Mayoral challenger Danielle Tagger-Epstein fired back at the Journal News (publisher of LoHud.com) for its story Thursday, sending its editorial board a letter saying its paper published a “shoddy, irresponsible, and just plain wrong LoHud story” and defending her actions.
The following letter was provided to MyRye.com from the Tagger-Epstein campaign:
“Four years ago, one of my neighbors told me that he’d been the victim of discrimination and an unconstitutional arrest. So I looked into it because clearly that would be a problem – both in terms of the alleged misconduct itself and the potential multi-million dollar liability it opened our city up to. It turns out that multiple videos of the arrest backed up the core of my neighbors story, and the case against him was later dismissed. Anyone who marched for equal justice last summer should be able to understand that sometimes our police make mistakes. Acknowledging that doesn’t mean you hate police, it just means you want to build a better justice system.
It should have ended there, but instead Mayor Cohn and his supporters decided to launch an illegal smear campaign against me in a secret kangaroo court that he controlled that had no right to exist at all. And today, we see the latest bullying behavior from them with a shoddy, irresponsible, and just plain wrong LoHud story trying to make my efforts to resolve this mess seem sinister. For reader who would like the whole truth about this case, it can be found here https://casetext.com/case/people-v-rose-2020
I stand by my actions because they were the right thing to do. As a neighbor I vouched for Jonathan’s character. As an elected official I separately tried to discuss his disturbing allegations through the proper channels in City government. And as a concerned citizen I take gun violence extremely seriously: that’s why I worked on it as a Councilwoman and as a volunteer for Moms Demand Action.
However the Mayor’s team might try to spin this, the real story today isn’t about one unconstitutional search and arrest by our police department in 2017. It’s about Mayor Cohn’s abuse of power, while spending tens of thousands of taxpayer dollars to improperly co opt the Board of Ethics to try and settle a personal political vendetta. It’s about Mayor Cohn’s pattern of behavior trying to silence anyone who disagrees publicly with him. He tried to force me from office back then, and he’s trying to win a campaign today. It’s about his patronizing and toxic attitude towards independent thought. Now Mayor Cohn admits he’s doing it in the midst of a campaign because he wants me to “learn [my] lesson.”
It is deeply ironic that in falsely accusing me of interfering in an investigation, the Mayor did exactly that himself!
It’s clear that political insiders will go to any length to defend their own and win; that’s what’s going on here. They threatened me before I decided to run that they would try and use my commitment to ensuring fair and equal treatment for all against me. My steadfast commitment to a fair and safe community stands. I will not be intimidated. I will not back down.
Respectfully,
Danielle Tagger-Epstein
Candidate for Mayor, City of Rye”
Tagger-Epstein is a liar. Plain and simple. Her “friend” is a multi-millionaire straight white male, so how exactly was he discriminated against? Her “friend” was in a school zone with multiple illegal loaded handguns with multiple high capacity magazines right next to Rye High School and Rye Middle School. Her “friend” is a felonious criminal, armed to the teeth, driving around Rye High School/Middle School when he was caught with these loaded illegal guns. What exactly was her “friend” doing with all those weapons in a school zone, violating Federal gun free school zone laws as well. She then used her position on the Rye City Council to try and “persuade” the Commissioner of police to drop charges. Made repeated phone calls and sent a letter to the district attorney’s office to try and interfere and get criminal weapons charges dropped for a personal friend, making sure they were well aware of her position as a city council person. She then goes to the court hearing to stare down the officer as he testifies, which one can only assume would be an attempt to intimidate a witness and alter their testimony. Is this not obvious corruption and abuse of power on her part? And now she seeks even higher political office? How can anyone vote for a person who conducts themselves in such an inappropriate, corrupt, and criminal manner? It is a crime to use your position as a public official to try and obstruct the rule of law to do personal favors for “friends”. The only ones who acted “irresponsibly” are Tagger-Epstein and her “friend” who carries multiple illegal loaded handguns through a school zones while school is in session. Thank God the police stopped him, otherwise who knows what may have happened. But this is who she defends? This is how she “supports” the City of Rye Police? By making baseless claims that Rye police officers discriminate against others? Essentially calling them racists and criminals. This is a prime example of her poor judgement, between her choice of friends and her actions while holding public office.
I think Milton school should have been notified that a parent was stopped near the school with illegal weapons in his car. You had better believe I would have better protected my children who went to Milton school and fraternized with that man’s children both on my property and his. It makes me sick to my stomach that I inadvertently put my children in harms way by allowing them to be near a man with a stockpile of illegal, deadly weapons.
At the heart of this is what “the right thing to do” means to you as someone running for mayor . Do not state that as a fact because my opinion of the right thing to do when a town resident is found in MY CHILDRENS SCHOOL ZONE this day and age with the following is VERY different than yours.
– LOADED semi-automatic guns, bullets in chamber (ready to fire)
– high capacity bullet magazines
– 7 knives, including polymer-based knives made to elude metal detectors
– throwing stars
– brass knuckles
– Quick-clot which is used to staunch bleeding for gunshot and other serious wounds.
I applaud your loyalty to your friend in an extraordinarily difficult situation, your tenacity for what *you believe* is the right thing to do, I just find your judgement here to use your elected capacity in this specific instance to be unspeakably poor. Indeed, you violated the code of ethics and were censured for it.
Not looking to punish you again but knowing your judgement when life gets really real is important. And it’s important it was public before people vote.
Honestly, Politics these days just makes me feel dirty so I’m not incredibly involved yet but if I feel my babies, OUR babies were potentially put in the kind of harms way that haunts my/every parents worst nightmares, you better believe I will speak up.