COURIER LIFE,14 MARCH 27-APRIL 2, 2020
OPINION
During a pandemic is no time to
abandon basic law-and-order!
Now is the time for more democracy,
not more obvious voter supression!
The coronavirus outbreak
has laid bare a lot of
harmful elements of our
culture. I’d like to address a
particularly obscure one: designating
petitions.
Designating petitions
are what politicians in New
York use to make themselves
eligible to run as candidates
of a political party.
The candidates must collect
a certain amount of signatures,
in a given period of
time (normally about five
weeks), from voters who live
in the district they are running
for and are enrolled in
the party they wish to represent.
The signatures must
be gathered by someone also
enrolled in that party, or a
notary. New York requires
far more signatures than
any other state.
Among those who follow
this sort of thing, New York is
well-known to have the most
restrictive ballot access laws
in the country. To navigate
the process safely, candidates
need to hire election lawyers,
which costs them thousands
of dollars. It appears a majority
of all election lawyers
practicing in the country are
New Yorkers.
This year, because the
process of gathering signatures
is emphatically not social
distancing, the time period
for collecting signatures
was abruptly curtailed and
the number of signatures required
for any offi ce was cut
by 70 percent. The sky did not
fall with these much lower
requirements.
Nevertheless, scores of
campaigns across the city
are having the validity of
their petitions challenged.
If they lose the challenge —
and a signature can be declared
invalid, for instance,
by an eligible voter printing
instead of signing their
name, or signing in ink that
isn’t blue or black — the candidate
will be knocked off
the ballot. The process of defending
their ballot position
will expose the candidates,
their campaign workers,
and Board of Elections employees
to the risk of viral
infection.
The purpose of the petition
law is a fl awed one: making
it harder to get on the
ballot curtails “nuisance
candidates,” candidates with
no shot at winning who clog
up the ballot and notionally
make it diffi cult for voters
to fi nd their preferred candidate.
But no one has ever
been able to show that nuisance
candidates cause any
harm. The most extreme
case, the California gubernatorial
recall of 2003, had 135
candidates but the top four
garnered 97.3% of the vote.
America’s best Republican
governor of the 21st Century,
Arnold Schwarzenegger, was
elected by over a million vote
margin.
What the petition laws actually
do is protect the status
quo, by making it easier
for incumbents to avoid even
having to face elections. In
my own experience, I have
seen the same errors get
minor candidates knocked
off for fraud while being ignored
when perpetrated by
the campaigns of members
of congress. So as usual, our
current system in New York
really just stems from an instinctive
fear of democracy
by our politicians.
Nick Rizzo is a Democratic
District Leader representing
the 50th Assembly District
and a political consultant
who lives in Greenpoint.
Follow him on Twitter at @
NickRizzo.
WORDS OF
RIZZDOM
Nick Rizzo
Our progressive friends
are now demanding
that due to the coronavirus,
we let criminals
out of jail and lay off arrests
and prosecutions. Unfortunately,
our Democrat
elected officials are dutifully
following their marching
orders.
Here’s a novel idea: don’t
commit crimes against innocent
New Yorkers and you
won’t have to worry about
being in jail during these
times.
Brooklyn Councilman
Brad Lander said, “New York
City and New York State have
a responsibility to shrink the
jail population by halting arrests.”
Indeed, there may be legitimate
concerns about the
population on Rikers Island
under these circumstances,
but telling criminals they
are free to commit their bad
deeds without fear of arrest is
ludicrous. Since the jail population
is about half of what
it was six years ago, there
is plenty of room to socially
space inmates and provide
proper medical service. Doing
this makes more sense
than releasing criminals and
halting arrests.
Now, more than ever, we
need order. However, our
own Brooklyn District Attorney,
Eric Gonzalez, publicly
announced that his offi ce
will immediately stop prosecuting
certain offenses. His
spokesman actually said that
one of the specifi c crimes that
will get a pass is shoplifting.
This is nuts.
During these times, Gonzalez
is telling everyone that
they can steal from our local
supermarket or any other
business that is still permitted
to be open. Some businesses
are going to have a
tough enough time staying
afl oat, but now they must also
worry about losing money
to shoplifters. Now, managers
and employees will also
have to act more as security
guards, rather than getting
needed stock to the shelves
and helping their paying customers.
Announcing that you
can steal without worrying
about prosecution is negligence
by anyone, but even
more so for a top “prosecutor.”
Mayor Bill de Blasio has
also jumped on the bandwagon.
He recently announced
that the city will be
reviewing 200 inmates in city
jails for release on a rolling
basis.
Thankfully, NYPD Commissioner
Dermot Shea has
said he is not going along with
the advice of the Legal Aid
Society, New York City Public
Advocate Jumaane Williams,
Councilman Lander
and many other lawmakers
to slow down on arrests. He
said, “We have no intention of
strategically cutting enforcement
specifi cally related to
the coronavirus.” At least
there is one adult in the room
at City Hall.
We already have a public
health crisis; we don’t need
a public safety one also.
Bob Capano has worked
for Brooklyn Republican and
Democrat elected officials,
and has been an adjunct political
science professor for
over 15 years. Follow him on
twitter @bobcapano
THE RIGHT
VIEW
Bob Capano