Democrat Madeline Singas, who was endorsed by the New York Times, has picked up momentum in her race against Republican Kate Murray for the Nassau Country District Attorney’s race, closing a six-point gap in the last month.
That was the result of a Newsday/News 12/Siena College survey that showed Murray, the Hempstead Town supervisor, still leads Singas, the acting Nassau DA 46-45 percent, essentially tied given the margin of error.
Nine percent of those asked said they are undecided leading up to the Nov. 3 election.
With so much at stake as the race intensified, the two took shots at each other as the campaign came into his last few critical days.
Singas joined several party members running in local races at the ninth Politics and Pancakes breakfast at The Harvest Diner in Westbury on Oct. 30 and subtly tried to get at her opponent.
“Experience matters when it comes to being the District Attorney, and you can’t count on a popular name,” Singas said, without naming Murray, Newday reported. “You have to have done the work before the people will vote for you. You need to be a prosecutor and not a politician.”
That came a few days after Murray lacerated Singas for what she called Singas’ “refusal to fight” diversion sentencing for drug dealers, the newspaper said.
Joined by county police union leaders, Murray talked about the New York City issue over a judge’s diversion into a drug-treatment program of the man accused of fatally shooting NYPD Officer Randolph Holder.
She said while city prosecutors objected to diverting the suspect in the Holder case that Singas’ office is too lenient about the program in her country.
Singas said recently that “diversion in this state is controlled by judges. It doesn’t matter if we scream and jump until we’re blue in the face.”
Citing state law that allows prosecutors to request hearings to protest diversion decisions, Murray said that Singas was wrongly characterizing her office as having no say.
“She is absolutely abdicating that privilege on behalf of the residents of Nassau County to offer an opinion,” Murray said.
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