The two Democrats vying to succeed Mayor Michael Bloomberg faced off in the first round of mayoral debates Wednesday night. Both City Comptroller Bill Thompson and Queens City Councilman Tony Avella wasted no time challenging the Mayor’s record on education, employment, crime and the city budget. Things also got heated when the candidates opened the [...]
A federal judge has issued a ruling that could doom an Indian reservation’s booming business in tax-free cigarettes and spell trouble for other native American tobacco dealers in the state. In a decision announced Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Carol Bagley Amon in Brooklyn barred a group of smoke shops on Long Island’s reservation from selling [...]
Governor David Paterson tried to downplay his comments on race and media bias Tuesday by working the damage control angle during an appearance on Long Island. Paterson has been receiving heat over comments made during an interview last week with WWRL radio where he blamed the media for treating him unfairly, and claimed the media [...]
Democratic Congressman Paul D. Tonko was sweating in his suit Tuesday night as he stood before 1,500 people half of them angry, half sympathetic as he attempted to explain his support for health care reform. Tonko appeared before a microphone at the pavilion at Elm Avenue Park, where it was 10 degrees hotter than the [...]
Manhattan district attorney candidate Leslie Crocker Snyder has accepted a $10,000 contribution from a high-profile tobacco executive whose company has long been a client of her law firm. Bennett LeBow, chairman of Vector Group Ltd, which owns Liggett Group Inc., the fifth largest manufacturer of cigarettes in the United States, contributed $10,000 to Snyder’s campaign [...]
New York Rep. Charles Rangel is facing more questions over his personal finances after an amended report he filed this month shows he failed to disclose up to $500,000 in assets in 2007. An amended report to his 2007 Congressional disclosure form indicates that Rangel’s assets include a checking account with a balance between $250,000 [...]
City and state scores on SATs spiraled downward for the fourth straight year, according to new data. Since hitting a peak in 2005, the city’s average score on each 800-point section of the SAT has dropped by 13 points in reading, to 435, and by 18 points in math, to 459. Scores on the writing [...]
The mother of City Comptroller candidate John Liu is trying to backtrack after she told a newspaper reporter that her son never worked in a sweatshop. Jamy Liu appeared at a rally with her son Tuesday and said she took him to the garment factory where she worked, though she didn’t elaborate on the details. [...]
With the Sept. 15 primary almost here, City Councilwoman Maria Baez has punked out of debating the two challengers for her West Bronx seat. There’re a lotta questions she may not want to answer at the debate, which airs 9 p.m. Monday on Gary Axelbank’s BronxTalk (channel 67), co-sponsored by the Bronx News Network. Though [...]
Nassau County Legislature Roger Corbin filed a $10-million civil suit Monday against both his first lawyer in his federal criminal case and a private detective he hired for his defense. The suit filed in State Supreme Court in Minolea names as defendants Corbin’s initial lawyer, David Bythewood of Mineola, and private detective Jay Salpeter, best [...]
