A week ago, I reported that State Senator Neil D. Breslin (D-Albany County) would face his second primary challenge in as many years from the same number of opponents.
Today, one of his opponents, Luke Martland, has sent out the first press release recieved by this blogger since signing up to recieve notifactions from Senator Breslin himself, candidate Martland, and the other guy running, Tim Carney.
The release, quoted in it's entirety below, calls out Senator Breslin for both flip-flopping on his promise to not cut education and for making the actual cuts to education spending. The only changes I make are hard returns for ease of reading and adding some italics for emphasis where appropriate:
Martland Blasts Breslin for Flip Flopping on Education Budget Cuts
(Albany) - State Senate candidate Luke Martland today blasted State Senator Neil Breslin (D-46th) for “Flip Flopping” on a commitment Breslin made to stop cuts to school aid.
On March 8th Breslin signed a letter to Governor Paterson stating that he would not vote for any cuts to education. Only two weeks later, on March 22nd, he voted for a budget that cut school aid by $1.4 billion.
When asked by CBS 6 News “what changed” he responded “…ahhh, I’m on a team, and the team is the Democratic Conference and uh … there needs to be cuts in education and I think that was the starting point of me saying no cuts.” He also said his letter was merely an “overstatement” designed to establish a “bargaining position.”
New York Post State Editor and CBS6 commentator Fred Dicker said that Breslin’s Flip Flop is an outright lie. Dicker said Breslin apparently thinks “…that he can just lie outright, and that’s just a political strategy .... In fact that is what is going on we are being lied to all the time..”
“Neil Breslin voted for devastating cuts in school aid because his bosses in New York City told him to,” said Martland, who graduated from Albany High School and is challenging Breslin in the Democratic primary. “The party bosses say “flip” and Breslin flips, they say “flop” and he flops. This shows why Neil Breslin is one of the reasons that New York State government is dysfunctional and ethically corrupt. It is time for a change in Albany.”
“If I had signed a letter saying I could not support massive cuts to school aid, I would not have broken my promise and then voted for the cuts,” said Martland, whose mother taught at the Academy of the Holy Names and whose father was a professor at UAlbany. “I’m not a flip flopper, I’m a fighter,” said Martland, who has spent his career in criminal justice as an assistant district attorney, assistant attorney general and working for the Department of Criminal Justice Services.
Luke Martland’s stand on issues can be found at
The presser actually links to Martland's main page; here's the link to the issues page itself. Martland has broken things down to four issues (Ethics, State Debt, Jobs, and Taxes) as well as Nine Promises all relating to reforming the way the Senate operates (none of which mention having to change any rules in order to do so).
To be fair, you can check out Breslin's campaign site as well. But at the time of this writing, it's just a patriotic banner with the simplistic slogan "Our community, our values, our voice, our Senator" that says "Thank you" below.
This Democratic primary voter says "Thanks, but no thanks" here, and is glad to see at least one primary opponent getting things started this heavy, this early.
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