Lhota slams Weiner rise
ANTHONY WEINER’S free ride is over.
For weeks, rival mayoral candidates have mostly avoided bashing Weiner for the sexting scandal that forced him to resign from Congress two years ago.
That abruptly changed Wendesday, a day after a Marist College/Wall Street Journal/WNBC poll showed Weiner vaulting into the lead in the Democratic primary.
Joe Lhota, the leading Republican candidate, fired off a fund-raising appeal that said, “Weiner (is) leading the Democratic primary . . . and it’s up to us to stop him.”
“Like me, I’m sure that you had hoped to have seen the last of Anthony Weiner when he resigned from Congress following an illicit sexual Twitter scandal and botched coverup, but he’s back and desperate for political redemption.”
That scandal is part of a “pattern” of “simply unacceptable” behavior that in- cludes “padding his resume with dubious claims” and “making up his own facts.”
Weiner fired back: “I’ve been getting hit by rightwing Republicans since the moment I got into public life.”
The Marist poll found Weiner was the choice of 25% of registered Democrats — his best showing yet. City Council Speaker Christine Quinn (20%) was in second and former City Controller William Thompson (13%) was third.
A Quinnipiac University poll out Wednesday suggested a tighter race. It found Quinn in first (19%), followed by Weiner (17%) and Thompson (16%).
Republican George McDonald, an advocate for the homeless, said if Weiner were a teacher, he’d have ended up in a “rubber room” for his conduct.
“I think Tony lacks the character and the judgment to be NYC’s mayor,” said McDonald, participating in the first of a series of candidate live chats on NYDailyNews.com.