Name: Andrew Cuomo Once Created A Fake Women's Rights Party As Political Revenge
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Andrew Cuomo Once Created A Fake Women's Rights Party As Political Revenge

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×U.S. EditionPart of HuffPost Politics. ©2022 BuzzFeed, Inc. All rights reserved.×AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement“To him, it was a political ploy, a political game and he controlled every part of it.”- Cecilia Tkaczyk, former New York state senatorDemocrats in the legislature had long wanted to enshrine federal abortion rights into state law and pass other feminist legislation. But Republican control of the state Senate continually stopped them ― and Cuomo seemed, at best, noncommittal about helping Democrats retake the state Senate.In 2012, Cuomo allowed state Senate Republicans to their own districts, even as Republican governors across the country were drawing districts to favor the GOP as well. He could have vetoed their plan, but he instead.AdvertisementIn addition, around the same time Tkaczyk won her upset victory in 2012, the Independent Democratic Conference, a small group of conservative Democrats in the state Senate, was hammering out a power-sharing agreement with the chamber’s Republicans. Tkaczyk’s win ensured the Democrats a one-seat numerical majority in the state Senate, notwithstanding the pro-GOP gerrymandering. But in a pattern that would repeat itself on at least one other occasion over the next five years, the IDC and another renegade Democratic state senator, Simcha Felder, would by aligning with Republicans.Cuomo reportedly gave the IDC’s formation his . At the very least, he had the political power to nudge them back into the mainstream Democratic fold, but chose not to do so as he prepared to face down a more robust primary challenge from Cynthia Nixon.What’s more, in order to earn the New York WFP’s endorsement in 2014, Cuomo promised to campaign for vulnerable state Senate Democrats.Tkaczyk told HuffPost that the governor did nothing significant to help and seemed irritated that she had won in the first place. During a 2013 meeting of upstate lawmakers in Syracuse where Cuomo made a surprise appearance, Tkaczyk recalls him going around the room and complimenting every lawmaker there except her, whom he ignored.Advertisement“He went down the row and talked glowingly about every senator, skipped over me, and kept going,” she said, noting that she was seated between two Republicans.The entire experience affirmed for Tkaczyk what many female lawmakers, journalists and activists have since echoed: that Cuomo uses women’s rights and feminist rhetoric as a sword against enemies and a shield against critics, rather than because he is sincerely committed to the cause.As Rebecca Traister noted in , Cuomo’s top aide Melissa DeRosa pointed to Cuomo’s work to “further women’s rights, to expand protections for women in the workplace, maternal health, reproductive health” as to the sexual harassment allegations against him. After Tkaczyk’s re-election loss in 2014, she decided to take a page out of Cuomo’s book and play a petty game of her own.AdvertisementChatting with her girlfriends one night over glasses of wine, she plotted to try taking over the WEP to troll Cuomo.“For a guy to start a political party called the Women’s Equality Party was just absurd,” she said.Tkaczyk figured out that a majority of the WEP’s candidates had had to sign off on the party’s rules. But only two out of the four WEP candidates from the 2014 election cycle signed off: Cuomo and Hochul.So in August 2015, Tkaczyk submitted a new set of party rules that made her chair of the party. She at the time that she was “making sure women are running” the Women’s Equality Party. (While the party’s treasurer was a woman, Tkaczyk noted that candidates seeking endorsements from the party were instructed to contact Cuomo’s office.)“To him, it was a political ploy, a political game and he controlled every part of it,” Tkaczyk told HuffPost.Initially, a state Supreme Court judge with Tkaczyk, but Cuomo’s allies won on appeal and she decided to stop pursuing the matter.AdvertisementOver the course of its brief existence, the WEP appeared to be best known for spawning a with pink streaks on it with which Cuomo and Hochul, now his lieutenant governor, could tour the state.Cuomo financed the party with loans from his campaign accounts, and the skeletal “party” ordered its priorities accordingly. Endorsing Cuomo allies took precedence over endorsing women, according to a May 2018 report in The . For example, the WEP endorsed DuWayne Gregory over Liuba Grechen Shirley in the Democratic primary to take on then-Rep. Peter King in a Long Island district in 2018. Shirley made history when she successfully the Federal Election Commission to allow her to use campaign funds to pay for child care, but Gregory, a Suffolk County legislator, came recommended by the WEP’s “state committee person.” (Shirley ultimately won the nomination and lost to King in the general election.)In the end, the WEP went out with a whimper after just three election cycles. Cuomo received on the WEP ballot line in the 2018 general election. In accordance with state law, the poor showing cost the party its place on the ballot. No one has tried to revive the party since.Given her own experiences with Cuomo’s pettiness, Tkaczyk was not surprised to learn that Cuomo is accused of coming on to female staffers. “He doesn’t do anything that’s not intentional. That’s my experience with his behavior,” Tkaczyk said. “The WEP is an example of that behavior. It was an absurd thing to do and yet he did it.”AdvertisementBut she takes no pleasure in the scandal, even if it eventually forces Cuomo to be held accountable for his actions.“I’m really disturbed that this is what it takes, because this is harming women,” she said. “I’m not joyful at all.”Suggest a correctionNewsletter Sign UpHuffPost's top politics stories, straight to your inbox.Successfully Subscribed!Realness delivered to your inbox

×U.S. EditionPart of HuffPost Politics. ©2022 BuzzFeed, Inc. All rights reserved.×AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement“To him, it was a political ploy, a political game and he controlled every part of it.”- Cecilia Tkaczyk, former New York state senatorDemocrats in the legislature had long wanted to enshrine federal abortion rights into state law and pass other feminist legislation. But Republican control of the state Senate continually stopped them ― and Cuomo seemed, at best, noncommittal about helping Democrats retake the state Senate.In 2012, Cuomo allowed...

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danielmarans

Senior politics reporter,  @HuffPost . daniel.marans@huffpost.com

Daniel Marans

At HuffPost, we put people first. We believe that real life is news, and news is personal.

Andrew Cuomo Once Created A Fake Women's Rights Party As Political Revenge

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