Jack Martins won’t be going back to Albany.
The Republican state senator from Old Westbury announced Sunday, April 12, that he’s declining to seek re-election to the 7th State Senate District, a move that caught many Nassau County Republicans flat-footed just days after he passed on accepting his party’s nomination on the final day allowed under state election rules.
Martins is 58 and has been around Nassau County politics long enough that his exits and entrances are never simple. He was mayor of Mineola from 2004 to 2010, won the 7th District Senate seat in 2011, held it until 2016, lost a congressional race that year to then-Rep. Tom Suozzi, lost a Nassau County executive bid in 2017, then clawed his way back to the Senate in 2022 after Democrat Anna Kaplan held the seat for four years. A career of hard-fought inches, not clean sweeps.
“Serving the people of the 7th Senate District has been the honor of a lifetime,” Martins said in his statement. “While I will no longer be your senator at the end of this term, the work ahead for our state remains clear.”
Clear, maybe. But who carries it forward for Republicans is anything but. Party officials hadn’t named a replacement candidate as of this writing. Efforts to reach Nassau County Republican Committee Chairman Joseph Cairo were unavailing, according to Long Island Press, which first reported the announcement.
Not ideal timing.
The 7th Senate District runs across North Hempstead and includes Port Washington, Great Neck, Manhasset, Roslyn, Old Westbury, and parts of both Hempstead and Oyster Bay. It’s genuinely competitive, the kind of seat that changes hands whenever the political wind shifts. Republican Elaine Phillips held it from 2017 to 2018. Kaplan flipped it in 2019. Martins won it back in 2022. That’s three different occupants in about a dozen years.
On the Democratic side, Rory Lancman has already emerged as a candidate. That name won’t mean much to most Nassau readers, but it signals the party is ready to make a run at this seat. Without a named Republican in the race, Democrats have a head start.
Martins had indicated earlier this year that he planned to run again. This reversal, then, is a real shift, not a long-anticipated retirement. He currently works as a non-equity partner at a Uniondale law firm. His statement touched on the affordability concerns that have defined Long Island politics for a generation.
“Addressing affordability and ensuring that Long Island remains a place where families choose to stay must continue to be our top priority,” he said.
Hard to argue with that. Property taxes in Nassau County rank among the highest in the country, and residents of the 7th District know what it costs to stay here. Whether the next senator does anything about it is another matter entirely.
Martins isn’t the only Republican stepping back in Nassau. State Assembly Member Daniel Norber announced in February that he won’t seek a second term in the 16th Assembly District. Norber’s single term followed a party switch that drew considerable attention. Before him, former John A. DeGrace had been selected by Nassau County Republican leaders to challenge Democratic Rep. Laura Gillen for Congress, then formally withdrew from the June 23 primary ballot. Party leadership is now designating a replacement candidate under state election rules.
So in a relatively short stretch, Nassau Republicans have lost or ceded a Senate seat candidate, an Assembly incumbent, and a congressional hopeful. That’s a lot of holes to fill.
In a previous statement to Schneps Media, Cairo had struck a confident tone. “The Nassau County Republican Committee is energized to continue the Red Wave that has swept across Nassau County, nominating a team of candidates that will fight the Hochul/Mamdani agenda of high taxes and crime,” he said.
Energized is a word politicians use when the situation requires it. Whether the committee can translate that energy into a credible candidate for the 7th District before the clock runs out is the actual question.
The Nassau County Board of Elections will tell you the mechanics. The party still has options under state rules to designate a candidate outside the primary process. But designated candidates start late, raise money late, and build name recognition even later.
Martins spent years building his in that district. Whoever comes next starts from scratch.