Will NY Dems Say Anything About Rochester Mayor's Bust On Gun Charges?

A couple of months ago, Rochester Mayor Lovely Warren’s husband was arrested on gun and drug charges, but the mayor herself had repeatedly denied any involvement or awareness of her spouse’s alleged lawbreaking. Despite those pleas of ignorance, a grand jury has now returned several indictments against the mayor herself. Warren’s facing a felony charge of criminal possession of a firearm, as well as two counts of endangering the welfare of a child and failure to lock/secure firearms in a dwelling.

This is now the second felony charge for Warren, who was also indicted on campaign finance fraud last year, but this most recent arrest poses a much bigger problem for Democrats in New York than Warren’s alleged campaign-related crime. Politicians have their standard stock answer when one of their colleagues is accused of breaking election law; usually something like “these are troubling accusations, but I’ll reserve judgement until a jury has reached a verdict.”

I don’t think that’s going to fly here. Not only are we talking about a gun control champion getting busted for illegally possessing a firearm, but Warren’s arrest highlights the fact that under New York law, mere possession of an unlicensed handgun is supposed to result in prison time upon conviction. While establishment New York Democrats like Andrew Cuomo, Attorney General Letitia James, and NYC Democratic mayoral candidate Eric Adams are all now talking about the need to get tough on criminals, far-Left activists in the state are still demanding a “reimagining” of the criminal justice system itself. Warren’s charges highlight the split on among Democrats, and thanks to her relatively high profile in state politics, it makes it tough for New York pols to ignore her arrest.