JUST hours after Gov. Paterson named Richard Ravitch to be his lieutenant, Donald Trump had a message for the governor: Tell him, “You’re fired.”
In a blistering, two-page “Dear David” letter, Trump blasts Ravitch, the governor’s controversial choice for lieutenant governor, as “extremely weak, ineffective and a poor negotiator.”
“The only thing he’s been good at is getting appointments and convincing the press he’s done a good job when, in fact, if you look at the real numbers and what has happened with the places he left, you would see just the opposite,” the “Apprentice” star wrote.
“His image as a ‘Mr. Fix-It’ is exactly that, an image.”
Trump also warned Paterson that Ravitch, a one-time state official and former MTA head who the governor says will help him prepare for a huge looming budget deficit, would give away the store to New York’s labor unions.
“If you look at Mr. Ravitch’s history with the unions, it will show one thing very clearly: that the unions will love having him at the helm because he will give them whatever they want, even though the deficit of New York has reached catastrophic levels.
“Ravitch is a man who is constantly giving, and that is exactly what New York state does not need at this time,” he wrote.
Trump’s scathing letter, a copy of which was obtained by The Post, was sent Thursday, just hours after Paterson, in a move called unconstitutional by Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, named Ravitch to fill the spot left vacant when Paterson succeeded Eliot Spitzer in March 2008.
“I truly don’t understand your choice of Richard Ravitch to be lieutenant governor,” the letter began.
“I have known Richard for a long period of time and know very well his strengths and weaknesses.”
Trump, whose developer father, Fred, once had business dealings with Ravitch’s construction company, spent just one paragraph in the lengthy letter on Ravitch’s “strengths,” which he noted with only faint praise.
“He is able to communicate well with reporters and the press, and his image has always been good and very clean despite his failures as a businessman and representative of state government,” Trump wrote.
As for Ravitch’s purported weaknesses, Trump reached back decades to a time when his father hired Ravitch’s firm as a construction representative for the development of Trump Village in Brooklyn.
“After a short period of time in dealing with very smart and tough contractors and subcontractors, it became obvious to my father, Fred, that Dick Ravitch was very ineffective at getting the lowest price and overall best contract,” the letter said.
“He was always looking to appease as opposed to making a good deal.”
Trump also held Ravitch, the chief negotiator for Major League Baseball in the early 1990s, “responsible for the disastrous Major League Baseball strike and horrendous results in a very sad period for professional sports.”
And he said that if the governor carefully studied Ravitch’s tenure as the one-time head of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, “you will not be impressed.”
“I would hope you will keep these insights into Richard Ravitch and his performance history in mind as you continue working hard to reconstruct the mess we are in,” Trump said.