Bruce Blakeman
R · Governor, New York · Tier 1
Tier 1, “Firmly pro-Israel”
Nassau County Executive and the GOP gubernatorial nominee; one of the most prominent pro-Israel Republicans in NY. He faced no primary: the June 23, 2026 GOP primary was canceled after Stefanik suspended her campaign in December 2025 and Trump endorsed him. He faces Hochul in November. Signed “friendship agreements” with West Bank settlement councils (using “Judea and Samaria”), attended the May 2026 Jerusalem Real Estate Expo in Manhattan, and is under contract to buy an apartment in Beit Shemesh. Blakeman marched in the 2025 and 2026 Israel Day Parades — at the 2026 one, on May 31, he said it was “a source of pride… to support the State of Israel,” walking behind signs reading “Bruce Blakeman Fights for Israel,” the year Mayor Mamdani skipped it. A self-identified Zionist, he backed an anti-BDS law. At his October 13, 2026 debate with Hochul he did not back away from his warning to Hasidic leaders two days earlier that Mamdani would not stop rioters “burning down the yeshivas and your shuls” (JTA, citing the New York Times), saying the people he meant were “the professional protesters that took over Columbia University,” and he attacked Mamdani for dropping the city’s antisemitism definition: “the first thing he did was sign an executive order to water down the definition of antisemitism.” In a Jewish Press interview published October 29, 2026, he called the Columbia protesters “the paid political thugs that said that they were part of the Free Palestine movement,” said that when they came to Nassau County “I had tanks, I had horses, I had dogs, I had SWAT teams,” and said that as governor he would have told New York City, “You better clean it up now and end it, or I will do it as governor with the State Police and, if necessary, the National Guard.” Mother Jones reported on October 30, 2026 that he welcomed Itamar Ben-Gvir to Nassau County with a police honor guard in April 2025; that at the November 2025 signing of the Hebron Hills pact he said “I love Judea and Samaria” and “I love the spirit of the people there”; and that after meeting the settler leader Yossi Dagan at a 2026 premiere he said in a joint video, “We will always stand with you, Yossi.”
A firm Tier 1 on acts of his own. In 2016, as a Hempstead town council member, he brokered the town’s sister-city agreement with the Shomron Regional Council, which takes in 35 West Bank settlements, and during his time on the council Hempstead became the first New York municipality to pass anti-BDS legislation. As Nassau County Executive he has taken the county into cooperation pacts with the Hebron Hills, Binyamin and Samaria regional councils; the Hebron Hills council said he “expresses unwavering support for the Hebron Hills in particular and for Judea and Samaria in general.” He calls himself “a proud Zionist,” attacks Hochul from the right for insufficient pro-Israel zeal and calls Mamdani “an antisemite”; in June 2026 he said of Brad Lander, who is Jewish, “Even though he’s Jewish, this guy would be a camp guard in the concentration camp if he could,” later retreating to “Maybe camp guard was too strong, but certainly collaborator.” No statement of concern for Palestinian civilians was found in his record.
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elect26 places 2026 midterm candidates on a six-tier spectrum, from 1 (most pro-Israel) to 6 (most critical of Israel).