As the two Brooklyn factions of the Republican Party prepare for the next phase of their litigation to see which one is the flag bearer of the borough’s GOP, there is one thing that both sides separately agree on – endorsing Donald Trump in the upcoming April 19 New York State Republican primary.
That after Arnaldo Ferraro, Chairman of the Kings County Republican County Committee, yesterday announced that the executive committee would endorse Donald Trump contrary to the “wait and see” attitude of other groups.
“Our organization is taking the initiative to endorse the leading Republican candidate for President of the United States. Sitting on the fence is certainly not an indication of leadership. The Primary elections for President are set for April 19 and this date is just around the corner. We must act quickly and work hard if we want to assure that our selected candidate wins the election.”
Lucretia Regina-Potter, 46 AD Republican District Leader and Secretary of the Kings County Republican Party, added, “With Donald trump as the head of the Republican ticket in the General Elections in November, we stand a much better chance to elect Republican candidates for public office in our County and revitalize and grow the Republican Party in Brooklyn. It is for this reason we strongly urge Republican incumbents and other Republican candidates for office to contact our organization to discuss their campaigns in Brooklyn.”
Lucretia Regina-Potter, Jack Benton, Catherine Fox. (Standing) from L-R: William Davidson, Stephen Maresca, Arnaldo Ferraro, Phyllis Carbo, Veronica, and John Pawson. Not in the picture, but represented by proxies, are Ronald D’Angelo, Michael Di Meglio, Elizabeth Tenner, and Jeffrey Ferretti.
Brooklyn is without a wholly Republican representative from Kings County in the New York State Assembly, U.S. House of Representatives, and New York City Council. Bay Ridge State Senator Marty Golden, is the only legislator representing only Republicans in Brooklyn.
Additionally, Republican Congressman Dan Donovan represents a small part of Southern Brooklyn as part of his mainly Staten Island district. Similarly, Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis represents part of Bay Ridge as part of her majority Staten Island district. Both Donovan and Malliotakis live in Staten Island.
On the other side, sources in the Kings County Republican group led by attorney Ted Ghorra, confirmed they too will endorse Trump.
Ghorra would not confirm or deny the sources, but noted that Trump is a native New Yorker and thus a home state favorite that has a lot of rank-and-file Republican support.
The endorsements come as the Ghorra faction is actively trying to make the GOP more diverse culturally and racially in hoping to rebuild the Party. As such, he dismissed notions that Trump is so divisive that he will turn off minorities and immigrants from joining the GOP.
“I think he (Trump) will have a lot more of a calm, serine disposition moving forward,” said Ghorra, adding that Trump’s wife is an immigrant and that Trump is only seeking of a temporary ban of some immigrants until security concerns are worked out.
The endorsements come as Kings County Supreme Court Judge Edgar Walker made a partial ruling on a bitter dispute between factions led by former Kings County Republican Party Chair Craig Eaton and Golden.
The dispute revolves around Eaton’s faction throwing out Golden’s committee member proxy votes, allowing Ferraro to become chair by a 327-46 margin.
In his partial ruling, Walker reinstated 170 of the 438 proxies that Eaton’s camp threw out and ordered the two sides to meet the first week in April for a conference to set rules for a further hearing on the issue of which proxies would be counted.
“It’s nothing personal,” said Ghorra. “At end of day it’s a matter of fairness and having people’s votes counted. It’s a matter of little ‘d’ democracy. If you win you win. If you lose you lose, but you need transparency.
