FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT WWW.QNS.COM AUGUST 8, 2019 • THE QUEENS COURIER 11
Cabán concession fi nally brings end to Queens DA primary
BY MARK HALLUM
mhallum@schnepsmedia.com
@QNS
Public defender Tiff any Cabán conceded
to Borough President Melinda Katz on
Aug. 6 hours aft er a faltering court battle
to redeem a number of invalidated ballots.
But Cabán and her supporters were
jubilant in the strong challenge their campaign
made to the Democratic establishment
in Queens. Th e fi nal margin in the
race was 55 votes between the two out
over 91,000 cast.
It was the end of a six-week struggle
that began on Primary Night with a celebratory
tone for Cabán, who emerged on
June 25 with an 1,100-vote lead in the sixway
contest. Katz refused to concede and
insisted that more than 3,000 paper ballots
be counted.
Aft er those ballots were counted a week
later, on July 3, Katz overcame the defi -
cit and emerged with a slender, 20-vote
lead. Th at triggered an automatic recount
of all 91,000 ballots cast in the race, and a
lawsuit by Cabán’s team seeking to have
reinstated more than 100 affi davit ballots
which the Board of Elections invalidated.
Cabán delivered her concession speech
at Katch in Astoria, where the expressions
on the faces of the people standing beside
her were in sharp contrast to those on
stage aft er the June 25 primary. Members
of VOCAL NY stood with her, but the
only elected offi cials who endorsed her
Public defender Tiff any Cabán conceded the Democratic primary for Queens district attorney during
a party in Astoria on Aug. 6.
run and were present on Tuesday night
were state Senator Michael Gianaris and
Assemblyman Ron Kim.
“I’ve never run for offi ce before. I didn’t
Photo: Mark Hallum/QNS
come from a particularly engaged political
family,” Cabán said. “On that NY1
debate stage, I said stages like this were
not made or built for people like me and
that has changed … We completely transformed
the conversation around criminal
justice reform. We forced the next district
attorney to commit to ending all cash bail.
We pushed for the decriminalization of
sex work and we pushed it all the way into
the presidential campaign.”
Cabán entered the fi eld of seven candidates
in the DA race later than some of the
other frontrunners, having announced
her run in January. In that time, she
won support from the two presidential
candidates, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie
Sanders, and gathered fi nancial support
from across the nation.
In a statement, Katz thanked Cabán for
conceding, claiming primaries accentuate
diff erences between more traditional
Democrats and progressives rather than
bringing them together.
“I want to thank Tiff any Cabán for
bringing closure to this long and hardfought
race. Too oft en, the process of primary
campaigns obscures the vast commonalities
we share as Democrats and
reformers. We all want a safe Queens
where everyone is treated equally,” Katz
said.
As for what’s next, Katz moves on to the
November general election, where she’s
expected to defeat the Republican nominee,
Ozone Park attorney Daniel Kogan.
Should she win the race, Katz will have
to resign the Queens borough president’s
offi ce before offi cially taking the reins as
Queens’ next top prosecutor.
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