16 THE QUEENS COURIER • APRIL 8, 2021 FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT WWW.QNS.COM
BY JACOB KAYE AND
ANGÉLICA ACEVEDO
editorial@qns.com
@QNS
City Council candidate Amit
Bagga was already facing an
uphill battle. A fi rst-time candidate
running in one of the most
crowded races in the city, Bagga
and his team needed to collect
hundreds of signatures from voters
in order to get his name on
the ballot.
However, the real complications
began when Bagga and
several members of his campaign
staff learned they had
been exposed to a person with
COVID-19. Th ough signatures
still needed to be collected,
Bagga had to go into a 14-day
quarantine during the fi nal week
of petitioning.
“It’s, of course, scary. When it
happens, there is a degree of anxiety,
and there’s a degree of concern
that is very real,” Bagga said.
“I think logic, common sense
and just being prudent, clearly
dictated that petitioning should
have been canceled.”
Of the 26 City Council campaigns
in Queens who responded
to QNS’ inquiries, three reported
that a member, or multiple members,
of their volunteer team,
staff or the candidates themselves
had been exposed to, or contracted
COVID-19 during the
petitioning process. While not
every campaign could confi rm
that contraction of the virus happened
as a result of petitioning,
in all cases, petitioning, which
ended the last week of March,
was interrupted and the process
to get on the ballot became even
more of a challenge.
Petitioning requires candidates
to collect in-person signatures
from voters who live in the candidate’s
district and are registered
in the candidate’s party.
Despite calls from over 100
candidates and lawmakers citywide
to call off the signature
collection because of the threat
COVID-19 posed to both petitioners
and voters, the process
wasn’t canceled. Instead, the
number of required signatures
required for City Council candidates
was reduced from 900
to 270.
For a handful of campaigns,
collecting fewer signatures didn’t
keep them safe from the virus,
which has infected around
Despite precautions, petitioning exposed
18,000 New York City residents
in the past week and killed nearly
50,000 New York state residents
since it fi rst began spreading a
year ago. Even for those campaigns
that were not exposed to
COVID-19 during petitioning,
many said the risk of contracting
the virus weighed heavily during
the process.
An overwhelming number
of campaigns noted that
they were “fortunate” to avoid
being exposed to or contracting
COVID-19.
In last year’s elections —
the fi rst during the pandemic
— Governor Andrew Cuomo
reduced the number of needed
petition signatures by 70 percent.
Th e same reduction applied
to this year’s process.
But as was the case last year,
candidates running for offi ce in
2021 called on petitioning to be
canceled entirely.
Over 100 lawmakers and candidates,
including many from
Queens, sued the governor and
Mayor Bill de Blasio in February
in an attempt to cancel petitioning
outright, citing the risk the
activity posed to candidates, voters
and volunteers.
“I feel really hesitant about
sending people out there who
will volunteer for me, or be on
my campaign, and asking them
to risk exposure to COVID to
get me on the ballot,” Queens
borough president candidate
and lawsuit plaintiff Jimmy Van
Bramer told QNS at the time.
“It’s a choice no one should have
to make.”
Th e lawsuit was struck down
in court, and petitioning went
on.
About a month later, Van
Bramer was one of several candidates
across New York City
to contract COVID-19 during
petitioning.
“Given my extreme caution
as a caregiver for my mother,
I believe I contracted COVID
from petitioning, which the governor
refused to cancel despite
the public health emergency and
a lawsuit from candidates,” Van
Bramer said. “We suspended
our volunteer petitioning operation
aft er I tested positive, and
prior to that, our campaign had
taken precautions, such as making
rubber gloves and hand sanitizer
available, used diff erent
pens and standing six feet apart.”
Van Bramer ended up collecting
more than 4,300 signatures,
almost four times the required
1,200 for borough president
COURTESY OF HANTZOPOULOS
candidates. Like many candidates,
he called on opponents
not to challenge each other’s signatures,
a process that might
further put campaign workers
at risk.
Bagga, who is running for
City Council for Van Bramer’s
seat in District 26, was lucky
enough not to contract the virus.
However, when he and three
members of his campaign staff
were forced to quarantine, he
had to fi gure out how he’d continue
to collect signatures.
While locked away in his
home, volunteers would go door
to door to ask voters for signatures.
“And then they would say,
‘Amit would really like to speak
to you directly,’” Bagga said. “If
the voter agreed, the volunteers
held up the phone in such a way
Evie Hantzopoulos, a candidate in City Council District 22, collects a signature from a voter.
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