I first met Anthony Weiner in 1997 when I was assigned to the City Hall bureau for the New York Post. In a City Council that was filled with lawmakers who were products of the political machine with some even qualifying for Social Security, Weiner stood out.
Just 27 years old when he was first elected to the Council in 1991, Weiner’s youthful energy was refreshing in a building that often felt stuck in the era of Abe Beame. Jostling for attention in City Hall’s press room, Weiner had plenty of ideas that he wanted to promote – along with his own career.
His big opportunity came a year later in 1998 when his political mentor, Chuck Schumer, decided to give up his job in the House of Representatives and run for the U.S. Senate. The undercard in Schumer’s Democratic primary was the hard-fought battle for his House seat. Weiner faced off against a City Councilman and two state lawmakers – including then-Assemblywoman Melinda Katz. The race was close and Weiner managed to beat Katz by a razor-thin margin. One of the keys to Weiner’s victory was the fact that he spent an awful lot of time in the Rockaways, a neighborhood where I had recently moved so I got to know him and see him more.
Weiner’s years in Congress were not always happy ones for him. Although he loved representing the district, Republicans controlled the House for most of the time he was in office, leaving him to use his seat more as a bully pulpit than a place for actual legislation.
But it also allowed him to build a platform for a run for mayor in 2005. Weiner’s partisan politics and fiery persona were a strong contrast to Michael Bloomberg’s cool and technocratic approach to city government.
His strong but unsuccessful run for 2005 would actually prove to be his high point in politics. Six years ago on Memorial Day weekend, it all started unraveling for Weiner when he accidentally sent a sexually-explicit photo to a woman over Twitter and then falsely claimed someone hacked his account.
The lies unraveled, forcing him to quit the House and politics. In hindsight, it would have been a smart moment for Weiner to have moved on to another chapter in his life. But the lure of politics called even though he hadn’t truly exorcised his demons.
A return to mayoral politics in 2013 had him briefly looking like the frontrunner in a crowded Democratic primary race but when another sexting scandal arose, his campaign imploded, leaving him with just five percent of the vote on Primary Day.
And yet there was a third act for Weiner, serving both as a NY1 Wiseguy and a Daily News columnist. While he never would be a candidate again, he still had a platform and his weekly jousting with former Sen. Alfonse D’Amato and other guests were lively, interesting, and entertaining. But he still had not learned the lessons of his mistakes.
Last August, the New York Post reported that Weiner was “sexting” with another woman and then in September the Daily Mail reported that he was preying on a North Carolina teen via the Internet. And in an irony that hasn’t been lost on Democrats, his seized laptop became evidence in an FBI probe of Hillary Clinton, who employed Weiner’s wife.
It’s a final disaster that brought down his career, his marriage, possibly a presidential campaign, and Weiner’s freedom.
He pleaded guilty last week to “transferring obscene material to a minor” which will likely land him close to two years in federal prison. It’s a sad end to a promising career of that young man who was running through City Hall more than twenty years ago. Plenty of politicians ignore the warning signs repeatedly flashed to them as they try to race to the top. It’s a shame it happened here.
Bob Hardt