Cuomo Aides Wrote Democratic Party Mailer Linking Nixon To Anti-Semitism
Top aides of New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo wrote and approved the state Democratic Party’s mailing that accused challenger Cynthia Nixon of being soft on anti-Semitism and supporting the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement against Israel, the New York Post reported Wednesday.
Cuomo has denied that he had anything to do with the mailer, which went out to Jewish neighborhoods a few days before election day for his contentious primary. But sources told the Post that former top aide Larry Schwartz was “very involved” in the effort. Schwartz served as Cuomo’s secretary from 2011 to 2015, when he was appointed to the board of the MTA.
“We all know that Larry is the person closest to the governor and he doesn’t do anything without the Cuomos’ knowledge,” a source said. “It’s similar to a criminal cartel where they only communicate verbally to a handful of trusted people, of which Larry is one.”
A Cuomo campaign spokeswoman largely confirmed Schwartz’s involvement.
“Larry Schwartz who serves on our campaign in a volunteer capacity was reviewing mail pieces in an ad hoc fashion, but he only saw the positive section of the mailer and never saw the negative section,” spokeswoman Lis Smith told the Post. “Had he seen it, it would have never gone out.”
The mailer said that Nixon is “against funding for yeshivas,” supports BDS and has been “silent on the rise of anti-Semitism.”
Nixon, who is raising her children Jewish, called the mailer “disgusting and cynical” and “Trumpian.”
Contact Aiden Pink at pink@forward.com or on Twitter, @aidenpink
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.
If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.
Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO