The mayoral race is turning vicious between Democrats Bill Thompson and Christine Quinn.
In his harshest statement yet, Thompson trashed Quinn — the City Council speaker — for presiding over the council during a budgetary scandal, as well as her flip-flop on term limits.
“There has been a pattern of questions surrounding Christine Quinn’s entire tenure as speaker,” Thompson told The Post. “From the phantom member-items scandal, to breaking her word to voters and throwing out term limits, to endorsements that are potentially tied to Speaker Quinn’s actions on legislation, this is a troubling trail that reeks of cynical, old-fashioned politics.”
He was responding to a specific question about an endorsement Quinn received this week from the Mason Tenders District Council — a union she sided with when she passed a controversial bill on reporting requirements last year. The bill requires substantially more reporting from developers that have city contracts.
Thompson — who narrowly lost to Mayor Bloomberg in 2009 — opposed that legislation.
The Mason Tenders pushed for the bill, which Bloomberg vetoed. Quinn and the council in turn overrode the mayor’s veto.
Mayoral contender Bill de Blasio, the public advocate, declined to comment on the connection between Quinn and the Mason Tenders.
Thompson’s attack hits Quinn on a particularly vulnerable issue: the so-called slush-fund scandal, which involved a federal probe into the longstanding practice of stashing away taxpayer money in phantom accounts to later fund pet projects.
Quinn was cleared in the initial probe, but the feds are still investigating abuse of the funds by individual council members under her watch. Thompson was comptroller during the member -item scandal.
For her part, Quinn said she was proud of the Mason Tenders endorsement. AndUnion President Mike McGuire defended the endorsement and took a shot at Thompson.
“We endorsed Chris because she has the best record and best ideas to help middle-class New Yorkers,” McGuire said. “We did not endorse Bill Thompson because his accomplishments just don’t measure up.”
Thompson’s ramped up criticism of Quinn comes as a new New York 1/Marist College survey showed the council speaker as the clear front-runner in the Democratic primary contest for mayor. The poll showed Quinn with 37 percent to 13 percent for Thompson, 12 percent for Public Advocate Bill de Blasio and 9 percent for current city Comptroller John Liu.
Thompson insiders claim the early polls ignore the support that Thompson, who is African-American, will receive in the black and Latino communities on primary day.
sgoldenberg@nypost.com
Gloves come off in Dem mayoral war
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Gloves come off in Dem mayoral war
