De Blasio insists the state Board of Elections singled him out

It was a defiant Mayor Bill de Blasio who refused to back off his assertion that his political fundraising was being unfairly singled out by the state Board of Elections.  

At a press conference Thursday, de Blasio once again charged that the leak of a criminal referral citing his fundraising, which was written by a gubernatorial appointee to the Board of Elections, was proof that he was the victim of a smear campaign orchestrated by operatives with loyalty to Gov. Andrew Cuomo.  

But de Blasio went out of his way at to differentiate between the Board of Elections scrutiny of his fundraising for Democratic state Senate candidates in 2014 and the ongoing local and federal prosecutors probes into his fundraising, which he said were legitimate.

“We are cooperating fully with the district attorney, with the U.S. attorney. We respect them,” de Blasio told reporters at the press conference, which was called to announce another major drop in violent crime for the first five months of this year.   

In January Risa Sugarman, the state Board of Elections’ chief enforcement counsel, wrote the criminal referral to prosecutors alleging that in 2014, in an effort to fund a Democratic takeover of the state Senate, de Blasio and his allies engaged in “willful and flagrant” violations of state laws. In April, that letter, which should have remained confidential as law enforcement sensitive material, was leaked to the Daily News.

Earlier this week, New York State Inspector General Catherine Leahy Scott reported that the source of the leak was John Conklin, the Board of Elections’ communications director and formerly the state Senate Republicans’ legislative director from 1993 until 2008. Conklin admitted as much under oath, according to the inspector General.

Scott's finding prompted Cuomo on Tuesday to take de Blasio to task for “falsely and recklessly” accusing “public servants” of wrongdoing “who were just  doing their job.” Cuomo also called on de Blasio to apologize for impugning the integrity of state officials. 

“The U.S. attorney and the Manhattan district attorney believe there are significant questions of following the law and legal compliance when it comes to the mayor’s fundraising,” Cuomo was quoted as telling reporters. 

So far, law enforcement officials has been circumspect on the de Blasio probes, or, for that matter, into their ongoing investigations into the activities of Cuomo loyalists. 

De Blasio refused to apologize, instead doubling down on his analysis that he was victimized by more people than just one lone leaker of the Board of Elections letter to prosecutors. 

“Now, apparently we have further information that a reporter had foreknowledge of the existence of the report,” de Blasio said. “The report was created by someone who has a particular employment history, and the report, although looking at a period of time where many people and institutions were involved in those elections, surprisingly only focused on one person.”

When asked if his escalating feud with the governor might undermine the public’s confidence in how well both the city and state are being led, de Blasio said the hype surrounding the clash was more the obsession of the media and the political class, and of no interest to voters.

“I think it is thoroughly uninteresting to everyday New Yorkers who want to know are we driving down crime, are we improving schools, are we helping them get affordable housing,” de Blasio said. “That’s what they care about.”