Mayor owes $250G to city lobbying firm
ACTRESS ALYSSA Milano joined New York pols Monday to push for an amendment to the constitution to guarantee equal rights for women.
The “Charmed” star and Rep. Carolyn Maloney rallied at Wall Street’s “Fearless Girl” statue to say the equal rights amendment, introduced decades ago, should finally be ratified.
“I am here today because women are not guaranteed equal justice under the law of our Constitution,” Milano said.
Illinois last week became the 37th state to ratify the ERA, which would guarantee equal treatment under the law for both genders — leaving it one short of the 38 states necessary to add it to the Constitution.
But the deadline for ratification passed in 1982, meaning ratifying the amendment would require another vote of Congress to change the deadline. That’s unlikely in the current Republican-controlled Congress.
Maloney (D-N.Y.) has introduced the amendment in Congress 11 times, but it has never received a committee hearing. MAYOR de Blasio owes a law firm that also lobbies the city at least $250,000, according to new financial disclosure filings.
A spokesman for de Blasio, Eric Phillips, said the debt, listed on de Blasio’s Conflicts of Interest Board financial disclosure, is about $300,000 for the firm Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel LLP’s work representing de Blasio in investigations related to his political dealings.
That’s on top of the $2.6 million the taxpayers paid to the law firm earlier this year to cover legal expenses related to de Blasio’s government conduct. But de Blasio — who initially pledged not to use city funds to pay any of his legal bills but reversed course after a Conflicts of Interest Board ruling severely limited his ability to raise money with a legal defense fund — can’t use city money to pay off the portion of his debt related to campaign activities.
Phillips said there were no terms on the debt, nor is there interest collected.
“It’s not uncommon for people to need some time to pay off such a bill for legal compliance,” Phillips said, insisting, “Kramer Levin gets no special treatment and the bill will be paid in full.”