By Ali Gharib

With voters trickling into polling stations in the 29th Council District, the expected low turnout could prove a boon to the Democratic primary campaign of late-coming dark horse Albert Cohen.

The Forest Hills-based lawyer is hoping to mobilize his Bukharian Jewish community to drive his tallies beyond his five rivals.

“It’s dead, which is actually in my favor,” said Cohen, walking up to one of his campaign workers standing idly on an empty street corner outside Public School 175 in Forest Hills “The less people show up, the better my chances.”

That’s because Cohen focused great effort on registering and mobilizing the roughly 30,000 Bukharians in the district, about one-tenth of the group’s worldwide population. In the course of this campaign, Cohen’s team signed up about 3,500 new voters.

Bukharians are a group of Central Asian Jews who immigrated to Queens after the fall of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. Most remained politically dormant since arriving here, and even this new involvement has not come easily.

Aron Aronov, director of the Bukharian Jewish Museum in Rego Park, explained that Bukharians feel hesitant to enter politics after experiencing political oppression in the Soviet Union.

“In the Soviet Union, the politics was like traveling in space,” said Aronov, alluding to the alienating repression.

Apathy reigns, too. Some of the Bukharians randomly asked about voting said that they hadn’t signed up.

“No, I’m not interested in this thing,” said Ariel, a Bukharian who declined to reveal his last name and avoided eye contact from beneath a brimmed hat.

Then there were those who, despite the best efforts of organizers, didn’t understand that they had to denote party affiliation 25 days ahead of the primary. The Queens contests are closed, meaning only those registered to a party can vote in its primary.

“For them, it’s like, ‘I’m a citizen. I should be able to vote for the person I want to vote for,’” said Lilianna Zulunova, Cohen’s campaign manager. “They don’t understand that if you’re a Republican, you can’t vote in a [Democratic] primary election.”

But these weren’t the only glitches in Cohen’s drive to enlist supporters.

A report in the New York Post today insinuated that Cohen’s team had boosted registration numbers with incomplete forms and the inclusion of at least two dead people.

Zulunova, who, according to the Post, handed in the faulty forms, denied any wrongdoing. She maintained that nearly every one had valid phone numbers on them – an integral part of verifying new voters’ identities.

Despite the problems, the room was buzzing today at Cohen’s campaign headquarters on 108th Street. People rushed back and forth directing drivers to take walk-in voters who needed to locate and get to their polling sites.

If they weren’t yet registered, volunteers and campaign staff handed out sign-up materials in preparation for November’s general election.

“I just registered 50 people,” Zulunova said proudly at around 2 p.m.

“And they were all alive, right?” joked Alberto Torres, a general practice lawyer from the Bronx who has volunteered for Cohen’s campaign.

“Yeah! I don’t need to register dead people,” said Zulunova with a broad smile.

Even Cohen’s elderly mother worked the phones, giving instructions in Russian on how and where to vote. Nearly everyone in the headquarters spoke to each other in quick-tongued Russian, which, along with Bokhari – a mixture of Farsi, Tajik, Uzbek and sprinklings of Hebrew – is the lingua franca of the community.

The use of language served Cohen well. He has gotten ringing endorsements from New York’s only Russian-speaking assemblyperson, Alec Brook-Krasny, and virtually every Russian-language paper in the city.

Cohen also garnered support from other immigrant groups that he has pledged to defend. He received the backing of several South Asian communities, and of a Sikh newspaper, Shree-e-Panjab.

But victory is not certain. Cohen faces stiff opposition in the primary from more experienced political figures. These include Deputy Borough President Karen Koslowitz, who is backed by the county Democratic machine; party activist Lynn Shulman; former assemblyperson Michael Cohen; local activist Heidi Chain; and the savvy 27-year-old political upstart Mel Gagarin, who posted slick ads on YouTube.

But in contrast to other candidates, it appeared that Albert Cohen assembled the most vibrant grassroots operation of the day.

At Forest Hills High School, his alma mater, Albert Cohen marshaled Bukharian volunteers to patrol all entrances. His opponent Michael Cohen sat alone in a folding metal chair holding flyers for passersby.

“Absolutely,” replied Michael Cohen, when asked if he was concerned about Albert Cohen’s ability to rally his community.