NYC mayor shown holding severed head of Lady Liberty in mocking banner
“He hates the true New Yorkers … people who built this city,” the artist says about Bill de Blasio
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Some New Yorkers’ frustration with Mayor Bill de Blasio appeared to reach a boiling point Tuesday – with a banner of the mayor unfurled over the Staten Island Expressway.
The banner showed the Democrat wearing a T-shirt of the late Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara and holding the severed head of Lady Liberty.
“It’s what he’s doing to New York, he’s severing the head of the greatest city on Earth,” Scott LoBaido, the artist behind the banner, told the New York Post.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}MAYORS OF PORTLAND, CHICAGO, ATLANTA, OTHER BIG CITIES DEMAND 'FEDERAL FORCES' WITHDRAW
“New York has turned into a sh—hole because of this guy,” LoBaido continued. “He hates the true New Yorkers – police officers, firefighters … people who built this city.”
The artist’s banner appeared on an overpass at Exit 13B of the expressway during the afternoon rush hour, the Post reported.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Among those retweeting images of the banner was Nicole Malliotakis, a Republican state lawmaker from Staten Island who is running for a U.S. House seat in November.
Malliotakis previously was the Republican nominee who ran against de Blasio for mayor of the Big Apple in 2017.
In a previous Twitter message on Tuesday, Malliotakis retweeted photos of New York government buildings covered with graffiti from recent riots. The images included police officers depicted as pigs as well as the “A” logo used by anarchists, stylized to also resemble the communist hammer and sickle.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}“@NYCMayor is perfectly fine with the anti-police graffiti and communist hammer & sickle spraypainted on #NYC government buildings . . . heck, he may have spraypainted them himself. Disgusting,” Malliotakis wrote.
De Blasio, 59, now serving his second term as mayor of the nation’s largest city, is among a group of Democratic mayors across the nation who have been taking heat from their constituents – as well as from President Trump and other Republicans – for their handling of the coronavirus pandemic, the rioting and other unrest that has followed the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, and recent spikes in shootings and other crimes.
One of de Blasio's staunchest critics has been U.S. Rep. Lee Zeldin, R-N.Y., who has called for de Blasio to be removed from office.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}“I don't believe New York City is going to survive the remainder of Mayor de Blasio’s term in office," Zeldin told Fox News earlier this month.
Other Democratic mayors facing similar criticism include Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan and Portland, Ore., Mayor Ted Wheeler.
Earlier this month, President Trump took aim at de Blasio after reports that New York City planned to slash the city’s police budget by $1 billion and paint a “Black Lives Matter” mural in the street along Fifth Avenue, directly outside Trump Tower.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}“NYC is cutting Police $’s by ONE BILLION DOLLARS, and yet the @NYCMayor is going to paint a big, expensive, yellow Black Lives Matter sign on Fifth Avenue, denigrating this luxury Avenue,” Trump tweeted this month.
De Blasio – who later helped Black Lives Matter activists paint the mural – responded to the president by implying that Trump was a racist.
“Here’s what you don’t understand,” de Blasio wrote. “Black people BUILT 5th Ave and so much of this nation. Your ‘luxury’ came from THEIR labor, for which they have never been justly compensated. We are honoring them. The fact that you see it as denigrating your street is the definition of racism.”
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Tuesday’s outpouring of frustration against de Blasio came one day after another New York Democrat, former state Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, was sentenced to more than six years in prison after being convicted on corruption charges.
Silver, whose district covered lower Manhattan in New York City, was arrested Jan. 22, 2015, just three weeks after being elected Assembly speaker for the eleventh time. He resigned a few days later.