One on One with Gillen and D'Esposito

                                                                            

                                                                   Newsday debate

Longtime adversaries and current opponents for the District 4 Congressional seat,  Democrat Laura Gillen and  and Republican Anthony D'Esposito faced-off in a Newsday debate that aired today.

They were surprisingly civil to each other.

Gillen, a lawyer and "a mom", stunned the political world in 2017 by beating a Republican incumbent to become the first Democratic Hempstead Town Supervisor in a hundred years. She served for two years before losing her bid for re-election to Republican Don Clavin.

D'Esposito, a retired NYC police detective and former Island Park fire department chief,  was and still is a member of the mostly Republican Hempstead Town Board.

The two repeatedly clashed.

But the worst thing Gillen had to say today about D'Esposito in their debate was,  "Either Mr. D'Esposito is confused or he is misleading you," in reference to an energy program that Gillen proposed in 2019 and D'Esposito voted down.

D'Esposito's most cutting remark about the former supervisor: "Laura Gillen is on the wrong side of every issue that's facing the individuals who live in the 4th Congressional District."

During the debate, Gillen again reiterated her two main campaign issues: protecting women's right to abortions and enacting stricter gun control laws.

The state Democratic party apparently believes those two issues will lead to victories in November, at least in blue New York, because all its candidates are focusing on them.

For example, a recent mailing for Gillen by the state Democratic committee again stressed abortion rights and claimed D'Esposito will vote for a national a national abortion ban:                                                                      
                                                                                       

D'Esposito said today, " I would never support a nationwide abortion ban." He said the U.S. Supreme Court sent the issue back to the states. "In New York, nothing is changing. It is not on the ballot in November. .... Right now in New York state, women's reproductive rights are protected."

At the same time Gillen's abortion rights mailer went out, D'Esposito sent another attack against cashless bail laws enacted by the Democratic majority in Albany, which he contends Gillen supported.

Gillen maintains she has never supported cashless bail nor defunding police.

"There is no daylight between me and Mr. D'Esposito on two things: we are both against the cashless bail law, " she said today. "I spoke against it when I was an elected Democratic official, going against my own party..."

"We are both in favor of fully funding our police force to keep our communities safe. I'm raising four kids here. I want my community to be safe."

Gillen made no mention of her allegations two weeks ago that D'Esposito's "vicious smear campaign" about her position on cashless bail and defunding police had "incentivized his extremist followers" to threaten, harass and chase her down, even "rally a mob to come to my house endangering my family." 

She presented no proof and D'Esposito denied it.

But in today's debate D'Espositio widened his focus from cashless bail to blaming Gillen's party and Democratic President Joe Biden for soaring inflation, empty store shelves, baby formula shortages. the southern border crisis and rising crime.

National polls show economic issues are the top concern among voters followed by worries about crime.

Neither Gillen nor D'Esposito lost their temper today.

That was unlike the anger Gillen sometimes expressed when she was town supervisor,  heading an often uncooperative seven- member board that included only one other Democrat.

In 2019, Gillen's then- chief of staff Jim Laccarruba was caught on a hot mic, talking to the town clerk while the board was in executive session over a dispute concerning a building department audit, explaining that he had warned Gillen against losing her temper:

"I told her already she better calm down," he said. "This doesn't benefit her at all when she gets mad. She looks horrible. Her eyes get big, she leans into the mic, her mouth gets wide..That's why I walked over and said, 'I warned you this was coming.' ..She can't help herself sometimes."