Mayor Bill de Blasio says the transit union’s demand for an investigation into his secretive deals to kill the city’s horse-carriage trade is “just foolish.”
Sorry, Bill — the union has a good idea.
Well, basically: Transport Workers Union President John Samuelson wants Attorney General Eric Schneiderman to head the probe. Likely better choices? Manhattan DA Cy Vance, who has no apparent political ambition at the moment, or US Attorney Preet Bharara, a proven corruption-fighter.
But someone should be looking into the mayor’s obsession with ridding the city of horse carriages — and whether some special obligation to reward special-interest donors is behind it.
Granted, the mayor and Samuelson have had their differences on other issues. And the union has been cozying up to de Blasio’s rival, Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
But the TWU’s charges have plain merit.
After all, this was never about animal rights, for all the claims to the contrary.
Those who sank money into de Blasio’s 2013 campaign — and worked to sink his chief rival, Christine Quinn — were real estate developers with eyes on the West Side parcels that house the horse stables.
Asked about that link Monday, the mayor insisted he doesn’t “think it’s an issue.”
Sorry: Lots of New Yorkers don’t buy it. Why is he so reluctant to say he just can’t deliver on this promise?
De Blasio also claims the press is making too much of his anti-horse-carriage crusade, telling reporters to “really think about what’s important.”
But it was Bill de Blasio who called the issue so urgent that he vowed to ban the horse carriages on “Day One” of his mayoralty.
And it’s de Blasio who won’t take no for an answer — coming back this year to a fight that humiliated him last year. And then, the moment his latest “deal” collapsed in flames, immediately setting out to find an alternative.
Something strange is going on here — so strange, the issue deserves a closer look.