Hiram Monserrate, the Queens Democrat who was expelled from the State Senate for assaulting his girlfriend and later jailed for stealing public funds, is plotting another comeback.
Monserrate, now a Democratic district leader, filed on Tuesday to run against Queens Assemblymember Jeffrion Aubry, a fellow Democrat and one of the highest-ranking lawmakers in the chamber. A source close to Monserrate said the politician has not made a final decision on whether to run but is strongly considering the possibility.
“Hiram is considering a run. He hasn’t made a decision yet,” said the source. “He opened the committee, he’s trying to raise money and see what happens.”
Two years ago, Monserrate ran unsuccessfully for City Council against Francisco Moya, a former assemblymember. Though Moya had the strong support of the Democratic establishment and the city’s major labor unions, Monserrate still managed to garner 44 percent of the vote. Monserrate had held the City Council seat, based in East Elmhurst and Corona, in the early 2000s before he was elected to the State Senate in 2008.
In 2010, Monserrate’s colleagues voted overwhelmingly to expel him the chamber after he was charged with beating and slashing his then-girlfriend, Karla Giraldo. Security camera footage showed Monserrate dragging her by her hair through the lobby of their building, and doctors later said Giraldo needed 40 stitches.
In 2012, Monserrate was sentenced to two years in prison after he plead guilty to misappropriating $109,000 in city grants when he was a member of the City Council.
Were he to run, Monserrate would be competitive. He is a district leader in Aubry’s district, which overlaps with Moya’s Council seat, and maintains a base of support there. Aubry did not immediately return a request for comment.
Within Queens politics, Monserrate is a complicated figure, both reviled and respected. His club, the East Elmhurst Corona Democratic Club, is regarded as one of the most active in the borough, having backed four successful district leader candidacies, including his own. Though Monserrate once threw the Senate into chaos by briefly partnering with the Republicans, he has presented himself as a populist, anti-machine progressive, effectively spearheading the first insurgent judicial victory Queens has seen in several decades. In parts of East Elmhurst and Corona, especially among older voters who remember his days as an energetic elected official, Monserrate remains popular.
“We all know Hiram’s past,” State Senator Jessica Ramos, a progressive from an overlapping Queens district, told Gothamist. “The voters get to decide his future in public service.”
On October 22nd, Monserrate appeared at the launch party for the New Reformers, a progressive organization dedicated to electing a reform slate of district leaders in 2020 and weakening the power of the Queens Democratic Party. Monserrate, like every district leader in the borough, was invited.
One of the founders of New Reformers, Vigie Ramos Rios, is now the campaign manager for Anthony Miranda, the chairman of the National Latino Officers Association. Miranda is an old friend of Monserrate, a former NYPD officer who was a founding member of the Officers Association. Ramos Rios is best known for managing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s first campaign for Congress.
“Hiram is a duly elected District Leader and as such a part of the Queens Democratic Party County Committee,” Ramos Rios said in a statement. “As a DL he is likely working with his community on a number of issues and they are, I imagine, interested in the Queens Borough Presidents race. He and his community are a part of Queens.”
Monserrate, however, is still likely to encounter fierce resistance from elected officials, unions, and women’s groups, as he did in 2017. Nily Rozic, a Queens assemblymember, told the Daily News that his decision to run exemplifies “just how quickly we forget violence against women.”
In a statement to Gothamist, Councilmember Moya called Assemblymember Aubrey "a pillar of dignity and public service."
“A convicted domestic abuser and disgraced politician convicted of stealing taxpayer money wants to go after a man who is synonymous with the social justice movement in this state and who ushered in some of the most significant criminal justice reforms we’ve ever seen?" Moya said. "This challenge is a joke."
Another Queens Democrat, speaking anonymously for fear of retribution from Monserrate’s supporters, bemoaned the “short memory” of some voters in Corona and East Elmhurst.
“I have concerns because he’s a very, very smart strategist,” the Democrat said of Monserrate. “He has managed to stay relevant, one way or another. He knows where the power is.”
