Clarke Holds a Wolfson Grudge

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April 3, 2007 | 9:33 a.m.

Freshman Congresswoman Yvette Clarke of Brooklyn, the only Democratic member of the New York delegation yet to endorse Hillary Clinton for President, just confirmed a report on the reason she's holding out. She hasn't endorsed yet, in part, because Hillary spokesman and advisor Howard Wolfson worked on the Congressional campaign of David Yassky, who was one of Clarke's opponents in last year's four-way primary. Here is NBC's transcript of Clarke's interview this morning with John Noel:

JOHN NOEL: The fact that her political consultant worked for your opponent in the congressional race, does that play into this at all? YVETTE CLARKE: Of course that raises a big flag, you know, puts up an antenna because again that was an issue that the community was very ill at ease with. And we've had some conversations about it to be quite honest with you. And I think that that needs to be addressed in order for the community to feel like that something like that would not occur again.

UPDATE: Wolfson responds: "My work for David Yassky was based on a decade of friendship with him. I have enormous respect for Congresswoman Clarke and look forward to supporting her re-election." -- Azi Paybarah