From Gar Joseph:
Without a competitive mayor’s race, the talk at the Famous Deli was about voter turnout and its impact on the Philly judge candidates running statewide: Seamus McCaffery and John Younge.
McCaffery is running for the state Supreme Court, Young for Superior Court. Low turnout could doom their chances.
Expectations heading into today were low. Party chairman Bob Brady worried turnout could be as low as 20 percent. But he and others were bouyed by what they said was surprising turnout in the 7 a.m.-9 a.m. time slot.
“It was decent,” Brady said. “In my division I had 50 to 60 people. I’d love to get to 30 percent, but it can’t drop off this evening. It has to keep steady.”
State Sen. Vince Fumo predicted turnout between 25 and 30 percent. Bob Henon, labor leader John Dougherty’s chief lieutenant, was even more optimistic, predicting 35 percent. All of those numbers would be a record low for an open-seat mayor’s race.
Republican mayoral candidate Al Taubenberger said there was a line at his polling place, Rhawn and Veree in the 63rd ward. “The people I saw in the Northeast are genuinely interested,” he said.
David Auspitz is the deli’s former owner who encouraged the Election Day tradition and is now a zoning board member. He said any turnout surprise could be credited to the high tone of the Taubenberger-Michael Nutter race.
“These two have changed politics forever,” Auspitz said. “They never said a bad word about each other, they just talked about issues. Elections will never be the same because of the class Al has shown.”
Fumo and Dougherty, often at odds, are both backing McCaffery. Fumo said he thinks the judge’s big weekend TV buy could offset low turnout. Also helping: Good turnout for competitive races in the suburbs where McCaffery has name recognition.
McCaffery agreed that the SE Pa. suburbs could work to his benefit.
“I’m so much of a different candidate for a democrat,” he said. “I have Republican crossover votes across the state because of my background as a police officer and prosecutor. Eastern Pa. turnout is always going to be monumental, but my core support group is crossover republicans and independents.”
Municipal Court candidate Jacquie Frazier Lyde, daughter of ex-heavyweight champ Joe Frazier, said the boxing community throughoput the city had been a base of support for her with volunteers coming from boxing clubs and Rec Centers. Former boxing commissioners George Bochetto and Jimmy Binns have held fund raisers. Boxers Tim Witherspoon and Tex Cobb have campaigned for her.
“I’m going to fight for justice from the bench,” Frazier-Lyde promised.
(edited to add by Dan) Gar also filed a video report of his visit to Famous Deli. It doesn't seem that he was aware at that point about Nutter's decision to skip the stop but he did correctly speculate that Nutter wouldn't be there.