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Aubertine Upsets Barclay to Win Special Election

SYRACUSE, N.Y. (AP) - Democrat Assemblyman Darrel Aubertine upsets Republican Will Barclay in a special election for the state Senate's 48th district.

The win moves the Democrats a step closer to controlling the Senate.

With 100% of the precincts reporting:
Darrel Aubertine.......... 27,901 52%
William Barclay.............25,345 48%
The Associated Press is calling the race for Aubertine.

Results by county

Oswego County:
Darrel Aubertine(D).........................7,819
William Barclay(R)..........................13,546

Jefferson County:
Darrel Aubertine(D).........................13,580
William Barclay(R)..........................7,715

Saint Lawrence County:
Darrel Aubertine(D).........................6,502
William Barclay(R)..........................4,084

Aubertine, a dairy farmer from Cape Vincent, was first elected to the 118th Assembly District in 2002. Barclay was elected the same year in the adjacent 124th Assembly District. His father, H. Douglas Barclay, served in the New York Senate from 1965 to 1984.

The two men were seeking to replace Republican Sen. Jim Wright, who retired in January after 15 years to take a consulting job.

Click the link to see Chad Newton's live report. FROM EARLIER:

SYRACUSE, N.Y. (AP) - The ballot in Tuesday's special election for the state Senate's 48th District carries the names of Democrat Darrel Aubertine and Republican Will Barclay but the race is just as much a face-off between Gov. Eliot Spitzer and Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno. Aubertine is a dairy farmer from Cape Vincent, first elected to the 118th Assembly in 2002. Barclay was elected the same year in the adjacent 124th Assembly district. His father, H. Douglas Barclay, served in the New York Senate from 1965 to 1984. In a race that grew nasty, the two men sought to replace Republican Sen. Jim Wright, who retired in January after 15 years to take a consulting job. Wright's departure left the Republicans with a 32-29 edge in the Senate, where they have held power since the mid-1960s. It's a margin of control that has been eroding steadily over the past decade. A loss here, where Republicans usually win, carries an ominous overtone for Bruno and the GOP, who face yielding total control of state government to the Democrats, already in command of the Assembly and the governor's mansion. Spitzer made it clear early in his term that we wanted a Democratically controlled Senate and he worked to win a special election last year on Long Island. Polls and political observers described the race as virtually dead even going into Tuesday's vote. Each candidate will likely spend more than $1.3 million on the campaign, which barely lasted six weeks, making it the second most expensive Senate election in state history. Most of the money came from the state parties or the party leadership - only about 1 percent of each candidates' total contributions have come from inside the district. The candidates spent most of that money on negative television ads attacking each other both politically and personally. Meanwhile, both the Republican and Democratic leadership have loaned key political operatives to the campaigns. No Democrat has held the North Country seat for at least a century and enrollment would appear to favor Barclay - 78,454 Republicans to 46,824 Democrats but there are also 35,000 independent voters. But Aubertine is a Democrat who has been elected three times in his district, a traditionally Republican territory. Polls showed him with a strong lead in his home turf of Jefferson and St. Lawrence counties. The two candidates took each other to court over who would get the Independence Party line. A judge initially ruled the line would be left blank but the state Court of Appeals on Monday awarded the line to Barclay. A snowstorm forecast for Tuesday also could keep away all but the most passionate voters.

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