Jimmy Mack, Southampton Town Trustees President, on Historic Reelection and the Blue Wave

Fresh off his reelection, Southampton Town Trustees President Jimmy Mack talks to Spark about the blue wave, Chris Gallant’s close congressional race and the life beyond politics that shaped him.

Jimmy Mack made history in 2025 when he became the first openly gay member of the Southampton Town Trustees in its 340-year history. On Tuesday, Mack, president of the Southampton Town Trustees, had another reason to celebrate: He won reelection with 16,701 votes, the highest total in the race, as all five Democratic incumbents secured another term.

Mack and fellow Democrats Hannah Pell-O’Farrell, Sara Topping, Joseph McLoughlin and Matthew Parsons first swept the board in 2025. Because of a change in New York’s election calendar, they had to return to the ballot just one year later. This time, they won two-year terms.

It was a strong election night for local Democrats, including Southampton Town Supervisor Maria Moore and state Assemblyman Tommy John Schiavoni.

But there was one disappointment for Mack: the narrow defeat of congressional candidate Chris Gallant by Republican incumbent Nick LaLota. LaLota led Gallant by 6,677 votes, 152,546 to 145,869, according to election results that remain unofficial as of this writing. Gallant conceded Wednesday afternoon.

“I wanted him to win so bad. It just broke my heart,” Mack told Spark Hamptons.

Raised in the Westhampton Beach area, Mack grew up in Quiogue before moving to Seafield Lane in Westhampton Beach at 15. He now lives in Southampton’s North Sea community with his husband, Brian Mott. A longtime volunteer EMT and environmental advocate, Mack has a personal history that includes overcoming addiction and living with HIV for nearly four decades. His experiences have shaped a deep commitment to public service.

Jimmy Mack: The Spark Hamptons Q&A

Congratulations on your reelection. What was your mood going into election night?

Oh, I knew we would win. I mean, last year was historic because not only was I the first openly gay person, but it was the first time in the 340-year history of the trustees that they ever had a Democratic majority, much less all five of us. It’s just never happened. It’s always been a Republican stronghold, always.

What do you think accounted for the Democrats’ historic victory in 2025?

Trump. I mean, we (the Southampton Trustees) were the beginning of the blue tsunami last year. We were at the beginning of it because of the odd year.

We were two women, one handicapped person, one marine biologist, and myself, a gay man. So we were, to begin with, very different, and we ran last year against — guess what — five straight Republican men. This year there were five of us running against just one Republican. Only one of the five Republicans who ran last year, John Carson, ran this year.

We are a very diverse group. And I love that about us.

And the other Southampton Democrats did well on election night.

Very well. I mean, extraordinarily well.

Maria Moore is just a gem to work with. Tommy John has done so much for us.

Bill Pell, I talk to him every day. He was a former trustee and has been so helpful steering us. His daughter is also a trustee, so he is the liaison to the Town Council. We couldn’t have done this without him.

We all won, and we all won big.

Let’s talk about Chris Gallant. You were an early supporter of his campaign.

I was the first top elected official to endorse him. And then I found out, in doing so, that I was the only openly gay elected official, which kind of seems odd.

Do you think the controversy over the photographs that surfaced during Gallant’s campaign ultimately helped or hurt him?

In the end, it helped him. He became an international celebrity and raised a million dollars in two weeks after this happened.

It put him on the map. Everyone was talking about it.

Throughout this whole thing, we have talked almost every other day, at least, if not every day.

Do you think Chris Gallant would run again?

I told him he should now take all the goodwill that he has established, and there’s a lot, and bank on it, and run again in two years, because I don’t think LaLota is going to run again, nor do I think he would win again. It was that close.

And I think Chris Gallant has everything he needs. Like myself, he’s a man of service.

I saw in him what I was like then, because I’ve been doing public service for 30 years ever since I got sober.

And you spent a lot of time campaigning with Chris Gallant.

Looking back on this year, I put more time and effort into his campaign than my own.

We did so many meet-and-greets together, and I took him around Southampton to introduce him to everyone.

I want him to take all that goodwill and capitalize on it and use it and run again and win.

For readers who might not be familiar with the Southampton Town Trustees, explain what you do.

We are entrusted. It is a trust, and what we are stewards of is the 25,000 underwater acres of bay bottoms and pond bottoms and lake bottoms that are collectively owned by the freeholders of the commonalty of Southampton.

We were established by the Dongan Patent in 1686. The governor at the time established the trustees to be stewards of the waterways, and it’s unique and wonderful.

We’re in charge of keeping the waterways clean and the bays safe for shellfish. It’s an amazing job that I absolutely love. And we also are in charge of water access and water rights.

And that’s important not just to the ecosystem but to the whole way of life out here.

The whole way of life, yes. That’s what makes us so distinct, is that we’re keeping intact our natural resources out here, our greatest natural resources, which are our beach access and our beaches and our waterways.

What condition are Southampton’s waterways in now?

We suffer through a lot of harmful algae blooms and stuff like that, and we are also in charge of keeping the shellfish alive.

We’re making a comeback with oysters. Scallops were decimated by a different harmful algae bloom.

And the nitrogen levels, we have to keep that in check with runoff from the roads and sewage out here that gets into the waterways.

That’s why the county’s doing a big push with Southampton Town to get the new septic systems put in that are helping to keep the nitrogen out of our waters, which is what is killing our shellfish.

We’re responsible for opening up the Mecox and the Sagaponack cut, and that is a tradition that goes back not only 340 years but to the Shinnecock Nation.

Are there other things you want to accomplish in your next term as trustee?

My top priority next year is to get us out of the road business.

We don’t have the infrastructure. We don’t have the equipment, and it’s not part of our mission statement unless it is a road that connects to the water.

Last year we spent a couple hundred thousand dollars maintaining them, and they’re not even ours. We’re going to court to figure out who actually owns them.

I would rather spend that couple hundred thousand on our mission statement — access to water and keeping the waterways clean and available to all of my constituents.

I think the money would be much better used.

What made you get involved in running for public office? What prompted it?

I came back here in 1992, got sober and then decided I couldn’t go back to New York City in advertising.

Two years later, I wound up with a job working for the people of Robins Island, and then later Cow Neck Farm.

Louis Bacon, who owns Robins Island, is a big environmentalist, and through working for him directly and seeing what he was doing with the environment and how he was working with the Peconic Land Trust and the Nature Conservancy to buy these large properties and then turn them over to never be developed, I got an interest in that.

He was inspirational in really thinking about conservation and how important it is.

Public service has also been a big part of your life as a volunteer EMT. 

In my very first year as an EMT, 22 years ago, I became EMT of the Year and got an award for running more calls than anyone.

In 2024, I was Suffolk County Healthcare Hero of the Year, and I was also Southampton EMT of the Year. And I was Southampton EMT of the Year in 2025 and several years before that, too.

My father was chief of radiology at Southampton Hospital all his life, but I never got into medicine until I was 47.

If I’m going to do something, it’s going to be at 110%. I’m all in.

And with all the passion I put into becoming EMT of the Year, I’m going to put that into being the best trustee.

I didn’t do it for the money because it doesn’t pay well at all.

You mentioned getting sober in 1992. What was that experience like at Seafield?

Thirty-four years ago, at Seafield. And that’s part of my story.

Going to Seafield in 1992, I went there totally broken, a broken man who was near death and couldn’t stop drinking, who was on Antabuse and still drinking.

And I had a miraculous spiritual awakening. But what I learned there was that if I was going to stay sober, I had to dedicate my life to helping my community, being of service to my community.

And I’ve done that. But I learned that at Seafield, 34 years ago.

I was voted in to become mayor when I was there for my 28 days. Mayor of Seafield. The beginning of my political career.

I went from advertising in the city in the ’80s, which made Mad Men look mild — my drug and alcohol problem was huge — to getting sober and moving back, and taking on a whole new life.

The rehab I went to was a nursing home when I was growing up, and when I was 10, I used to walk there from Quiogue, where I originally grew up, to where my grandfather, who I am named for, went to die of cancer.

And when I went in there in 1992, I went into detox and wound up for the first three days in the room that he died in.

And I always say, he went there to die. I went there to live.

The full circle connection to Seafield

At 15, I moved to Seafield Lane, right down the road. And that’s when my whole drinking and drugging started.

I did that till I was 35, but it got bad in the end, mainly because at 29, I was diagnosed with HIV and told I had a year and a half to live.

And tell that to an alcoholic. I went off the deep end.

How long have you and Brian (Mott) been together?

It’s actually 11/11/11 when we met. So in a week we’ll be together 15 years.

We both have a tattoo.

Your family has been an important part of your life and your work.

I could never have done all of the things I’ve done in sobriety without the support of my incredible husband, and my brother and my sister and my mother.

My mother, Fay, who’s turning 96, has been to every single political event I have been at.

She volunteered to run the Southampton Democratic headquarters the past two years.

My father outed me with my mother in 1980, with love and compassion, and it was one of the highlights of my life.

And they have stood by me ever since.

What does protecting the East End’s natural resources mean to you personally?

I grew up on the water. The house that I grew up in is on a peninsula. It’s surrounded by water. I was a lifeguard. It was my first job. I come from a family of boaters and people who love the water.

I really would love to see the unique character of this community stay the way it is.

People come out here for the water and the beaches, and we’re in charge of keeping them vibrant and alive and clean and pristine.

How exciting could that be? Plus, it’s so much better than legislating.

Southampton Town Trustees: https://southamptontownny.gov/trustees

Jimmy Mack on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jimmymackfortrustee/

Southampton Town Trustees on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/southamptontowntrustees/

Angela LaGreca

Editor, Co-Founder/Publisher

Angela LaGreca, Editor-in-chief and co-Founder/Publisher of Spark Hamptons, is a four-time Emmy Award-winning journalist, producer, writer and comedian/host. Her TV credits include NBC’s “Today,” ABC’s “The View,” and, most recently, the primetime cable news program “Cuomo” on NewsNation. On the East End, she was the Creative Director at LTV, VP Features/Events/Photo Editor at Dan’s Papers, and has performed at Guild Hall, Bay Street Theater and the WHBPAC. Her publishing career began at Modern Photography, where she was managing editor. LaGreca lives in Manhattan and East Hampton and can be reached at angelatvmedia@gmail.com and angela@sparkhamptons.com .