It has been irritating to look at longtime Black political leaders – particularly members of the clergy – line as much as endorse Andrew Cuomo of all folks for mayor of New York Metropolis.
Fewer politicians on the planet are much less deserving of a political comeback than Cuomo. Not solely is he at the moment main in polling, however group leaders representing areas extra more likely to undergo from a Cuomo mayorship than profit try to assist engineer it for him.
It’s a pathetic, albeit predictable final result given Cuomo’s historical past of operating to the Black group when politically expedient and choose leaders from it are embracing him no matter how little he plans to do for the group in return.
Years in the past, when Cuomo’s governorship grew to become ensnarled in scandal over allegations of sexual harassment, he ran to a Black church in Harlem to get vaccinated in opposition to the coronavirus, and whereas current, was lavished with reward by numerous Black ministers and political figures in attendance.
So, as Cuomo was engulfed in controversy following a number of girls, together with former and present aides, accusing him of constructing inappropriate remarks and conduct like undesirable touching and unwelcome sexual advances, they had been singing the satan’s excessive praises to heaven.
The New York Instances quoted a kind of folks, Hazel N. Dukes, president of the NY chapter of the NAACP, referring to Cuomo as her “son” throughout her remarks, insisting that “he ain’t white.”
With all due respect to Ms. Dukes, Cuomo might need been her play son, however that man ain’t no rattling honorary Negro.
Fortunately, there have been others like New York Metropolis Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, who protested Cuomo’s actions on the time and reminded others of the hurt he delivered to Black communities.
“Gov. Cuomo just isn’t a sufferer, and he’s not a casualty. He’s a strong one that has brought about victims and has brought about casualties,” Williams stated at a protest exterior of Cuomo’s workplace in 2021.
Others, like the general public schooling advocacy group Alliance for High quality Training, argued: “Governor Cuomo’s insurance policies have deepened inequality in public colleges, and strengthened the constructions of academic racism in New York.”
But, only some weeks in the past, 30 Black religion leaders launched an announcement claiming that “Andrew Cuomo’s management displays the values we maintain shut: uplifting the marginalized, combating for fairness, and constructing a metropolis the place each particular person has the possibility to thrive.”
The person who empowered Republicans in NY to assist him stave off a extra progressive agenda, who reportedly ruled like a tyrant and a creep, is one of the best particular person to do all that?
This doesn’t even embody his administration’s abysmal dealing with of nursing properties within the state in the course of the pandemic and all of the ache, struggling, and lack of life it brought about.
There may be additionally the matter of Cuomo’s longtime knack for informal shows of racism.
Cuomo is similar one that, in 2008, as a supporter of Hillary Clinton within the Democratic main, stated of Barack Obama’s loss within the New Hampshire main: “It’s not a TV-crazed race. Frankly, you’ll be able to’t purchase your method into it. You possibly can’t shuck and jive at a press convention. You possibly can’t simply postpone reporters, as a result of you may have actual folks taking a look at you saying reply the query, , and all these strikes you can also make with the press don’t work while you’re in somebody’s lounge.”
Then, a decade later, in 2019, he used “the N-word” throughout a reside radio interview with WAMC.
His racism within the Nineteen Nineties was no higher.
Whereas operating in opposition to Carl McCall within the Democratic main for governor of NY, Cuomo dismissed McCall as little greater than “a racial contract” between Black and Latino New Yorkers that ought to not prevail.
Cuomo misplaced that race, however no less than efficiently pulled off the function of spoiler for the Black gubernatorial hopeful – a task repeated years later when, as New York’s lawyer basic, he was accused of utilizing his workplace to run an orchestrated marketing campaign to push Governor David Paterson out of the race.
That is the person a state chapter president of the NAACP claims “ain’t white.”
He sounds mighty white to me and of a well-known kind.
In her e book, Confidence Man, New York Instances reporter Maggie Haberman wrote that “the one two politicians I ever heard publicly use the phrase ‘The Blacks’ had been Donald Trump and Andrew Cuomo.”
And, like Trump, Cuomo just isn’t the kind to confess fault.
In reality, to at the present time, in the case of acknowledging his bullying and abusive conduct that led him to resign, he and his supporters proceed to assault Lawyer Normal Letitia James and her purported “incompetence.” Sure, that may be a mighty racist and really Trumpian assertion of him to make. The identical may be stated of him wanting to make use of tax-payer funds to sue James in retaliation.
Years in the past, regardless of his identified rocky historical past, Cuomo grew to become governor with ample Black help. Historical past may repeat itself now, however it’s not too late to show this round earlier than the June Democratic mayoral main in NYC and remind Black voters what kind of politician they’re doubtlessly returning to prominence.
It was clownish sufficient when a few of these identical Black pastors and political operatives continued to help the present scandal-prone mayor of NYC, Eric Adams.
It’s unforgivable to advocate for Black voters to switch one corrupt politician with one other.
As Bertha Lewis, founder and president of Black Management and Motion Coalition, put it in an op-ed for the New York Each day Information: “Cuomo’s father, Mario, was a champion for our communities. His son’s actions now threaten that legacy.”
The Black pastors and politicians telling Black New Yorkers in any other case are incorrect and in determined want of their conscience.
Michael Arceneaux is a New York Instances bestselling creator whose most up-to-date e book, “I Lastly Purchased Some Jordans,” was printed final March.
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