One of the Few Elected Black Republicans Loses Hempstead Election

The sound should be louder when a giant falls, but it seemed quiet Wednesday around Hempstead, the state's largest village, a day after Republican Mayor James Garner was defeated by trustee Wayne Hall in his bid for a fifth four-year term. Garner, 59, at 6'5" and more than 300 pounds, casts a big shadow politically as well as physically in the village. He was the first African-American ever elected mayor on Long Island and, after ending his one-year term last year as president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, he was one of black Republicanism's few faces nationally. Tuesday's loss was Garner's second since November, when he failed in a bid to unseat Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (D-Mineola) in Congress.  [more]