By Anthony Giudice and Robert Pozarycki at QNS.com
The wildest City Council race in Queens is finally over.
Eight days after the election, Robert Holden clinched the 30th City Council District seat over two-term incumbent Elizabeth Crowley. His narrow Election Night victory was upheld after the Board of Elections counted all absentee and affidavit ballots on Nov. 15.
It was a stunning defeat for Crowley, the only incumbent Democratic City Council member to lose to a Republican candidate this election cycle. In a statement Thursday morning, Crowley said her nine years working in the City Council were “the most rewarding and fulfilling of my entire life.”
At the conclusion of Wednesday’s count, a source close to the situation reported, Holden had 137 more votes than Crowley. His margin of victory had actually grown by four; after polls were tabulated on Election Night, the Republican challenger had a 133-vote lead over his Democratic rival.
“It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done, running for office, but it’s the most gratifying thing,” Holden said of his win in an interview with QNS on Nov. 16. “Right now, it’s the most satisfying thing other than maybe getting Elmhurst Park.”
Holden thanked his team of volunteers for the hard work they put in to help him get elected.
“My volunteers were great. They pushed me and supported me,” he said. “They’re responsible for this, not me. This was David and Goliath. A group of volunteers taking down a nine-year incumbent — this is tremendously satisfying, and I owe it all to my volunteers and my wife.”
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Councilman Eric Ulrich defeated democrat opponent Mike Scala on election day, winning re-election.
By Gina Martinez
City Councilman Eric Ulrich (R-Ozone Park) has been re-elected to a third term with 66 percent of the 22, 577 votes cast, according to unofficial results from the WNYC website.
With 14,862 votes, the incumbent easily beat his Democratic opponent Michael Scala, who won 7,715 votes, or 34 percent, to represent District 32, which covers parts of Belle Harbor, Breezy Point, Broad Channel, Howard Beach, Lindenwood, Ozone Park, Richmond Hill, Rockaway Park, Roxbury, South Ozone Park, West Hamilton Beach and Woodhaven, after a contentious campaign.
On Tuesday morning, voter turnout at Howard Beach’s PS 146 was steady, according to poll workers.
One couple who cast their votes for Ulrich said they thought he had been approachable and helpful in his previous terms. Their main concern was crime in the neighborhood, which they believe has increased. They were confident the Republican candidate would have a second term.
In a victory statement Ulrich said he was deeply humbled by the Election Night results.
“I want to thank the voters for putting their trust and faith in me,” he said. “Representing my constituents at City Hall is one of the greatest honors of my life. Serving my community and protecting our quality of life will always be my top priority,”
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Today is Election Day!
We have important local races across the Borough.
CITYWIDE CANDIDATES
MAYOR – Nicole Malliotakis
COMPTROLLER – Michael J. Faulkner
PUBLIC ADVOCATE – Juan Carlos Polanco
BOROUGH PRESIDENT – William K. Kregler
QUEENS CITY COUNCIL CANDIDATES
Konstantinos Poulidis CD 19
Joseph Concannon CD 23
Marvin Jeffcoat CD 26
Rupert Green CD 27
Ivan D. Mossop CD 28
Robert Holden CD 30
Re-Elect Eric Ulrich CD 32
SUPREME COURT
Joseph Kasper
To find your poll site go to: https://nyc.pollsitelocator.com/Search.aspx
You have a choice! #Vote #Election2017 #QueensCountyGOP
Polls close @9pm.
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NY1 Queens Reporter Ruschell Boone sits down with Chairwoman Joann Ariola, to talk about her plans the party.
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Middle Village civic leader Robert Holden officially secured the Republican Party line on Wednesday in his bid to unseat incumbent Councilwoman Elizabeth Crowley of the 30th District, who had defeated him in the Democratic primary.
The lifelong Democrat was officially given the Queens County GOP’s support as the party itself underwent a shakeup on Sept. 28. Former Congressman Robert Turner, who had led the party for four years, was voted out of his chairmanship post and replaced by JoAnn Ariola, a Howard Beach civic activist and Republican district leader in the 23rd Assembly District.
Despite a decisive loss to Crowley in the Sept. 12 primary, Holden had already intended to go on to the November general election on the Conservative, Reform and “Dump de Blasio” lines. Up until this week, the Republican candidate for the Council seat, attorney Joseph Kasper, had been virtually nonexistent on the campaign trail. He wasn’t listed in the Campaign Finance Bureau’s “Follow the Money” contribution database, had no campaign website and doesn’t even live with the 30th District’s confines, which include Ridgewood, Glendale, Maspeth, Middle Village and parts of Woodhaven and Woodside.
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By Patricia Adams and Michael V. Cusenza
Joann Ariola, longtime civic president and borough GOP district leader, has been named chairwoman of the Queens County Republican Party.
Ariola on Wednesday evening upset incumbent Chairman Bob Turner, 3-1, during a QGOP reorganization meeting in Howard Beach. The stunning victory was bolstered by what Ariola characterized as an “overwhelming” show of support from Republican committee members and district leaders throughout the county.
“I first want to say that I appreciate how far Bob Turner has taken the party, and now it is my job to pick up where he leaves off and carry out the work that is so needed,” Ariola beamed in an exclusive chat with The Forum following the event at Russo’s on the Bay, which is just a stone’s throw from her Lindenwood home.
Former U.S. Rep. Turner was handed the reins of a dysfunctional QGOP in March 2015, inheriting a group in turmoil and disarray that for several years had been divided into two combative factions that hadn’t been able to see eye-to-eye on myriad issues, including leadership.
The vast majority of the membership saw the selection of Turner as a major milestone for the party in the borough.
“The war is over,” state GOP committeeman and district leader Bart Haggerty told The Forum at the time.
On Monday, many were excited about the prospects of an Ariola era.
After calling Turner “a true champion for the Republican Party,” and noting that the QGOP is “greatly appreciative for his service,” City Councilman Eric Ulrich (R-Ozone Park) said he was “happy” that his “good friend” Ariola, whose party roots date back some 25 years, had been elected the new county leader.
The newly-minted chairwoman later told The Forum that she was both “honored and humbled to have been given the support of people I have worked with and admired over the last two decades.”
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Mayor Bill de Blasio’s unintentionally hilarious, self-coronating interview in New York Magazine this week included this insane sentence:
“I think people all over this city, of every background, would like to have the city government be able to determine which building goes where, how high it will be, who gets to live in it, what the rent will be.”
Ahem — leave aside for the moment the Marxist-Leninist malarkey behind the mayor’s lust for “central planning” that might as well be a Soviet-style Five-Year Plan.
Let’s instead take de Blasio’s statement on its own, laugh-riot terms. So, people all over town want City Hall to micromanage land and property use, do they?
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President Trump on Friday told Jewish leaders during the traditional phone call before the start of the High Holy Days next week that he would crack down on rising anti-Semitism across the US.
With his Jewish son-in-law Jared Kushner also on the line, Trump said the tradition of Judaism “strengthens our nation and inspires us all,” The Jerusalem Post reported.
Trump said he was aware that Holocaust survivors were also on the call, and emphasized how important it was to learn their history.
“We forcefully condemn those who seek to promote anti-Semitism,” Trump said.
“I will make sure we protect Jewish communities, and all communities, to make sure they are safe.”
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By Deroy Murdock at National Review
Under de Blasio, rats thrive, subways stall, and it’s legal to pee — and live — on the sidewalks. Four words elected Donald J. Trump president: “Make America great again.” Unlike Hillary Clinton’s nebulous creed — “Stronger Together” —Trump’s slogan was a call to action. MAGA suggested better times ahead and recalled better times behind. Also, MAGA was general enough that voters supplied their own definitions of “great,” ranging from low taxes to school choice or what Trump called a “beautiful southern-border wall.” Gotham’s Republican/Conservative mayoral nominee Nicole Malliotakis should deploy her own four-word motto:
Clean Up New York!” That battle cry would crystallize what New Yorkers already know: Democratic mayor Bill de Blasio has made a grimy mess of America’s premier metropolis. There is plenty to clean up, all of which the Staten Island state assemblywoman easily could articulate: Clean up the garbage. A random walk down any New York street these days confirms that litter, refuse, and overall squalor are widespread.
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Mayor de Blasio likes using taxpayer money to create “good-paying” local jobs — unless he’s campaigning.
De Blasio’s re-election bid has spent $1.27 million at businesses headquartered or located outside the five boroughs, according to campaign finance records through Aug. 28.
That’s nearly half of roughly $2.7 million shelled out by the campaign, including outstanding bills, since de Blasio took office in 2014.
The money went toward office technology, political consultants, polling and other services sold by companies as far away as San Francisco and as close as Yonkers.
Revolution Messaging, an agency in Washington, DC, has been paid $268,130 since last September for digital work, Web site development and online advertising consulting.
That company was founded by members of President Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign and Sen. Bernie Sanders’ 2016 bid, providing “authentic digital storytelling for progressive causes,” according to its Web site.
De Blasio’s campaign paid ADP Payroll Solutions, based in El Paso, Texas, $228,372 between March 2016 and this past August, records show.
The campaign also splurged while fund-raising outside the city, spending $168,185 on hotels, catering and clubs nationwide.
In June, de Blasio outlined a 10-year plan to create jobs paying more than $50,000 a year using at least $1.35 billion in public funds.
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