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\n Photo: Cindy Schultz\/The New York Times\/Redux\n <\/p>\n
After years of outwitting<\/a> her opponents at every turn<\/a>, Assemblywoman Rodneyse Bichotte Hermelyn, the first woman to chair the Kings County Democratic machine, is stepping down as leader of the party. But that doesn\u2019t mean the civil war has ended.<\/p>\n \u201cI am now up to my next chapter in life,\u201d she told me<\/a> Monday evening, announcing that she will not be a candidate for the chairmanship and declining to confirm rumors that she is backing an ally, Assemblywoman Nikki Lucas, as her successor. \u201cThis will be an open process, and we\u2019re very excited for the change.\u201d Later, she wrote in a New York Daily News op-ed<\/a> that she has a fancy new title: \u201cBrooklyn Democratic Party Chair Emeritus.\u201d<\/p>\n The New Kings Democrats, part of a reform coalition that has been trying for years to oust Bichotte Hermelyn and take control of the party, immediately cried foul. \u201cThe Party Chair attempting to pick her own successor after she lost an election isn\u2019t democracy,\u201d the group said on social media<\/a>. On Tuesday afternoon, a judge granted a temporary restraining order<\/a> to block that night\u2019s planned vote to select Bichotte Hermelyn\u2019s successor, one of two court victories for reformers that have thrown a wrench in the outgoing chair\u2019s plans.<\/p>\n The heart of the fight is Bichotte Hermelyn\u2019s recent move to expand the party\u2019s 42-member Executive Committee<\/a> by adding 26 seats to the group \u2014 positions that would be filled by appointees loyal to Bichotte Hermelyn, who engineered the expanded group to head off the possibility of being voted out as chair. A group of reformers sued to block the expansion and earlier Tuesday won a ruling<\/a> by the state\u2019s second-highest court, the Appellate Division, which struck down an August 25 vote to expand the committee as \u201cnull and void\u201d and blocked a scheduled vote for a new chair.<\/p>\n \u201cDemocratically elected District Leaders must pick who chairs the party next. Anything less will be a fight. We won\u2019t back down,\u201d tweeted City Councilwoman Sandy Nurse<\/a>, who is a District Leader. But as she\u2019s done before, Bichotte Hermelyn attempted a partial end run around the district leaders by steering matters to the much larger County Committee, which has as many as 5,000 slots, most of which are unfilled. Until now, by securing written proxies of hundreds of committee members, Bichotte Hermelyn and her allies have been able to keep control of the party and change its rules as she chooses.<\/p>\n Brooklyn has seen these battles before. In 2005, shortly after the party\u2019s leader, ex-assemblyman Clarence Norman Jr., was convicted<\/a> of accepting illegal campaign contributions and falsifying business records, party leaders met in the back room of a diner on Cadman Plaza to pick a new boss from five candidates. It was a cagey affair: \u201cI was talking with another leader about who\u2019s supposed to be committed to who,\u201d District Leader Ralph Perfetto told me<\/a> at the time. \u201cWe came up with 80 votes, even though there\u2019s only 41 district leaders.\u201d<\/p>\n The party settled on Assemblyman Vito Lopez, who spent seven years as leader before resigning after being censured<\/a> by the legislature amid allegations that he sexually harassed female staffers. A few years into Lopez\u2019s tenure as Brooklyn boss, in 2010, a then-unknown Bichotte Hermelyn, pulled off the unlikely feat of knocking an incumbent district leader off the ballot<\/a> and starting her own rise in politics. That same year, in the middle of a fight for control, Lopez told me in passing that he had quietly changed the party\u2019s rules by adding five hand-picked, at-large district leaders to the Executive Committee to fend off any possible insurrection. (His fellow bosses in the other boroughs had similar contingencies in place, Lopez\u00a0 noted.)<\/p>\n The purpose of all the machinations is to control the jobs, money, and respect that come with leading one of the nation\u2019s largest Democratic organizations. Brooklyn\u2019s boss helps people land jobs at the Board of Elections and the state courthouses and get the lucrative gigs staffing poll sites on Election Day. They receive friendly, fawning phone calls from candidates for every conceivable position, from City Council to State Supreme Court judge to the presidency.<\/p>\n And when good-government types denounce the grip that insiders have on politics, bosses like Bichotte Hermelyn drive reformers crazy by beating them to the punch, implementing some version of the changes the outsiders called for. \u201cI modernized the organization. I brought technology into a party stuck in the past. I created service days. I opened doors to communities long ignored. I made judicial screening transparent, diverse, and reflective of Brooklyn \u2014 Muslim, Jewish, Caribbean, gay, Asian,\u201d Bichotte-Hermelyn wrote in the News. \u201cI created opportunities for members from every corner of Brooklyn to participate meaningfully in our democracy \u2014 including mobilizing buses for weeks into Pennsylvania, Upstate New York, and Long Island to support national candidates. We showed discipline, unity, and strength. That is what real grassroots power looks like.\u201d<\/p>\n The fight rages on in the courts, and there will surely be contentious meetings to pick the next boss of Brooklyn; some of NBK\u2019s district leaders are also certain to face challenges when the positions come up for a vote in 2028. \u201cI think sometimes people continue to challenge me just to stay relevant,\u201d Bichotte Hermelyn told me. \u201cIt\u2019s like, \u2018Damn. She did it again. She did a great thing.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Sign Up for the Intelligencer\u00a0Newsletter<\/p>\n Daily news about the politics, business, and technology shaping our world.<\/p>\n Vox Media, LLC Terms and Privacy Notice<\/p>\n