did move from Brooklyn in 1957 before the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge was built). That's a big deal. Islanders want to know whether you came before or after the bridge was built. My youngest brother was born on SI - which is a big deal to native Islanders.

Indeed, SI is very conservative. SI elects conservative democrats as well as republicans. Democrat, John Murphy was SI's congressman for many years until he got mixed up in the ABSCAM scandal. Then there was a long line of republicans until conservative democrat, Max Rose, was elected. He was defeated by republican Nicole Malliotakis.

One of my Dad's law partners was State Senator John Marchi - a truly great man and public servant. He was the longest serving state senator in NY. He ran, and beat, Mayor John Lindsay in the republican primary for mayor of NYC in 1969. Alas, the democrats put up a conservative, Mario Procochino, who split the conservative vote with John Marchi and John Lindsay was re-elected mayor running on the liberal party line.

John Marchi was a key figure in the push to have SI secede from NYC. Unfortunately, the movement never succeeded.

Yes, there is organized crime on SI. Sammy "The Bull" Gravano lived in SI. John Gotti had SI ties. I hung out at a pizza place after H.S. I went to an all boys HS and we would meet girls from the 7 Catholic HS there. My Dad hated me going there because he felt that it may have ties to the mob. But as someone mentioned above, there are a lot of cops and firemen on the Island. Indeed, SI has a large blue collar population.

We always laughed about being the "2nd Class" borough. We got the city's hand me down subway cars (SI's RR is all above ground) and would get the city's other outdated equipment, i.e. police cars, fire engines, etc.

I had a wonderful upbringing on the Island. And while it is still a good place to live, I would not go back to live in any part of NYC ever again.

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Every red neighborhood in all of NYC has one thing in common... Mob controlled.

Look at every neighborhood that went for Trump in Brooklyn,Bronx and Queens and they are all areas of historically Italian families and mob activity.

So as to why Staten Island is red, it's the most Italian of the Burroughs.

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Why are you equating the conservatism of Italian enclaves to “the mob”?

Italians, cops, firefighters, restaurant owners

Is SI still primarily populated mostly by Italians and Jewish folks, with a healthy contingent of the Irish?

That's a really cool post
!

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I always sort of heard this and did some more research on it. Not only is it conservative, but it's getting more conservative. Trump won by a greater margin there in 2020 than he did in 2016. What gives? I'd think maybe it really is just culturally more separated by it's physical distance from the rest of New York City but it butts right up against equally as liberal Newark and New Jersey. It's like a conservative island in the middle of a liberal continent and doesn't seem to be deteriorating the same way that many other urban conservative strongholds seem to be.

What gives?

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Because nobody who isn't working class would ever want to commute to NYC on the Staten Island Ferry, particularly in the winter. It's really that simple. Its also really a different world, its like walking back in time on Staten Island. Real people there, real working class New Yorkers there. Like an endangered species.

I work with several people from Staten Island. They are in some ways a lot like Trump. They don’t believe in holding back the truth and if it hurts your feelings then you’re a pussy. Sometimes it can be too much in your face but I kind of appreciate the honesty.