When Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand first said she would run for her third full term, the announcement prompted a flicker of surprise in New York political circles and a flood of speculation about who would challenge her.
As New York’s junior senator, Gillibrand had kept head down in recent years — picking unglamorous and thorny legislative battles, rarely courting headlines and inspiring skeptics to tag her as a sort of ghost senator.
But nine months after she announced her candidacy, Gillibrand has defied many expectations. No up-and-coming Democrats have stepped up to challenge her. And pundits said they doubted the GOP will bother with a serious general election effort to oust her.
If she makes the general election, the strength of her performance could lift or dent Democrats in a handful of key congressional races.
Gillibrand’s campaign still lacks infrastructure. But she enters the 2024 primary with a formidable $8.3 million war chest, according to a spokeswoman, and no opponents in sight.
This election season, at least, the low-key Democrat from Albany is looking more and more like a New York juggernaut, boosted by her flair for fund-raising and ability to avoid staunch critics.
“There was buzz in New York, especially around AOC and Ritchie,” Chris Coffey, a Democratic strategist, said of two possible primary challengers: Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rep. Ritchie Torres.
In the end, Coffey added, “It was just buzz.”
Ocasio-Cortez and Torres, both of the Bronx and in their mid-30s, decided not to run. Ocasio-Cortez, who dangled the threat of a primary against Brooklyn’s Sen. Chuck Schumer in the midterms, quickly said she had no interest in taking on Gillibrand.
New York’s two Senate seats are coveted political perches, placing their occupants at the intersection of America’s premier lawmaking body and its dominant media market. They can attract big personalities and intense campaigns.
Schumer, a cheerful glad-hander with a zest for chasing cameras, has parlayed his seat into a role as the Senate leader. He can polarize but rarely fades into the background.
Gillibrand’s style is different.
“It’s hard for people to pay attention to what I do, because I’m not a shiny object,” said Gillibrand, 56. “But I’m very effective in getting things done.”
In an interview with the Daily News, she rattled off a laundry list of accomplishments — including securing significant health care support for 9/11 first responders — that figure to form the crux of her campaign.
Last year, she notched long-sought legislative victories, passing anti-gun trafficking legislation and a bill stripping military commanders of the ability to decide whether sexual assault claims in the armed forces are prosecuted.
“I had to outmaneuver the DoD,” she said proudly. “I had to outmaneuver lots of generals.”
Schumer said “no one thought” Gillibrand could get the bill through.
“I remember her sitting on the floor and talking to some of the most conservative Republicans about why it was important,” he recalled.
Since emerging on the political scene nearly 17 years ago by winning a conservative upstate congressional district — “The only person who thought I could win was my mother,” she said — Gillibrand has displayed political agility.
She has also moved decidedly leftward, changing from a Blue Dog to a liberal-leaning senator after she was vaulted to the upper chamber by former Gov. David Paterson, who picked her to replace the outgoing Hillary Clinton in 2009.
But her political track record is hardly spotless.
Gillibrand’s last election campaign, after all, was a humbling eight-month run at the White House best remembered for a campaign stop at an Iowa restaurant where an unimpressed patron said, “Sorry, I’m just trying to get some ranch,” as she sneaked by the senator.
Some Democrats docked Gillibrand for party disloyalty after she called for the resignation of Al Franken, the Minnesota senator felled by sexual misconduct allegations.
In the 2020 race, Gillibrand found no clear constituency. Her once-conservative positions on immigration earned her a tough interview with Rachel Maddow on MSNBC; her progressive vision for the presidency ruled her out for centrists.
But in 14 years in the Senate, she has earned admirers among her colleagues. “She is relentless,” said Sen. Cory Booker, a New Jersey Democrat. “She gives a damn.”
When Booker joined the Senate a decade ago, Gillibrand had dinner with him and gave him a crash course on how to be effective in the chamber “down to your scheduling process,” he said.
“I wish I could have tape recorded it and given it to every new senator, regardless of party,” Booker said. “There is no bulls–t about her whatsoever.”
Fans in Washington don’t buy votes in New York. But Gillibrand’s style still seems to be resonating in a state where skilled practitioners of political theater tend to fly highest.
“You would think somebody who has had a lower profile would be a good target,” Hank Sheinkopf, a Democratic strategist, said of a primary challenge to Gillibrand. “But the Democrats don’t seem to feel that way.”
He said he expected Gillibrand to present herself in the reelection bid as a “worker, not a politician.”
“Which is probably a good argument today,” Sheinkopf added.
