Cops, CSEA snub Donnelly reelection bid

Daily Point

Surprise non-endorsements for Nassau DA Donnelly

While endorsements from law enforcement unions loom large in district attorney races, non-endorsements can be almost as visible, since prosecutors and police must interact so closely on a daily basis.

In a rare move, five weeks before the election, powerful unions representing Nassau County police officers and detectives are taking a pass on the county DA’s race, despite their vocal support four years ago for Republican incumbent Anne Donnelly.

Even more unusually, CSEA Local 830 on Monday took a big step further and backed Democrat Nicole Aloise against Donnelly. It’s the first time in more than a decade that the public sector union, the county’s largest, endorsed a DA candidate. A portion of its 8,000 county employees work in the DA’s office.

CSEA Local 830 president Kris Kalender told The Point in a statement: "Morale in the DA’s office has suffered under the current administration, with mismanagement and even the unprecedented use of a bot to take away work from our 200 members. Nicole Aloise is a highly skilled attorney with strong support from our membership who knew her as a prosecutor, and we believe she will restore professionalism and respect to the office."

Four years ago, the Nassau County Detectives’ Association Inc. and the Nassau County Police Benevolent Association endorsed Donnelly for the open seat against Democratic State Sen. Todd Kaminsky, who had voted to approve what became a controversial bail reform.

The DAI, with 1,200 active and retired members, has issued its list of endorsed candidates that includes Republican incumbents Bruce Blakeman for county executive, Elaine Phillips for comptroller and Maureen O’Connell for clerk, with similarly predictable GOP picks in the towns of Hempstead, North Hempstead and Oyster Bay. An endorsement in the DA’s race is conspicuously missing from that union’s announcement.

Bill Bourguignon, the DAI president, confirmed to The Point the union’s non-endorsement on Friday but declined to elaborate. Tom Shevlin, president of the PBA, with more than 4,500 active and retired members, was unavailable for comment.

No explanation for the unusual turnaround was available from either police union. One major clash emerged between Donnelly and the Nassau PD during her current term. It stemmed from the NCPD’s refusal to routinely hand over full disciplinary records to prosecutors as required by a 2019 state reform law involving the courts’ discovery process in criminal cases. By last year, however, it appeared that fight had been resolved as lawmakers in Albany, with Donnelly’s support, narrowed the discovery laws.

But in public forums and literature, Aloise, who herself quit Donnelly’s staff, has been painting a wider picture of dissension within the DA’s office where she says 90 prosecutors have resigned. "Once Anne Donnelly took office," Aloise has said, "it was no longer about justice, it was about her own agenda." Aloise also called Donnelly’s style "dictatorial."

The Police Benevolent Association of the New York State Troopers is supporting Aloise as well as unionized court officers.

Still, Donnelly’s camp boasts endorsements from other local organizations representing current and former police. These include the Sheriff’s Correction Officers Benevolent Association, the Superior Officers Association, the Association of Retired Police Officers and PBAs in Freeport and Lynbrook.

Nassau County Republican Committee chairman Joe Cairo replied to a request to the Donnelly campaign for comment on the endorsements and non-endorsements with a statement: "We are pleased with the broad-based support that the Nassau Republican team of candidates have received from local unions, including [in] the law enforcement community. We look forward to a great victory in November for the GOP slate." 

— Dan Janison dan.janison@newsday.com

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— Mark Nolan mark.nolan@newsday.com and Edward B. Colby edward.colby@newsday.com

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