Pedro Espada Does His Part to Get Andrew Cuomo Elected Governor

Pedro Espada's mad-hat denunciations of Andrew Cuomo as "the prince of darkness" are made-to-order commercials for the Cuomo gubernatorial campaign.

In a year when anti-incumbent and anti-Albany feelings poll so high, Espada's very personal outrage at Cuomo over the lawsuit that the Attorney General filed against him just reinforces Cuomo's efforts to distance himself from the chaos in the State Senate. (The only thing Espada could do to hurt Cuomo in the upcoming gubernatorial election would be to blame the probe of his Soundview Healthcare Network on the feds who joined Cuomo investigators in last week's raid, and take the spotlight off the crusading AG.)

Every rant from Espada is a plus for Cuomo.

Espada has already gotten as nasty as he could, accusing Cuomo of only getting where he is today "because his father helped him," adding that former governor Mario Cuomo "gave Andrew Cuomo the famous last name that he now counts on" to make himself governor.

But Espada wasn't always such a Cuomo antagonist.

When Governor Cuomo was in the fight for his political life, running against George Pataki in 1994, Espada, who was then in the State Senate, issued a press release on June 9 in response to a Hispanic Federation poll that showed that Hispanics were dissatisfied with the three-term governor.

"To remove Governor Cuomo now would result in vast setbacks for our community," Espada said, "setbacks that may very well prove incurable."

"Latinos in New York State should know that we have an ally in Mario Cuomo."