State Sen. Jamaal Bailey, the Bronx Democratic Party chairman and master of ceremonies for the evening, was surrounded at the dinner by local officials including Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie (83 A.D.), outgoing Bronx Borough President Ruben Díaz, Jr., City Councilwoman Vanessa Gibson (C.D. 16), the Democratic nominee for Bronx borough president, Assembly Member Michael Benedetto (A.D. 82) and City Councilman Mark Gjonaj (C.D. 13).

 

Former assemblyman and now senior VP for community affairs at Montefiore Medical Center, Marcos Crespo, and former State Sen. Jeff Klein were also seen at the event.

 

The new governor used the occasion to pay tribute to Bailey, who introduced her. Referring to the senator as “The Queen Maker,” she said, “He is responsible for ensuring that we now have five female council members heading off to City Hall.” Hochul added, “Thank you, Jamaal Bailey, for believing in women.”

 

She continued, “I’m going to be brief, because I know you all want to socialize, but here’s one message my friends, one message and you can take this to the bank. As your governor, I’m going to fight like hell for every one of you!”

 

Standing at one of three speaker podiums, Adams later addressed certain Bronx officials directly from across the room, saying, “Carl, Ruben, Vanessa, I cannot say enough about what you mean to me and this borough. When people were running, they wanted to be heard, but I wanted to be felt.”

 

As reported, Adams received strong support in the Bronx during his campaign stops across the borough before the June primary election, which he narrowly won, seeing off candidates like former sanitation commissioner and food czar, Kathryn Garcia, civil rights lawyer, Maya Wiley, and tech entrepreneur, Andrew Yang, who recently announced his departure from the Democratic Party.

 

The highlight of the evening was an awards presentation during which various supporters of the Democratic Party were honored. Among the honorees, this year, were Daniel Kane, Jr., president of Teamsters Local 202, David Caraballoso, vice president of NYC District Council of Carpenters, Camille Joseph-Goldman, group vice president of Charter Communications, Judy Secon, director of program and operations at NY Common Pantry, and Erica Vargas, assistant director of District Council 37, New York City’s largest public employee union, representing 125,000 members and 50,000 retirees.

 

Ariana Collade, a spokesperson for the Bronx Democratic Party later told Norwood News after the event in relation to Kane’s award, “We have honorees every year, who have done good work or for the betterment of the Bronx. Daniel J. Kane, Jr., is a teamster, and president of Local 202, which has 4,500 members, and are responsible for supplying the New York City area with the food that millions of New Yorkers eat every day.”

 

She added, “During his career, he has been responsible for the building of an organization that works on behalf of working men and women from New York City.”

Meanwhile, speaking from another makeshift podium that was only slightly less congested than the main stage, in the context of the upcoming general elections, De Blasio expressed his faith in Adams as the Democratic mayoral nominee, telling the crowd, “I’m pumped up that Eric Adams is going to be the next mayor of the City of New York.” He added, “We started a lot of things that he’s going to take to the next level.”