Aide to Corey Johnson runs for seat held by Joe Crowley's chief of staff
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Queens County Young Democrats President Breeana Mulligan, an aide to Council Speaker Corey Johnson, is running for Democratic district leader in Queens. Photo courtesy of Mulligan
By David Brand
A race for Democratic district leader in Western Queens has turned into a who’s who of New York City political connections and rivalries, as an aide to Council Speaker Corey Johnson tries to win a position vacated by a former chief of staff for ex-Rep. Joe Crowley. At the same time, a faction of reform-minded Democrats — including the past campaign manager for Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — have drafted candidates to challenge for the same position.
Breeana Mulligan, Johnson’s first deputy press secretary, is running for the Astoria seat held by district leader Anne Marie Anzalone, who is stepping down. She worked for Crowley throughout his tenure in Congress.
As long-time chair of the Queens County Democratic Party, Crowley helped Johnson — Mulligan’s boss — secure the Speakership in 2018.
Mulligan is president of the Queens County Young Democrats and said she tends to work behind the scenes, but she wants to ensure younger Democrats have a voice in the party structure.
“I had to think about [running] very carefully,” she said. “It’s a surreal experience for me, but I wanted to get more involved in the party.”
The unpaid position is one of four district leader seats in Assembly District 36; two others are held by State Sen. Michael Gianaris and Councilmember Costa Constantinides. Queens has a total of 72 Democratic district leaders — two men and two women representing each of the county’s 18 assembly districts, which are separated into A and B zones. They vote on party decisions, like who to designate for judgeships, and they run political clubs with some influence in the county party. In practice, however, many clubs rarely meet.
Mulligan has received the backing of the Queens County Democratic Party at a time when a coalition of progressive Democrats known as the New Reformers are preparing a slate of district leader candidates to challenge the party picks. The New Reformers want to overhaul the county organization, which they say is too insular with power too centralized. Vigie Ramos Rios, who steered Ocasio-Cortez’s 2018 campaign to defeat Crowley, co-founded the group.
Though Mulligan will appear on county organization petitions, she said she wants to unite a larger coalition of Democrats, including left-wing progressives and the very people running insurgent challengers against county-backed candidates.
“I want to work with everybody — the county organization, the New Reformers,” she said. “I work with everyone regardless of their ideology.”
Mulligan grew up in Bayside and worked for Councilmember Paul Vallone before beginning her role in the speaker’s office. She now lives in Astoria.
She said she has no interest in running for City Council in District 22, which overlaps with the Assembly district where she is campaigning for district leader. The council seat will open in 2021 because Constantinides is term-limited. It could open as early as March 24 if Constantinides wins the special election for Queens borough president.
The New Reformers are actively campaigning against party-backed district leader candidates, but co-founder Martha Ayon said Mulligan nevertheless represents a younger cohort of candidates vital to the party’s future.
“It has been the New Reformers’ mantra to include more young people, more women, more people of color, more LGBT individuals into the party,” said Ayon, a Queens political strategist.
She encouraged the county organization to include more members of the Queens Young Democrats, who for years have run ground game for candidates. Mulligan regularly made phone calls and canvassed for Crowley, for example. She also contributed to his 2018 campaign, according to Federal Election Commission filings.
Mulligan happened to file with the Board of Elections on Jan. 30, exactly two years after Johnson met with Anzalone — Crowley’s former chief of staff — for dinner in Sunnyside, according to his 2018 schedule. The meeting that highlights Crowley’s recent influence on New York City politics and high-profile races
Ayon turned her focus to the 2021 mayoral contest and said Mulligan winning the district leader seat could provide some local help to Johnson in his bid to succeed Mayor Bill de Blasio.
“Obviously there’s a benefit to it — having a staffer within [the party organization], and hypothetically in the room and having access to information would be useful to him,” she said.
One Democratic party insider said Mulligan’s bid to become a district leader in the county Democratic party — an organization unpopular among many progressives, especially in Western Queens — could be a “headache” for Johnson.
Another party member said Mulligan’s connections to Johnson and Crowley likely had little influence on her bid for district leader, but did raise another question ahead of his 2021 mayoral run.
“The question is, would he rather have County’s support or not?” the party member said.
Johnson’s spokesperson Jennifer Fermino dismissed the political speculation.
“He’s focused on being Speaker right now,” Fermino said.
“What Council employees do in their own time is up to them,” she added. “The Speaker is not involved in this race.”
