Photo: Getty Images North America
After a lifetime of public service and legal expertise, a seasoned statesman like Deputy Mayor Randy Mastro would seem like a logical choice for an unexperienced incoming mayor to select for a role on his staff. Instead, New York Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani bluntly told Mastro his services as first deputy mayor would not be needed in the Mamdani administration. Mastro may have gotten the last word, however; the former Chief of Staff and Deputy Mayor for Rudy Giuliani told the socialist mayor-in-waiting that he will officially resign at midnight on December 31st- exactly one minute before he assumes the highest office in the Big Apple. Mastro has gone on record before, saying in no uncertain terms that he won’t work with a socialist; he appeared on 710 WOR’s Mendte in the Morning program to lambast Mamdani’s recent declaration that he will allow the homeless to set up encampments in New York City.
Mastro told host Larry Mednte that Mamdani’s policy abandons basic human decency towards the homeless: “It’s not humane to leave the homeless out on the streets. People who can’t help themselves need our help. It’s bad for their quality of life. It’s bad for New Yorkers’ quality of life to leave homeless encampments out on the street. Hopefully some common sense will ultimately prevail, but this is just bad policy all the way around. It hasn’t worked in other cities that have allowed these encampments. It’s not good for the homeless population that’s left out on the streets, particularly as we approach the dead of winter, and Mayor Adams has had the right policy, which is to try and intervene to get these folks, many of them suffering from mental illness or addiction problems, the help they need.”
Mastro then recounted an incident that touched upon Mamdani’s arrogance to illustrate why he submitted his letter of resignation: “Mayor-elect Mamdani’s team sent us a list of 179 individuals that they intended to replace come January 1. Incredibly, the mayor and I were on that list- neither of us intended to ever, or could, continue to serve! And I had said many times that I’ll never work for a socialist, so I felt it was the right thing to do to set the record straight, that I was resigning, effective midnight December 31, and that we would be leaving together, Eric Adams and Randy Mastro.”
Photo Credit: Getty Images