Mayor Bill de Blasio’s presumptive Republican challenger demanded Monday that he “come clean with the taxpayers” about the cost of bringing his NYPD bodyguards to Germany for his big speech at a G20 protest rally.
Staten Island Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis also called for a full accounting of de Blasio’s previous trips to “Presidential primary hotspots Iowa and Vermont, and other locations for events not related to his official duties as mayor.”
Malliotakis called de Blasio’s travel “the escapades of a politician in search of a national candidacy.”
“Over the past few days, New Yorkers have witnessed this misguided arrogance on full display as the Mayor jetted off to Hamburg, Germany in search of an audience willing to listen to a speech were he extolled the diversity of the riders of our subways, while failing to mention the crisis our transit system faces and the so called ‘summer of hell’ that starts today,” she said.
The group “Hamburg Shows Attitude” has said it paid for de Blasio and three staffers to visit Germany so Hizzoner could deliver the keynote address at its demonstration Saturday.
De Blasio also took advantage of the trip and spent time with his son, Dante, a Yale University student who’s pursuing a summer internship in Berlin.
City Hall referred questions about the cost of the mayor’s security detail to the NYPD, which said, “We do not discuss the specific security [arrangements] for dignitaries, including the mayor, the NYPD protects.”
But in February, Police Commissioner James O’Neill sent a letter to members of Congress requesting reimbursement for the $25.7 million the NYPD and FDNY spent on “presidential-level security” for Trump Tower and the First Family between the election and inauguration of President Trump.
O’Neill also pegged future costs for the NYPD at $308,000 a day when Trump is in town.
In May — after Congress earmarked $120 million for New York City and other state and local governments — de Blasio personally thanked US Reps. Carolyn Maloney (D-Manhattan) and Nita Lowey (D-Westchester) at a news conference.
“We all know $24 million from Election Day to inauguration -– between $100,000 and $150,000 a day ever since. We’re talking about ultimately tens of millions of dollars that was on the line,” the mayor said at the time.
A spokeswoman for de Blasio’s re-election campaign said: “The mayor will proudly serve a full, four-year term if the people see fit to select him.”