The city’s sergeants union want Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis as their next mayor.
Ed Mullins, president of the Sergeants Benevolent Association, stood next to Malliotakis during a Tuesday morning breakfast at Antun’s in Queens Village for her first union endorsement.
“On behalf of, I’d like to say all members of the NYPD, because I know what they feel, particularly the members of the Sergeants Benevolent Association, we are endorsing (her) for the next mayor of The City New York. We could not be happier to see (this as) the outcome of this election,” he said to claps from the room.
Mullins said men and women in uniform can’t forget that the mayor marched in the Puerto Rican Day Parade, not far from former FALN leader Oscar Lopez Rivera.
NYPD cops hold a particular grudge against Lopez Rivera and his group for the 1975 bombing at Fraunces Tavern in lower Manhattan that killed four people and injured dozens. No one has ever been charged with the blast.
Lopez Rivera was convicted of sedition and other charges in 1981, and sentenced to 55 years in prison. His sentence was commuted by then-President Barack Obama in the final days of his administration.
“What they feel, in what’s occurring in the climate that exists, supporting terrorists. You can’t say you don’t support them I’m still marching the same parade. You can’t hide that and deny what occurs,” he said. “Every time I open a newspaper, there are questions about the integrity that exists in City Hall, federal investigations, pay to play. We all know that the US Attorney’s Office had a case. No one talks about it.”
Mullins relationship with de Blasio has been strained from nearly the start – he once called de Blasio a “nincompoop” and has ripped him over everything from his support of protesters to his recent trip to Germany after the murder of a police officer. He frequently criticizes de Blasio on the radio or television, and some in the de Blasio administration were not shy about hitting back – former Police Commissioner Bill Bratton dubbed him “Crazy Eddie” and the union leader called for the top cop to quit his job.
De Blasio’s Republican challenger was grateful for the union’s support.
“We need to change the conversation that we are having here in the city of New York. I feel very encouraged by today’s endorsement. I feel very confident, very confident that we are going to win this election. It is because of the people in this room. It is because of the people across the five boroughs who has had enough of a mayor who has an ‘I don’t care attitude,'” Malliotakis said. “He’s not serious about doing the job he was elected to do.”
She told the law enforcement crowd that their jobs are difficult enough fighting crime, “Now you have to be social workers.”
Mullins also said members of the NYPD have their hands full fighting terrorism and everyday crime.
“Those statistics say the crime is down. When we talk to the people in the streets of the city of New York they don’t feel safe,” he said.
With Jillian Jorgensen
