does not draw its funding from the population core downstate. Republicans have traditionally controlled the State Senate by virtue of holding most seats upstate, even if the state as a whole swung Democratic. However, the leadership has often been split between upstate senators, such as Joseph Bruno, and Long Islanders such as the former majority leader, Dean Skelos. The 2008 State Senate elections shifted political power in the chamber from the upstate-heavy Republicans to the New York City-centered Democrats. However, as evidence of continued Republican strength in the upstate, the Democrats won all but three seats in New York City but only five seats north of Westchester County. Skelos, a Long Island native, hatched a plan to lure four conservative New York City Democrats (known collectively as the "Gang of Four") to vote for Skelos as leader of the Senate in exchange for committee assignments, but the move backfired since the Democrats in question got the committee assignments ahead of the upstate senators who were expected to get them, but they turned and announced their support for Senate Democratic leader Malcolm Smith, as part of a deal that had been ironically hatched by upstate politicians Steven Pigeon and Tom Golisano. As a result, several State Senate Republicans have considered reaching out to the five upstate Democrats, compared to 27 downstate Democrats, in the chamber to form a coalition, including the Buffalo Democrat William Stachowski, who would have earned a powerful committee leadership position had it not been for the Gang of Four deal. Stachowski and the others have so far rebuffed any suggestions they would break ranks. In an effort to retain the upstate Democrats, Smith nominated Syracuse Senator David Valesky as his second-in-command. Upstate Democrats such as Valesky, Stachowski, and Darrel Aubertine often face significant pressure from constituents and other upstate lawmakers to hold more conservative positions than their downstate counterparts. In the congressional elections of 2006 and 2008, many upstate seats that had been historically held by Republicans came under serious challenge by Democratic contenders, and some (such as the 20th, 24th, and 29th districts) were lost to Democrats even with Republican voter enrollment advantages remaining in place. The seats went back to the Republicans in 2010. Slow population growth in the 1990s led legislators to eliminate two upstate House districts in the 2002 reapportionment and to leave all downstate districts alone, and so the influence of upstate