The mainstream New York press calls him a “rogue,” the defiant Democrat who caucuses with the Republicans in the New York Senate, putting his constituents’ needs ahead of those of his party. More locally, he’s the back-of-the-shul guy who gets things done, ensuring funding for schools and patching up roadways. Simcha Felder says his order of priorities is clear: “To G-d, to my wife, to my constituents” Photos Jeff Zorabedian, Personal archives

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he Beis Aharon Shul on Boro Park’s 18th Avenue feels well-worn, the carpet faded from tens of thousands of heavy footsteps over the years, a slight smell of burnt kugel and soap and prayer.

The sort of shul that has a “someone,” not the rav and not the gabbai, but that guy who fuels the whole operation, who makes sure there are tissues on the tables and the air-conditioning is working, and there are paper towels for the men when they fall Korim.

That someone looks just as you might imagine him: middle-aged, his shirt a bit creased, his smile slightly bent, a quirky sense of humor. He’s the type of guy who makes sure everyone has a seudah after davening on Shabbos, that the siddurim are put back on the shelves, who asks people at Shabbos Minchah if they had a good nap, who buys aliyos for people — and pays — even though he’s the previous rav’s son and the shul has no rabbi since the old rav passed away and he can do whatever he wants.

At Beis Aharon, the back-of-the-shul man certainly looks nothing like a “rogue” — the word used most often to describe Simcha Felder, the New York State senator who has thrown a wrench into party politics by caucusing with the Republicans even though he ran as a Democrat.

My first meeting with Felder takes place 160 miles away from Boro Park, in Albany, after the six thirty Shacharis minyan at Beth Abraham Jacob, the small shul adjoining Albany’s JCC, where the senator, one of the younger members of the minyan, is a perpetual golel, rolling up the Torah on Mondays and Thursdays.

“My good friend, the tzaddik Mike Simanowitz, would do hagbah,” Felder says, referring to the Democratic assemblyman from Queens who passed away last year at the age of 45. “I miss him dearly.”

Using the skills honed over a lifetime at the shul on Brooklyn’s 18th Avenue, Senator Felder jokes with the regulars — teases one about having already eaten breakfast, smiles tolerantly as an old man, in a gray Kangol cap pulled low, shares a joke about politicians.

And then he’s off to work.

Albany is a strange city, a hodgepodge of small-town America, where white clapboard colonials, crumbling row-houses, and low-slung Holiday Inns contrast with massive, gleaming high-rises downtown, as if to remind you that this is the capital of a major state.

Business in Albany is also sort of bizarre. It lacks the officialdom of Washington and the glamour of Lower Manhattan, but it’s where most of the major legislation affecting New Yorkers — like funding for social service organizations and transit and roadways — gets done.

Like the city itself, it’s obscure and can be hard to navigate, but Simcha Felder has it figured out.

“There isn’t much else to do in Albany, right?” he says, smiling and stepping outside of the shul and into the parking lot with newbie Assemblyman Dan Rosenthal, the Democrat who took Simanowitz’s place in the Assembly. In fact, Felder and Rosenthal go to work together each morning — brothers across the aisle, brothers in prayer.

Fight the Good Fight It would be hard to place the man running for reelection in Brooklyn’s 17th district into any sort of box. The Democrats, who have pitted self-described progressive Blake Morris against him in the September 13 primary, like to say he’s been unfaithful to the party, but Felder likes to say he’s very loyal — “To G-d, to my wife, to my constituents.” His voter outreach is based on experience, on trust, on the premise that people will appreciate that he’s free to vote according to his conscience.

Because most of his voters share his value system.

Simcha Felder represents a “super-district” with a high percentage of Orthodox Jews. What he’s done is leverage their support, combining it with his own thick skin and political smarts, and made himself and, by extension, his constituents, relevant.

But even a super-district presents challenges. For a secular pundit, an Orthodox district like the 17th looks like a shoo-in for a chareidi politician. But those on the inside know differently. Within the Orthodox community there are competing views on the role of a frum lawmaker.

Felder laughs at the mainstream assessment and shares an early piece of advice.

“When I was young, I was still working for Assemblyman Dov Hikind as chief of staff, and there was a vacant seat on the New York City Council. Dov felt that, since it had been vacated by a frum politician, it would be a loss if our community didn’t put someone forward, and he thought I could win. I asked the Stoliner Rebbe for advice, and the Rebbe gave me several conditions. One of the things he said was, ‘You’re not running for prime minister of Israel.’

“I think what the Rebbe meant was: Be focused and diligent, do your job well, and be an ambassador that way. Stay on message and alert. Make sure they don’t touch yeshivos, and that people don’t think abortion is normal. Fight the fight you were sent there for.”

“If you do that,” Felder says, shrugging, “then everyone will appreciate you. Stay focused on what is your job, and you’ll know what isn’t.”

There’s something he doesn’t tell me, but I’ve heard it through the grapevine: When a Jewish activist came into a very public role, he had a list of complaints, grievances against different individuals and organizations in the community who were less helpful than he would have liked.

Simcha called him in for a shmuess. “Listen,” he told the man, “none of this is personal. Don’t get carried away. It’s a job like any other. Work hard and keep your nose to the grindstone and never, ever keep cheshbonos.”

(Excerpted from Mishpacha, Issue 725)