At this week’s confirmation hearing on Randy Mastro, tapped by Mayor Adams to be the city’s top lawyer, the City Council exposed itself as a pack of disingenuous bigots.
Mastro, one of Gotham’s top lawyers, demonstrated why he’s more than qualified to lead the Law Department and provide legal counsel to the Adams administration as corporation counsel.
Meanwhile, the council’s progressive majority spent 11 hours on rude and distortion-filled “questioning.”
“Madam Speaker, I would be the best lawyer ever, just give me the opportunity I implore you,” Randy Mastro pleaded. “I will earn your trust.”
But the progs simply pilloried him over his tenure in the Giuliani administration, his work defending former Jersey Gov. Chris Christie in the Bridgegate scandal and his recent lawsuit over congestion pricing in New York.
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“I’m just asking you to let me answer the question,” he said during a clash over a Giuliani-era decision to withdraw a grant to Housing Works over its inability to account for half a million dollars in city funding.
“But you’re not asking the question,” bellowed Deputy Speaker Diana Ayala in reply.
“Mr. Mastro, you’ve said previously that you see a lot of similarities between the Giuliani and Adams administrations. And, unfortunately, I do too. And I couldn’t think of a more damning indictment,” griped Councilman Lincoln Restler (D-B’klyn).
“Why do you feel comfortable joining the administration as a white man to replace a woman of color?” demanded Majority Leader Amanda Farias (D-Bx), flagging that Mastro would replace ex-Corporation Counsel Sylvia Hinds-Radix .
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How is that his fault?
Do all jobs become color- and gender-coded once someone of the “right” identity holds them?
She suggested this proves Mastro lacks real commitment to diversity and inclusion, then cut him off when he tried to respond, insisting her bizarre query was “directly connected” to “your lived experience and how you get to move [in] the world.”
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To write off Mastro’s extensive pro bono legal work for the underprivileged, Public Advocate Jumaane Williams brought up “toxic charity” and “false generosity” — terms popularized by 20th century Marxist Brazilian educator Paulo Freire now used to assert that charitable work is simply a way to maintain “oppression.”
Like some other questioners, Williams said he’d personally hire Mastro to represent him in litigation yet he’d deny that opportunity to the mayor.
And that’s the real agenda here: The progs don’t want Mastro helping Adams pursue his policies.
They want the mayor’s top aides answerable to them , and serving their hard-left ideology.
But Adams doesn’t want war; in two interviews Friday, he would only say the hearing represented “the beauty of democracy in America” and an “amazing process.”
In fact, this pack of goons simply displayed their own biased nastiness — in contrast to Mastro’s reason, patience and eloquent defense of his public service and legal work.
Bad enough that they’re poised to deny New York the service of one honorable and impeccably qualified man; far worse that they’re fundamentally dedicated to make the city unlivable for decent folks of any race, gender or class.
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