By Hank Russell
New York State Democrats continue to paint Nassau County Executive and GOP candidate for governor Bruce Blakeman as an extremist and they are now saying he is becoming more extreme by the day.
As previously reported in Long Island Life & Politics, the NYS Democrats claimed Blakeman had met with John Eastman, an attorney who has been nicknamed “the architect of January 6.”
According to the NYS Dems, Blakeman was the keynote speaker at the Queens Village Republican Club’s Lincoln Dinner honoring Eastman on March 1. A Politico article mentioned that Eastman “played a central role in President Donald Trump’s effort to overturn the 2020 election.”
Most recently, state Democrats pointed out that Blakeman met with New York City Councilwoman Vickie Paladino (R-Whitestone) at the Whitestone Republican Club on March 11. On his Facebook page, Blakeman said he was “glad to visit” Paladino and the club’s members. “This group of people are fighting to protect Queens neighborhoods from the crime and chaos caused by Kathy Hochul and Zohran Mamdani,” Blakeman posted. “I’m proud to work with them to make New York more affordable and safe!”
Paladino was accused of Islamophobia for posting on her social media page a photo of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani praying with a group of Muslim sanitation workers and calling it a “part of [the] Islamic conquest.”
“Mass prayers in the streets, call to prayer blasting five times a day throughout the city, and the mayor conspicuously putting Islam first — both in his hires and his public media. The message is very clear — we are being replaced,” Paladino wrote. “And if a Christian mayor had been half as conspicuously religious, the left would be apoplectic — despite this being an historically and functionally Christian nation. It’s all about revolution and dismantling the country as it was founded.”
The City Council’s Ethics Committee changed Paladino for disorderly conduct, according to amNY, for other anti-Muslim posts, including one on X (formerly Twitter) in which she called for “the expulsion of Muslims from western nations.” Paladino recently filed a lawsuit against the CIty Council, claiming her First Amendment rights were violated and that those posts were on her personal social media page. City & State NY reported that Paladino’s son Robert cowrote her posts.
The NYS Dems also cited a Gothamist article in which she has retweeted white supremacist and neo-Nazi content in the past and has shown support for the Proud Boys, an alt-right group.
On an Instagram post in December, Blakeman called Paladino “a true fighter for her community in Queens. She has been a strong voice for public safety, increased police funding, quality-of-life protections — including action on squatting laws — and standing up against reckless criminal justice policies.”
“Blakeman is campaigning with and standing by Vickie Paladino even as she gets formal consequences for her own racism,” the NYS Democrats said in a statement.
The state Democrat party also went after Blakeman for encouraging WABC radio host Sid Rosenberg, to run for mayor after he called Mamdani on social media “a Radical Islam cockroach.” On Rosenberg’s show, Blakeman called Governor Kathy Hochul “a hypocrite” after calling Blakeman “a bootlicker.”
“I took that to be an antisemitic slur against me. That was something that was said against Jews during the Nazi regime.”
Blakeman said he was “offended” by Hochul’s remarks, but he “didn’t make a big deal about it because she can use whatever language she wants.”
He then encouraged Rosenberg for mayor, saying he has “good American values,” describing him as “someone who loves America.”
Rosenberg has since apologized for his remarks about Mamdani, attributing the tweet to “rage,” according to News 4 New York. On his show, he said, “[It’s] not nice to call somebody a bug, I get it, but it had nothing to do with anybody’s religion or faith or anything.”
“Blakeman said last week he is ‘serious’ about wanting Sid Rosenberg to run for NYC mayor – just one day after Rosenberg went on a racist, hateful tirade targeting Mayor Mamdani,” the NYS Dems stated.
On March 13, Long Island Life & Politics reached out to the Blakeman campaign for comment.
“If Bruce Blakeman’s support for cutting utility bills in half and lowering taxes is extreme, then what does one label Kathy Hochul and Zohran Mamdani’s plan to raise property taxes by 10% and add $4,100 to the average family utility bill?” said Blakeman for New York spokesperson Madison Spanodemos. “Reckless?”
Later that day, Blakeman issued a statement blasting Mamdani’s proposed 50% estate tax. “Under Hochul and Mamdani’s death tax of 50%, children will lose half the value of their parents’ home and family businesses will have to be sold off just to pay this cruel tax. As governor, I won’t let that happen.”