Restaurants want policy payments
understand the desire to protect the rights of voters,” said Commissioner Douglas Kellner. “However, this will place a tremendous burden on the local boards of elections as they are preparing for the November general election and is highly unlikely to change the results in any contest.”
Patel, a plaintiff in the lawsuit that produced Torres’ ruling, is trailing Maloney by about 3,700 votes in an unofficial count.
If the Torres ruling stands, upward of 1,200 mail-in ballots that were tossed in Patel’s race will be readmitted since they were received by June 25 and only lacked postmarks.
Speaking to the Daily News on Tuesday, Patel said he first wants those freshly readmitted votes counted before he considers asking the judge to review even more invalidated ballots. In total, some 12,500 ballots were thrown out in the race.
“We’re going to stay in the fight,” he said. “First, let’s count these ballots, and then we have to still explore why thousands of other ballots are not being counted.”
Maloney, who has declared victory despite the outstanding ballots, accused Patel of giving President Trump ammunition for his unfounded allegations about Democratic voter fraud in November’s election.
“It is regrettable that my former opponent has become President Trump’s mouthpiece in disparaging mail voting by making unsupported claims of many thousands of ballots being invalidated when the true facts show a smaller number that had no effect on the results,” Maloney said in a statement.
In a Zoom call earlier in the day, Remy Green, a civil rights attorney who represented Patel and other plaintiffs on the lawsuit, suggested there may be other primary races in New York that could be flipped because of the Torres ruling.
“We’re aware of a couple of cases where there is a chance,” Green said.
Green didn’t want to name any particular races that could still be in play besides the Maloney-Patel contest. Instead, Green put out a plea on Twitter for concerned candidates to “GET IN TOUCH ASAP.”
A coalition of some of the city’s best-known restaurants gave insurers something to feast on Tuesday: a lawsuit for denials of coverage during the coronavirus pandemic.
The group of roughly 50 restaurants, including Junior’s, Grand Central Oyster Bar, Red Hook Lobster Pound, Blue Smoke and Gramercy Tavern, says insurers denied their coverage under “all risk” commercial property policies. Despite the comprehensive title of the policy, the insurers determined the claims did not result from the “direct physical loss of” or “damage to” insured properties, according to the 148page lawsuit filed in Manhattan Supreme Court.
The restaurants have suffered hundreds of millions in losses due to the pandemic, the suit states.
“These restaurants paid their premiums and believed in good faith that when their businesses were interrupted for situations covered by their insurance policies, they would be made whole. But they weren’t. And that’s not right. We believe they are entitled to the benefit of their bargain,” said attorney Jeremy Creelan.
The restaurants argue they reasonably expected their policies would cover loss of income due to orders from the city and state. Coronavirus restrictions “rendered their properties essentially nonfunctional for months by requiring physical changes and restrictions to their properties,” the suit states.
The lawsuit names more than two dozen insurance companies as defendants. It comes one day after a survey of nearly 500 owners and operators of restaurants and bars found that 83% could not pay full rent in July. The establishments, which are fundamental to city life, are reeling from restrictions imposed in March to prevent COVID-19 outbreaks. Currently, restaurants and bars have had to overhaul their business models to accommodate for social distancing, outdoor dining and other measures.