Republicans have demoted one of Rudy Giuliani‘s top operatives after concluding the aide was more interested in pushing the former mayor for governor than in keeping GOP control of the state Senate, The Post has learned.
Matthew Mahoney is the $30,000-a-month executive director of the Senate Republican Campaign Committee and one-time head of Giuliani’s presidential field operations. He was relieved of overall responsibility for the Senate’s GOP campaign and told to concentrate on fund-raising and administrative chores, sources said.
The demotion, outlined at a confrontational meeting Monday, was also tied to Giuliani’s failure to deliver on pledges to raise substantial amounts of cash for the Republicans’ do-or-die effort to hold the Senate, sources said.
The GOP now has a mere one-vote majority.
The Post reported last week that Giuliani was supposed to announce the creation of a fund-raising committee to collect cash for the Senate GOP, which some believe is designed to bolster the ex-mayor should he run for governor.
Newly selected Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos (R-Nassau) approved the demotion of Mahoney, the sources said. Mahoney had been picked by then-Majority Leader Joseph Bruno, who resigned his seat Friday.
“Frankly, he [Mahoney] doesn’t know what the f- – – is going on around the rest of the state, outside of New York City,” a senior GOP operative told The Post.
“He’s been busy doing the Rudy stuff and the desire is to make sure he is focused on doing the Senate stuff.”
As part of the staff shakeup, Brendan Quinn, a former state GOP executive director, was promoted to chief campaign strategist. Edward Lurie, whom Mahoney replaced in February after a humiliating Republican loss in a special Senate race, has returned as a senior adviser, it was learned.
Tempers flared at the secret strategy meeting in Albany when Skelos aide Tom Dunham outlined the new arrangement to Mahoney and Quinn.
“It was a meeting at which the new roles were supposed to be civilly discussed, but it quickly devolved into a confrontation,” said a GOP source.
Mahoney contended that claims of his demotion were “completely untrue,” although he conceded he would be “spending more time” on fund-raising.
A source close to Giuliani, meanwhile, warned that if Senate Republicans “start scapegoating Giuliani people, Rudy will not be inclined to help.”