Did Republican Lee Zeldin conspire with a district attorney to throw an Iraq war vet under the bus as a campaign ploy?
On Monday, Congressman Lee Zeldin held a press conference denouncing cash bail laws that reportedly allowed a man who attacked him at a campaign event be released on his own recognizance.
David Jakubonis, 43, was quickly apprehended after lunging at the gubernatorial candidate at a campaign event Thursday. He was charged with attempted assault in the second degree, which isn’t eligible for cash bail. After the uproar over his release, Jakubonis was arrested again on federal assault charges.
“Political violence has no place in any part of this electoral process,” Zeldin told Newsmax.
The “dangerous weapon” described in mainstream accounts is a key chain called “My Kitty plastic self-defense keychain."
It’s marketed to women and, sure, in certain circumstances it might cause some damage, but this wasn’t those circumstances. Footage shows Zeldin easily warding off his would-be assailant, who is then piled on by police, handcuffed and zip-tied (footage also shows Jakubonis trying to grab the microphone rather than attack Zeldon and only pointed “My Kitty plastic self-defense keychain” once Zeldin was shoving him off. He claims that he had no idea who Zeldin is but had thought he’d overheard him bashing veterans. Jakubonis, like Zeldin, is an Iraq war veteran and says he’d recently had an alcohol relapse.
Despite the questionable efficacy of a “My Kitty plastic self-defense keychain” as a weapon of assassination, legal professionals questioned the initial charges against Jakubonis as oddly lenient.
Soon enough, it was revealed that the charges had been filed in Sandra Doorley’s office, who is co-chair of Zeldin's campaign.
“Inconvenient fact: The Monroe County DA could have chosen to charge him with a violent felony, which would have qualified the case for potential bail, and pushed to keep him behind bars,” observed reporter Errol Louis on Twitter. “Sandra Doorley, the DA, is a co-chair of Mr. Zeldin’s campaign.”
Others observed that Zeldin was tweeting away suspiciously soon after the attack that his assailant would be out due to bail reform.
I reached out to Doorley’s office to ask if she’d been part of the charging decision and any conflicts of interest that might arise in her position as DA and a co-chair of Zeldin’s campaign. They said, “Unlike other jurisdictions, in Monroe County police agencies file criminal charges and we receive paperwork after the charges are filed,” Doorley’s spokesperson to me. “The following morning, DA Doorley decided that she intends to recuse herself because of her pre-existing relationship with Mr. Zeldin. While she is not active in his campaign, she does consider him a friend. She agreed at one point to assist on his campaign but stepped away after discussions with the District attorney’s association of the State of NY in the spring.”
According to the NY District Attorneys Code of Political Activity, district attorneys and their assistants generally may not endorse political candidates. The New York State Bar Association concludes that it is not ethically proper for a district attorney to attend social or political functions except when it involves their own re-election campaign, and according to the New York Post, Doorley was in attendance at the Thursday rally.
There’s an innocent explanation, of course: maybe Doorley was too busy hanging out at the campaign event to oversee the charges herself. Even in that overly rosy scenario though, you’ve still got the above conflicts of interest. And since they’re such good friends, surely Doorley might have informed Zeldin by now that his assailant’s release has nothing to do with bail reform.
But frankly, the Occam’s razor explanation is that Zeldin and his co-chair conspired to use Jakubonis in a way that would lead to his immediate release and serve as fodder for Zeldin’s campaign message.
Let that sink in: if this is what happened, they are throwing a mentally unstable Iraq war vet in the spotlight and under the bus to score political points. What’s the special place in Hell for that? I reached out to Zeldin’s office asking if the congressman was aware that Doorley’s oversaw the charges that led to Jakubonis’ release.
I doubt Zeldin is going to unseat Hochul. But every bit of propaganda about bail reform infects the discourse and helps roll back reforms that millions rely on.