NEW YORK – Former Nebraska Sen. Bob Kerrey has thrown a cornhusker curveball at New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg – saying instead of helping Hizzoner keep his job, as promised, he might be out to take it himself.
Kerrey backed away from his offer to head “Democrats for Bloomberg,” then let slip he has his own designs on Gracie Mansion.
The could-be carpetbagger, president of the New School University, didn’t tell Team Bloomberg of the about-face before floating his mayoral trial balloon in The New York Times Sunday.
“No one from the campaign has spoken to him,” Bloomberg campaign manager Kevin Sheekey said. “We haven’t spoken to him and the mayor is out of the country.”
Bloomberg was pitching the city’s bid for the 2012 Olympics in Berlin.
Kerrey, who played a key role on the federal Sept. 11 commission, complained that Bloomberg’s focus on the proposed West Side stadium is distracting him from lobbying Washington for more security funds. The blunt-talking former governor of Nebraska will make his decision over the next few days, his spokesman George Arzt said Sunday. But political observers predicted the 61-year-old Kerrey, who once dated actress Debra Winger, will leave city Democrats at the altar.
“Forget about it,” said Doug Muzzio, a Baruch College political science professor. “It’s like the periodic Bill Clinton-for-mayor thing. It ain’t going to happen. … It sounds like the musings of a guy who’s dissatisfied with his job.”
Meanwhile, the homegrown Democrats Kerrey would be elbowing aside were deferential to the gray-haired Vietnam hero.
“I agree with Bob Kerrey’s criticism of Mayor Bloomberg, and that’s the reason I’m running,” Fernando Ferrer said in a statement.
Reggie Johnson, spokesman for Gifford Miller, said the City Council speaker “has an enormous amount of respect for Bob Kerrey and agrees that the mayor’s almost single-minded focus on building a new stadium is the wrong choice for our city’s future.”
Anson Kaye, a spokesman for Rep. Anthony Weiner, said, “From the sounds of it, Bob Kerrey already has a candidate in this race – Anthony Weiner.”
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