New York State Senate elections, 2012

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	New York State Senate elections, 2012
	Majority control • Campaign contributions
	Qualifications • Term limits • Impact of Redistricting
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	New York State Senate • 2012 New York House Elections

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Elections for the office of New York State Senate will be held in New York on November 6, 2012. A total of 62 seats will be up for election.

The signature filing deadline for candidates wishing to run in these elections is July 12, 2012. The primary election day will be September 11, 2012.

See also: New York State Assembly elections, 2012 and State legislative elections, 2012

Majority control

See also: Partisan composition of state senates

Heading into the November 6 election, the Republican Party holds the majority in the New York State Senate:

New York State Senate
Party		As of May 2012	After the 2012 Election
	Democratic Party	30	Pending
	Republican Party	32	Pending
Total		62	62

Campaign contributions

See also: State-by-state comparison of donations to state senate campaigns

This chart shows how many candidates ran for state senate in New York in past years and the cumulative amount of campaign contributions in state senate races, including contributions in both primary and general election contests. All figures come from Follow The Money.^[1]

Year	Number of candidates	Total contributions
2010	133	$48,466,031
2008	142	$47,019,720
2006	118	$34,814,138
2004	132	$30,017,313
2002	142	$24,443,377

In 2010, the candidates for state senate raised a total of $48,466,031 in campaign contributions. The top 10 donors were: ^[2]

Donor	Amount
Democratic Senate Campaign Cmte of New York	$2,736,038
Senate Republican Campaign Cmte of New York	$2,634,450
1199 SEIU United Healthcare Workers East	$419,400
New York State Trial Lawyers	$407,700
New York State United Teachers	$391,010
Democratic Senate Campaign Cmte of Colorado	$326,262
New York State Correctional Officers	$273,600
Nassau County Republican Cmte	$250,000
Oppenheimer, Suzi	$226,000
New York State AFL-CIO	$194,160

Qualifications

Article 3, Section 7 of the New York Constitution states: No person shall serve as a member of the legislature unless he or she is a citizen of the United States and has been a resident of the state of New York for five years, and, except as hereinafter otherwise prescribed, of the assembly or senate district for the twelve months immediately preceding his or her election; if elected a senator or member of assembly at the first election next ensuing after a readjustment or alteration of the senate or assembly districts becomes effective, a person, to be eligible to serve as such, must have been a resident of the county in which the senate or assembly district is contained for the twelve months immediately preceding his or her election. No member of the legislature shall, during the time for which he or she was elected, receive any civil appointment from the governor, the governor and the senate, the legislature or from any city government, to an office which shall have been created, or the emoluments whereof shall have been increased during such time.

Impact of redistricting

See also: Redistricting in New York

New York's redistricting process following the 2010 census was tumultuous at the best of times. The state's growth rate was at 2.19%, well below the national rate of 9.7%.^[3] The task of redistricting falls to a six person advisory commission known as the Legislative Task Force on Demographic Research and Reapportionment (LATFOR). Once they draw up maps, it is up to the full legislature whether to pass them or not.

Prior to the November 2010 elections, a majority of legislators signed a pledge by the activist group NY Uprising, stating that they would support nonpartisan redistricting reform. When the time came to actually implement that pledge, however, most of those who signed ignored the pledge, allowing the process to proceed as usual. LATFOR released proposed maps on January 26, 2012, which Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) called unacceptable and threaten to veto. Included in the map was an additional 63rd Senate seat, upsetting Democrats who argued the move was unconstitutional. In late March, revised proposals were issued, along with a constitutional amendment that would set up a new bipartisan commission on redistricting following the next census in 2020.^[4]

Cuomo ultimately accepted the maps in exchange for the passage of the constitutional amendment. Democrats challenged the 63rd seat in court but their lawsuit was rejected for not offering proof that it was unconstitutional.

List of candidates

District 1