At a packed grand opening on December 4 in Sheepshead Bay, former Councilman Ari Kagan and GOP leaders pitch a multi-ethnic, “open door” Republican movement.
A new Republican clubhouse has joined the Brooklyn political map. On December 4, 2025, the Community First Republican Club held its grand opening at 2101 East 16th Street, 2nd floor, near Avenue U in Southern Brooklyn, drawing a standing-room crowd of local voters, activists and elected officials. Online listings billed the evening as a two-hour reception with greetings from GOP officials, networking and refreshments, including kosher food.
Club president Ari Kagan, a former New York City councilman, opened the event by explaining why the new organization carries the name Community First. “People ask me, why did you decide to name it Community First?” he told the room.
“I believe it should be the priority for every elected official, for every party leader, for every American, for every New Yorker to put community first – to support our local communities, to make sure that we have a good quality of life.”
He stressed that the club plans to work with “all other clubs, not just in Brooklyn but beyond,” and even offer associate memberships to “common sense Democrats” willing to cooperate on public safety, taxes and quality-of-life issues.
The night doubled as a show of Republican unity in a borough where the party has quietly expanded its footprint over the past decade. Newly elected Kings County Republican chairman Liam McCabe – introduced by Kagan as an EMS worker “saving lives” by day – praised both the turnout and the club’s name.
“Community First is a perfect name for Ari Kagan,” McCabe said, recalling years when the two worked as staffers solving neighborhood problems from opposite parties. “There’s no Republican or Democratic way to pick up the garbage – and that’s really the truth… So it’s a perfect name for this club and for you to be the president of it.”
McCabe framed the club as part of a broader effort to reconnect the GOP with everyday neighborhood concerns rather than abstract ideological fights. His remarks echoed social media posts from party activists who described the opening as “crowded, crowded” and celebrated the launch as a sign of “growing energy” among Southern Brooklyn Republicans.
Former Brooklyn GOP chairman Richard Barsamian (introduced by Kagan as the man who “carried the Republican torch in Brooklyn for some difficult years”) used his speech to send a message of internal unity and outward outreach. He stressed that he and McCabe are “unified in delivering success after success” and insisted, “We are not interested in attacking Democrats. We are not interested in negativity. What we are interested in is the future of New York City… for all those who follow the law, who have love in their heart, whether they are Christians, Muslims, or Jews. They are New Yorkers and they are Americans.” Barsamian said the “R” in Republican should also stand for “responsible,” urging activists to “fight” for their neighborhoods while rejecting hatred and division.
The club’s political mission was spelled out most clearly when Kagan ran through the 2026 election calendar – from governor and statewide offices to the State Assembly and Senate – and urged members to back GOP candidates on a platform of “strong national security, public safety, low taxes, legal immigration and sanity of life.”
He reminded the audience that just 20 or 30 years ago, “everybody would say, Republican? No, no, not a chance,” but noted that today Brooklyn has “many, many Republican elected officials – and more to come.” That message was reinforced by the lineup in the room: Assemblymembers Michael Novakhov, Alec Brook-Krasny, Lester Chang and others were repeatedly name-checked as examples of a new GOP presence in heavily Democratic New York City.
When his turn came to speak, Assemblymember Michael Novakhov described what he called a “Republican movement” taking shape in Brooklyn. He pointed to the diverse crowd – Pakistani community members, Chinese Americans gathered in a Chinese adult day care center, Russian-speaking Brooklynites and longtime locals – as proof that the party is becoming “a party of the people” in neighborhoods that feel things have gone “really, really wrong” in recent years.
Clubs like Community First, he argued, do more than host meetings: they recruit candidates, knock on doors and help Republicans survive in a deep-blue city. “It’s very tough to be a Republican in a blue state… extremely tough,” Novakhov said, but insisted that more clubs mean more recruits, more volunteers and, ultimately, more elected officials.
The grand opening also highlighted the club’s recent community-service work. In the weeks leading up to December 4, members of the new organization joined a Thanksgiving turkey giveaway that distributed around 180 turkeys to nonprofits and families across Southern Brooklyn – a story that featured prominently in the club’s early social media presence and in posts by local elected officials.
That outreach fits Kagan’s repeated refrain that the Republican Party must be “on the ground, talking to people, listening to communities,” not “living somewhere in the air.”
On its official channels, the Community First Republican Club says it intends to “support Republican candidates and advocate for Southern Brooklyn communities”, positioning itself as both a campaign hub and a neighborhood problem-solving center.
After its debut night, organizers signaled that the club will continue regular meetings, voter-registration drives and candidate events at its East 16th Street address – with the explicit goal, as Novakhov put it, of electing “more and more Republican officials in the great city of New York and the great borough of Brooklyn.”