Eliot Spitzer’s opponent has already raised several million dollars and locked up numerous endorsements in the race for New York City comptroller, including from some of the city’s top labor unions.
Democratic Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer, whom Spitzer is opposing in the comptroller’s race, has already locked up the endorsements of more than 40 New York City organizations, including top labor unions that will play a crucial role in the election.
Spitzer, who was known as the crusading “Sheriff of Wall Street” during his tenure as New York Attorney General and eventually resigned from the state’s governorship in 2008 after admitting that he patronized call girls, announced Sunday that he is running for comptroller. The powerful position is being vacated by Democrat John Liu, who is running for mayor of the city in a crowded field that includes former congressman Anthony Weiner.
“I’m hopeful there will be forgiveness, I am asking for it,” Spitzer said in a phone call with a reporter. “I’ve never viewed politics as pushing anybody else aside” Spitzer later said in a WNYC radio interview Monday in reference to Stringer.
But Spitzer’s comeback campaign is already at a disadvantage, according to a DecideNYC.com analysis of New York organizational endorsements in the race.
Stringer has been endorsed by 1199 SEIU and other prominent locals of the Service Employees International Union. Stringer has also been endorsed by the United Federation of Teachers, Hotel and Motel Trades Council, Council of School Administrators, Communication Workers of America, Teamsters Joint Council 16, NYC Central Labor Council, United Association of Plumbers Local 1 and Uniformed Fire Officers Association.
Stringer has also gained the endorsement of the Queens County Democrats and the Working Families Party, a left-wing political party formed by various labor unions in 1998 that helped Spitzer gain more than 100,000 votes in his 2006 gubernatorial run.
Stringer, who flirted with his own bid for mayor earlier this year, has already raised more than $3.5 million and spent $566,000 in his campaign. However, Spitzer is said to be willing to spend millions from his own personal fortune on the race, according to the New York Post.
The married Spitzer resigned from the governorship after admitting to paying for prostitutes, including a tryst at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, D.C. Spitzer’s alleged former madam, Kristen Davis, plans to file papers to run against Spitzer and Stringer as a Libertarian.