Stuart Applebaum

This morning, Michael Bloomberg made the argument that congestion pricing would be good for the economy, and that without it, tens of thousands of jobs for New Yorkers “would almost certainly be dead in the water."

Standing with labor leaders outside the turnstile at the Brooklyn Bridge train station, Bloomberg told reporters, “The jobs created by congestion pricing, in both the short- and long-term, would be a real shot in the arm for our city’s economy.”  read more »

A few hours before Hillary Clinton scored a major coup with the SEIU non-endorsement, Hillary was busy working over the influential Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union.

Here is a picture of Hillary chatting with RWDSU’s national president, Stuart Appelbaum, and its Iowa director, Roger Grogbstich, at a diner outside Marshalltown, Iowa.

The union hasn’t endorsed a candidate yet, but it’s one of the groups that is likely to get some more attention from candidates since SEIU is letting its locals endorse different candidates.

If anyone has any updates on the ongoing courtship, please let me know.

UPDATE: A spokeswoman for the union, Carolyn Daly, said RWDSU has already voted to endorse Hillary, but has not made the announcement public yet.

Here’s the first push-back I've seen on the storyline that Eliot Spitzer’s allies are abandoning him: a statement from Stuart Applebaum, the president of the RWDSU union (who, coincidentally, played a key role in Andrew Cuomo’s campaign and was a member of Cuomo's transition team).

"We are proud to have supported him and will continue to whole-heartedly support him in his efforts to turn this state around from the malaise of the Pataki years and improve the lives of New York's working people,” Applebaum said in a public statement.

The full statement is after the jump.  read more »