Yesterday's Daily News reported: “City Councilman Domenic Recchia is dropping his bid for Brooklyn Borough President ... and Recchia (D-Coney Island) now plans to challenge embattled Republican Rep. Michael Grimm....”
Among other matters related to the race for Brooklyn Borough President, The Daily News report described the source of their information that Councilman Recchia is again considering the Grimm seat as, friends close to Mr. Recchia. It goes on to recount how Dominic Recchia had considered running against the Congressman Grimm, the Staten Island Republican last year. According to the News account, even though Grimm had defeated his Democratic challenger, Mark Murphy, 53 percent to 46 percent in November 2012, the former Marine, FBI agent and businessman still appears to be vulnerable, because he's still being investigated by the feds and a House Ethics panel for problematic fund-raising activities connected with his first campaign.
Recchia, a successful private sector lawyer, did not personally discuss his latest political move or any of his plans for the 2014 race; and his spokeswoman, Ashleigh Owens said, “The decision to run for office is not one to be taken lightly.... Council Member Recchia has been consulting with his family, friends, colleagues, staff, and constituents regarding his plans and will make an announcement soon”
(See The Daily News – Brooklyn, “Exclusive: City lawmaker Domenic Recchia drops Brooklyn Beep run ...” by Reuven Blau, 1/28/13 [http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/brooklyn/domenic-recchia-drops-brooklyn-beep-bid-paving-outspoken-state-lawmaker-eric-adams-article-1.1249817#ixzz2JNtEKDtd]). In any case, the News ran with the story.
However, in a short comment linking to the News’ article in his “Morning Read” column today, Colin Campbell specifically mentioned that – even though “...Mr. Recchia’s interest now lies in a congressional race against GOP Congressman Michael Grimm. Of course, former Rep. Mike McMahon, a Democrat, has expressed his own strong interest in the race, creating potential primary drama should Mr. Recchia push forward” ( “Morning Read: ‘I Vant to Have Your Vote’” by Colin Campbell, 1/29/13, Politicker [http://politicker.com/2013/01/morning-read-i-vant-to-have-your-vote/]).
When both a senior, but still up and coming, Brooklyn Councilman, Recchia and the former Congressman from the district, McMahon, are expressing interest in a contested congressional seat in a swing district more than a year and a half before election day, it means that the Democratic operatives in Washington are working hard to get a top candidate into the race against Grimm.
A tougher race for Grimm will mean tougher races for the down-ticket GOP-Conservative candidates for the State Senate and Assembly in parts of Brooklyn and all of Staten Island..
ReplyDeleteUPDATE: I could be wrong, but....
I somehow think that Gatemouth doesn't think this is the best play for Councilman Recchia (see "Coronation Coronary" posted by Gatemouth, 1/28/13 [http://www.r8ny.com/blog/gatemouth/coronation_coronary.html])
....and then there's the whole Eric Adams thing. It looks like it ruined the Gateman's day.
Dom Recchia will definitely not appeal to the voters of Staten Island who are all homeowners, because he raised our property taxes 18.5% in 2002. That was the reason most of us dumped McMahon for Grimm in 2010 when we learned he did the same in the City Council. If anything, he will be a drag on the Democratic ticket on Staten Island.
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