Heard Around Town
Boylan apologizes if coworkers ‘had a bad experience with me’
Lindsey Boylan is a leading candidate in Tuesday’s New York City Council special election, endorsed by Mayor Zohran Mamdani.
Former New York City Comptroller Brad Lander, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and City Council Member Alexa Avilés campaign with Lindsey Boylan (second from right). Jeff Coltin/City & State
On her way into voting in the New York City Council special election Tuesday morning, Lindsey Boylan said she was sorry if anyone felt she was an abusive boss.
Boylan went public with accusations of sexual harassment against Gov. Andrew Cuomo in 2020, saying he kissed her on the lips and joked about playing strip poker while she worked in his administration, among other complaints, which he denied. Immediately after Boylan spoke out, Cuomo staffers leaked reports showing that Boylan herself had received three workplace complaints while she was serving as chief of staff at Empire State Development – and resigned in 2018 after being confronted with the complaints.
“Each described that Ms. Boylan had been verbally abusive and treated administrative staff as if they were children,” Cuomo’s lawyers wrote in a 2021 memo.
City & State asked Boylan if it was true she resigned under pressure after facing complaints. “No, I resigned because I couldn't stay there anymore,” she said. “But if someone had a bad experience with me, I apologize. That was a very difficult period of my life.”
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani has endorsed Boylan and he campaigned with her Tuesday morning in Chelsea, praising her “as one of the first people who had the courage to stand up to who was then the most powerful man in the state.”
He brushed off a question about the workplace abuse allegations against her. “I'm really excited about Lindsey’s candidacy. And I think the thing that makes me excited about her candidacy is, frankly, the fact that I got to know her before she was running for anything,” he said about the three-time candidate. “I got to know her when she stood up, and it was quite a lonely time.”
Boylan is running for a seat on the west side of Manhattan vacated by Erik Bottcher after he won a state Senate seat. Bottcher is backing his former chief of staff Carl Wilson for the seat. Also running are Layla Law-Gisiko and Leslie Boghosian Murphy.
While the special election is nonpartisan, all four have filed petitions to run again in the Democratic primary in June.