#New York’s Republican Party needs to be ready for Democrats to screw up

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Robert Ortt, Republican Senator, during the LGBT bill vote in the Senate Chamber on January 15, 2019.
Shannon DeCelle

New York’s Republican Party is reduced to hoping Democrats screw up so badly that voters give the GOP another try.

Democrats gained a hefty 40-23 advantage in the state Senate last year. And if they keep control for the redistricting after the 2020 census, gerrymandering could well lock the GOP out for a decade.

Meanwhile, most big donors — the business community, especially real estate — feel compelled to “pay rent” to those in power, paying heavily for a hope of seeing their interests acknowledged.

The opposition still matters in both chambers — pointing out flaws in bills, offering common-sense ideas, bolstering the spines of beleagured Democratic moderates and so on. But it’s depressing work, prompting a wave of retirements among the remaining GOP senators — making it tougher for the party to even keep the seats it still has.

But this means much-needed fresh blood, and officeholders committed to principle, rather than power, pork and perks.

But ascendant progressives are wreaking disaster. Their insistence on emptying prisons and jails, no matter the risks to public safety, is boosting crime all across the state. And their obsession with “taxing the rich” is a growing drag on a once-vibrant economy.

It’s the GOP’s job now to be ready to step up when voters realize it’s time to change.