Harry Wilson calls Lee Zeldin, aide ‘scumbags’ in mistakenly sent text
Trailing in the polls appears to be getting to GOP gubernatorial candidate Harry Wilson.
Wilson bitterly blasted front-runner Lee Zeldin and a campaign aide as “scumbags” in a text message — and then accidentally sent it to his rival, The Post has learned.
Ahead of Tuesday’s primary elections, Wilson fumed over getting called out for condemning an attack on fellow GOP hopeful Andrew Giuliani’s dad, former Mayor Rudy Giuliani, while not saying anything about a Zeldin campaign sign getting defaced with a backward swastika and a slang reference to murder.
The discrepancy was noted by a Zeldin campaign worker, Ben Weiner, who tweeted at Wilson on Sunday night, “But nothing about the antisemitic vandalism on a @leezeldin sign?”
Less than 20 minutes later, Wilson sent a text message seeking advice from two campaign consultants, Chris Schrimpf of Red Tack Strategy and Alexandra Wilkes.
“Look at what these scumbags are trying to do,” Wilson wrote, according to an iPhone screenshot.
“This Weiner punk is a paid staffer on Zeldin’s campaign. You can see where they’re going with this. Response?”
But Wilson — who was in third place in the two most recent polls — also inadvertently included Zeldin in the brash group message.
Zeldin on Monday called Wilson’s angry language “pretty shocking.”“It was absolutely, extremely poor judgment on Wilson’s part. That’s really how he’s defined his campaign,” Zeldin said.
In response to the text message from Wilson, Schrimpf advised the candidate to “ignore” Weiner’s tweet “and act like you haven’t seen and do a tweet like: More religious and political hate. This can not be tolerated.”
Wilson wrote back, saying, “I agree on approach but think it should be stronger (directionally stronger than the Rudy tweet).”
Zeldin on Monday accused Wilson of “doing that to cover himself after realizing that he had included me in his original text.”
Wilson ultimately wound up tweeting about that incident: “Hate like this has no place anywhere in New York.”
“These sentiments can not be tolerated, and I hope the Suffolk police bring the perpetrator to justice immediately,” he added.
On Monday, Wilson said in a text message, “Accidentally adding someone to a text message is an easy mistake to make.”
“Voting for 4 Cuomo budgets and all of his tax increases that have made life for New Yorkers a living hell? That’s no slip of the thumb,” he added in reference to Zeldin.
Wilkes declined to comment and Schrimpf didn’t immediately an inquiry.
