Division problem
Dem mainliner blamed for splitting own party to keep power
ALBANY — A top aide to Gov. Cuomo says reunifying the fractured state Senate Democrats will be almost impossible as long as Sen. Michael Gianaris remains in a top leadership role for the mainline Dems.
The personal animosity between Gianaris (inset left) and Bronx Sen. Jeffrey Klein (inset right), who heads up a group of eight breakaway Senate Democrats aligned in a leadership coalition with the Republicans, is the single biggest roadblock for Dem control of the chamber, the Cuomo official said.
The Cuomo aide accused Gianaris, of Queens, of trying behind the scenes to torpedo any deal because he’d rather be deputy leader in the minority than lose influence if the Dems are in the majority.
“This is the oldest story in the book — it’s power, who gets it and who loses it,” the aide said. “When Jeff Klein rejoins the Democrats, Mike Gianaris gets displaced, and therefore he is working to further the divide.”
To break the stalemate, the Cuomo official said, the governor has gone “so far as to offer Mike a job in the administration or offer to support him to run for Queens County (district attorney) down the road.”
The official said Gianaris declined the job offer and Queens party leaders weren’t open to running Gianaris should the district attorney position open.
“As long as this tension exists, it’s nearly impossible to bring these two sides together,” the aide said.
Cuomo’s secretary to the governor, Melissa DeRosa, said Cuomo fully supports mainline Democratic leader Sen. Andrea StewartCousins and Democratic unification, but both sides “have to stop talking and come together.”
“The governor is working very hard again to end the personal agendas and infighting that is causing the divide and unify the factions, which is more important than ever when our democratic values are under attack by the Trump administration,” DeRosa said.
But a mainline Senate Democratic source accused Cuomo of “making up stories to mask his true agenda of divided government.”
“Everyone knows the single biggest impediment to a Democratic Senate is Andrew Cuomo,” he said. “This is a man who endorsed Republican Senate candidates, bragged to the Republican conference about how little he’s done to help his own party and continues to place false obstacles in the path of unification.” Senate Democrats after a special election in November are expected to be back at 32 members, enough for a majority. But the party does not control the chamber because of Klein’s Independent Democratic Conference with the Republicans and the fact a ninth Dem, Brooklyn Sen. Simcha Felder, caucuses with the GOP. The issue, if not resolved, threatens Cuomo if he is challenged in a Democratic primary next year or seeks to run for President in 2020, political experts say. Cuomo recently met with the Senate Dems to discuss the matter, sat down with Klein and Stewart-Cousins, and encouraged union allies of both sides to help work toward a reconciliation, his aide said.
Klein under any deal would have to be co-president of the chamber with Stewart-Cousins.
“Since 2014, the governor has spent time, energy and political capital to bring about a Democratic majority,” Klein said. “The reason it has not happened is because of the political grandstanding coming out of the Democratic conference.”
Stewart-Cousins, looking to become the Senate’s first black female majority leader, defended Gianaris and said she will not be bullied into making a change no other leader is being asked to as part of “some high school drama.”
“For some reason, whenever the question of myself or the Democrats are talked about having their rightful position, another unreasonable barrier is created,” she said.