With kindness not cutting it, Mayor Bloomberg is switching to muscle: The City Council recently passed two NYPD oversight bills that can override the mayor’s veto, just barely, but he’s not giving up. DNAinfo reports today that Bloomberg is specifically targeting Councilman Mark Weprin to change his vote by not-so-secretly courting potential Republican challengers to face the Queens Democrat*, using the mayor’s “considerable resources.” He has a lot of those.
Even if no one takes the bait to run against Weprin, the message is clear: “Bloomberg, in this situation, sees the people that voted for this bill as his enemies, so he’s screwing them,” one political science professor explained.
Weprin is holding strong, for the moment, telling DNAinfo, “I have no beef with the mayor.” Bloomberg’s beef, meanwhile, is now well known, so we’ll see how long Weprin lasts.
*Correction: This post originally said Weprin is a Republican; he is not.
