Golden: IDC Will Still Unite With the GOP Next Year

Will Bredderman

Republican State Senator Martin Golden claimed yesterday that the breakaway Independent Democratic Conference would undoubtedly caucus again with the GOP in the upper house of the state legislature next year–mainly because shared principles and anger over continued primary challenges to IDC leader State Senator Jeffrey Klein and State Senator Tony Avella.

At the celebration of the opening of his re-election campaign office, Mr. Golden told the Observer that the agreement between the IDC and the mainline Democrats forged in June would not survive past November, when he predicted that the Republicans would recover the majority in the State Senate. Mr. Golden, a Brooklyn lawmaker, added that the five members of the IDC were enraged that former Councilman Oliver Koppell and ex-Comptroller John Liu had not dropped their challenges to Mr. Klein and Mr. Avella respectively, which Mr. Golden claimed was supposed to have been part of the deal.

“They promised there would be no primaries, and they didn’t keep their promise,” Mr. Golden said. “I think Senator Klein is quite upset and that Senator Savino is quite upset and that the rest of the IDC is quite upset.”

Read more at http://observer.com/2014/09/golden-idc-will-still-unite-with-the-gop-next-year/#ixzz3CMm3xg9g