Paladino, NYC Council settle ethics dispute over Islamophobic tweets

The New York City Council’s Standards and Ethics Committee agreed to end disciplinary proceedings against Council Member Vickie Paladino over her anti-Muslim tweets, and Paladino agreed to drop her lawsuit against the council as part of a new settlement reached Monday.

Under the agreement, Paladino must publicly put out a statement clarifying that she never intended to make any council member or staff feel unwelcome or unsafe, and she must delete the handful of posts she was investigated over. She will also be required to remove any mention of being a council member from her personal Twitter account and she’ll receive a slap on the wrist from Sandra Ung, the Standards and Ethics Committee chair. In exchange, the City Council is required to withdraw the disciplinary charge against Paladino “with prejudice,” meaning the committee can’t investigate her over those tweets again. Details of the settlement were published online Monday afternoon.

Neither of the involved parties are allowed to comment on the matter beyond Paladino and Ung each releasing a statement. According to the settlement, Paladino’s will read as follows: 

“The disciplinary charge against me has been withdrawn and I am withdrawing my lawsuit. To be clear, my personal social media posts were not directed at any council member or staff. I am responsible for the content, I never intended to make council members or staff feel unwelcomed or unsafe in their work environment. I send a heartfelt thank you to the court for facilitating the resolution.”

“I appreciate that CM Paladino took down her tweets,” Ung said in her statement. “I believe the resolution strikes the right balance between protection of council staff and the First Amendment liberties of council members. I have met with CM Paladino and told her that I did not approve of the content of her tweets.”

The agreement ends a tumultuous legal and disciplinary saga that’s spanned several months, pitting the Republican council member against City Council Speaker Julie Menin, many of her colleagues and the city Law Department. The settlement comes roughly a month after Manhattan Judge Sabrina Kraus encouraged Paladino and the City Council to reach an agreement outside of court. 

The conflict kicked off in March when the council’s Committee on Rules, Privileges, Elections, Standards and Ethics charged Paladino with disorderly conduct for five Islamophobic posts she made on X that they said violated the council rules and anti-harassment policy. Paladino promptly sued, seeking to halt the disciplinary process while arguing that speech from her personal social media account was protected by the First Amendment. She also claimed the City Council was targeting her for her conservative political beliefs. 

While the city’s Law Department sought to dismiss the lawsuit, Kraus ultimately upheld a hearing in April where she heard arguments from both parties. She’d declined to issue a decision at the time, but expressed doubts about some of the city’s arguments. 

The nine-member Standards and Ethics Committee met Monday to approve the settlement. Jim Walden, Paladino’s attorney, declined to comment on the settlement.

A City Council source with knowledge of proceedings said the legislative body opted to settle out of concern that the judge would side with Paladino – thus setting a “harmful” precedent. 

Jason Goldman, former chief of staff to then-Speaker Corey Johnson, said that the City Council was wise to settle given “the significant litigation risk.” “A ruling against the council could have severely weakened its authority to regulate member conduct and created a damaging precedent with largely unfettered behavior going forward,” he said. “This outcome protects the institution of the council, reinforces accountability standards and reflects responsible leadership by Speaker Menin.”

It’s unclear what sort of impact this will have on the City Council’s disciplinary process going forward. Judges have historically had little power over the legislative body’s internal process. 

And while Kraus never ended up making a ruling in this particular case, Paladino did successfully halt disciplinary procedures with her lawsuit. It’s possible that other council members facing consequences in the future could attempt to do the same. 

Without judicial intervention, she’d have been required to appear before the standards and ethics committee again and at the conclusion of that process, the committee could have ordered her to complete sensitivity or ethics training, censured her, fined her, or, most seriously, expelled her from the council. Any final verdict would have needed to then be approved by two-thirds of the 51-member council. As it was her first time being disciplined by the committee, the punishment likely wouldn’t have been anything as serious as expulsion or a fine. 

Both parties are likely to try and frame the outcome as a victory – Paladino for evading punishment and being forced to apologize and Menin and the committee for taking action against her in the first place despite the risk and lack of precedent.

“There was a real concern that continuing the case would result in a broader ruling that would waken the council’s ability to hold members accountable going forward,” said Democratic Council Member Lynn Schulman, who is not a member of the standards and ethics committee. “That’s the biggest thing for me.”