ALBANY >> Voters supporting Gov. Andrew Cuomo are being asked to pick sides next week in a Democratic Party brawl that pits the union-backed Working Families Party against Cuomo’s new Women’s Equality Party.
To ensure survival past Election Day, each party is asking that votes for Cuomo be cast on their lines, rather than the Democratic Party’s Row A. The goal is winning at least 50,000 votes, the minimum amount necessary to keep a permanent ballot line.
The fighting comes in a campaign season that has Cuomo on four different ballot lines on Nov. 4, and Republican challenger Rob Astorino on three. The other significant candidate in the race, Green Party nominee Howie Hawkins, has only one line.
With polls showing Cuomo with a big lead over Astorino, pundits see the dispute as Cuomo trying to undermine WFP leaders and further consolidate his grip on power. But Women’s Equality Party leader Christine Quinn said Tuesday her goal is to advance bills addressing abortion and other issues.
“I really sense out there talking to women and men that people can’t believe that in New York the components of the Women’s Equality Agenda don’t exist in law,” she said. “They cannot believe it.”
“So goal one here is, let’s make a party, let’s create that party – let’s get the Women’s Equality Agenda in its entirety with the addition of an all-around (bill) responding to rape and sexual assault on college campuses,” she added. “Let’s get that passed into law.”
The Women’s Agenda is a package of 10 bills that has passed the Assembly but stalled in the Senate because of provisions to repeal current abortion laws, lifting criminal penalties that have been on the books for decades.
The Working Families Party also supports the Agenda, and supporters say what is really going on is Cuomo is trying to get even with critics unhappy with his attacks on teacher unions and public schools, his indecision on hydrofracking, and his support for tax breaks for the wealthy.
“There’s no party with a better record of delivering for women and families than WFP,” WFP co-chair Karen Scharff said. “When women vote WFP they’re supporting the Women’s Equality Act, plus a whole slate of grittier, broader economic justice issues that affect the lives of women and families, from raising the wage to paid sick days, affordable housing, public funding of elections, and the DREAM act.”
The union-backed WFP has been around for years, but party leaders’ clashes with Cuomo culminated with a push this spring to endorse Zephyr Teachout, a Cuomo critic. Cuomo secured the nomination with the help of private sector labor unions who remain strong supporters, but the fight frayed his ties with the WFP. He defeated Teachout in the Democratic primary and she has refused to endorse him for re-election.
In contrast, Cuomo is tightly bound with the Women’s Equality Party, which he has embraced and promoted whenever possible. The party is not yet an actual party, and is only on the ballot as a result of a petition drive. Quinn, who has acted as the party’s public leader, is a former New York City Council Speaker who lost the Democratic primary to run for mayor to Bill de Blasio. Cuomo and de Blasio have had frosty relations all year.
The Women’s Party is only running five candidates across the state: Cuomo, Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli statewide, and Senate Democratic leaders Andrea Stewart-Cousins and Jeff Klein downstate.
If it can get at least 50,000 votes next week, the party wins permanent ballot status. If the WFP fails to reach that benchmark, it could face extinction like the party it replaced as a Democratic offshoot, the now defunct Liberal Party.
The same is true for the fourth line Cuomo has this year, the Independence Party nomination. That party is not expected to have a problem winning at least 50,000 votes.
Republicans also have third party options next week, with Astorino running on the Republican, Conservative and Stop Common Core Party lines.
The Conservative Party has been running ads urging voters to send Cuomo a message by voting for Astorino on its line. Stop Common Core has been quieter, formed by Astorino to draw attention and votes to his position opposing the controversial Common Core standards that are in place in public schools across the state.
Other candidates for governor on Tuesday’s ballot are Hawkins, who is expected to siphon off Cuomo votes, and the nominees of the Libertarian Party and a new party line called the Sapien Party.
Libertarian nominee Michael McDermott praised and defended Cuomo in the only debate of the campaign season, engaging in a playful thumb-wrestle handshake at the conclusion. The handshake took place within inches of the face of Howie Hawkins, who remained seated on the Buffalo TV set as Cuomo and McDermott jumped up to congratulate each other.
The Sapient Party nominee for governor is a former Long Island Tea Party leader named Steve Cohn, and the lieutenant governor candidate is Bobby Kumar Kalotee, a deposed former Nassau County Independence Party chair.