Mayor de Blasio made excuses Sunday for being almost 1,000-miles away as 73,000 New Yorkers went without power on Saturday night.
As a 60-block swath of Manhattan suffered a five-hour blackout — with many trapped in elevators or subways, and even Times Squares’ famous billboards blank — Hizzoner was in an auto workers’ union hall in Waterloo, Iowa, in the latest stop of his presidential campaign.
While the mayor was only able to tweet about the scare, he insisted Sunday on CNN that he still had “the hand on the wheel” thanks to “top officials” still in the city while he was so far away.
“I am responsible for making sure everything in New York City is handled and handled well,” he told the news network, insisting all the necessary info got out to those who needed it.
His absence had not gone unnoticed — with many praising City Council Speaker Corey Johnson for stepping in like a de facto mayor.
“Mayor Corey Johnson has done a bang-up job during the last five hours. We have no idea what that random guy in Iowa is doing but good luck to him,” tweeted Nicole Gelinas of the Manhattan Institute.
De Blasio promised a full review of the blackout which struck on the 42nd anniversary and nearly to the hour of the 1977 one.
“We haven’t had many instances like this in many years,” he said, praising the “great job” by first responders.
“We’re going to look at this very carefully and review what happened,” he told CNN.