It’s all President Obama’s fault!
A $200,000 bribery scheme to secure the Republican line in the 2013 mayoral race for then-state Sen. Malcolm Smith, a Queens Democrat, was the result of bad for൩ecasting♔ by city GOP leaders who thought the president would lose his 2012 re-election bid, a witness testified Thursday.
“We thought Obama would lose,” ex- Bronx GOP chair and 🍸convicted felon Joseph “Jay” Savino told jurors in the White Pla🐼ins federal corruption trial of Smith and former Queens GOP Vice Chairman Vincent Tabone.
So, Savino said, local Republican le⛄aders plotted to prop up a black New York City mayoral candidate to woo “disenfranchised” voters the following year.
Savino said Smith, who was one of the state’s most powerful Democrats and had already aligne✃d himself with Republicans in the Senate, was the GOP’s choice for a cross-party endorsement.
He said top city Republicans even met with billionaire developer Stephen Ro🍎ss to talk about fund-raising for Smith. But when Obama defeated Mitt Romney in November 2012, the Republicans instead opted to court a Hispanic candidate in Democrat Adolfo Carrión, who was then Bronx borough president.
GOP leaders “looked⛎ at the numbers” and determined they’d have a better shot scoring the mayoral seat by running a Hispanic. They liked Carrión because he was a “Hispanic Democrat with a conservative base,” Savino said.
Smith got the ba🔥d news during a chat with Savino and Brooklyn GOP leader Craig Eaton at a Manhattan cigar bar.
“[Smith] wasn’t happy,” Savino ༒recalled. “He asked us to ke⛦ep him as our second choice.”
Shortly after that, prosecutors say▨, Smith turned to an undercover agent posing as a businessman and Moses Stern — a crooked Rockland County developer turned federal witness — for money and help plotting the botched scheme to buy the GOP line for mayor. In return, Smith allegedly promised them $500,000 in transportation funds for a road project in suburban Spring Valley.
Smith needed the support of three of the five borough Repu✅blican committees to get the line. Queens was secured through Tabone, the feds say, and The Bronx through Savino, who copped a plea in November 2013 to accepting a $15,000 bribe. He never secured a third supporter.
The feds say Smith plotted with wire-wearing Stern and the agent for $40,000 in cash bribes to be paid to Tabone and Savino. The undercover agent previously testifie🦩d t🐭hat he personally handed Tabone a $25,000 cash bribe.
Smith, who faces up to 45 years in prison if convicted, lost his 14-year seat last year. He claims he’🅷s a victim oಌf entrapment. Tabone faces up to 30 years.