Gay Marriage, a Billionaire and the NYS Senate

Golisano watching over the Senate . . .

In a move reminiscent of a parliamentary democracy — or a banana republic — rather than the dull party-line institution it normally is, Republicans in the state Senate took power from the Democrats today with the help of two “renegade” Democrats who switched sides in the leadership vote.

The State Senate was rocked today when two Democratic renegade senators broke from the party ranks and joined a surprise — and successful — move by Republicans to retake control of the 62-member chamber.

As 30 Democrats streamed out of the chamber, 30 Republicans and the two renegades remained and — despite lights being turned off, Internet service being shut down and a brief attempt by guards to clear the ornate chamber — wrestled control from the Democrats who took over the Senate in January after seven decades of GOP dominance.

The 32 lawmakers immediately elected Sen. Pedro Espada, a Bronx Democrat, as president of the body and Sen. Dean Skelos, a Nassau County Republican, as majority leader. Skelos had been majority leader when the Senate flipped to Democratic control six months ago.

There seem to be three reasons that Espada and Hiram Monserrate — both of NYC — might have chosen to desert their party, and all are troubling.  First is simple ambition.  Espada was set to become Senate president back in December as part of the original deal to make Malcolm Smith majority leader, but that deal fell apart.  This could just be Espada looking to get what he imagines to be his.

Secondly, there’s Tom Golisano.  The Florida billionaire, who spent millions securing the Democratic majority last fall, apparently helped engineer today’s coup.  He comes off looking something like Senator Palpatine here:

As the vote began, billionaire Tom Golisano entered the gallery on the Republican side with an entourage which included Steve Pigeon and Gary Parenti, who joked, “Look who’s here.” (Espada is an old friend of Pigeon, who also helped broker the discarded deal from last fall which would have made Espada majority leader under the Democrats.)

Angelo Aponte, secretary to the Senate Democrats, was heard confiding to someone in a hallway outside the Senate chamber that Golisano apparently threw a lot of money at the renegade Democrats.

They say you can tell a lot about a man by the friends he keeps.  Tom Golisano’s two top aides are Steve Pigeon and Larry Quinn.  Enough said.

The third possibility has to do with gay marriage.  The original deal that installed Malcolm Smith was almost derailed by opposition to gay marriage, and it’s been speculated that Smith only suceeded by promising not to bring the issue to a vote in the Senate. With the state Assembly passing a marriage equality bill, it could be that homophobic Democratic Senators wanted to prevent being forcved to choose between their caucus and their bigotry.

All of these possibilites suck.  It’s troubling that state government can essentially be derailed by the personal ambition of a few individuals.  It’s still more troubling for that to happen based on the whims of a billionaire who doesn’t even live in the state anymore.  But it’s even shittier if this is about denying rights to people based on who they fuck.

Tags: Dean Skelos, Gay Marriage, Larry Quinn, Malcolm Smith, New York, NYS Senate, Pedro Espada, Steve Pigeon, Tom Golisano