Both Sides Cool the Rhetoric in Furor Over a Fields Flier
by Nicholas Confessore and Patrick D. Healy
New York Times
July 10, 2005

An unusually public dispute between mayoral candidate C. Virginia Fields and Joseph C. Mercurio, the consultant she abruptly fired last week after revelations that her campaign had issued campaign fliers with doctored photos, receded from public view yesterday, even as New York's political classes debated how the turmoil would affect the Democratic primary.

On Friday, Mr. Mercurio said that the fliers - which used a stock image of two Asian-Americans and other cut-and-paste images of supporters of various ethnicities to imply they had all been present at one campaign event--had been printed over his objections. Ms. Fields insisted that he was ultimately responsible for them.

But yesterday, citing a desire not to escalate the dispute, both Ms. Fields and Mr. Mercurio declined to provide e-mail messages, invoices, or other documentation to corroborate the accounts of how the fliers had been produced.

"If they're not saying anything, I'm not going to get into any correspondence," Mr. Mercurio said.

Ms. Fields, the Manhattan Borough President, appeared to be lying low, canceling a news conference on subway security scheduled for today. And Ms. Fields' rivals for the Democratic nomination have been careful not to criticize her for the fliers.

Fernando Ferrer, a mayoral candidate who has led the field in most polls, said he was sympathetic to her after his own troubles this spring, when he said a police shooting in 1999 of an unarmed black man, Amadou Diallo, was not a crime--a statement for which he was attacked by Ms. Fields, among others.

"I've known her for a long time, she's a woman of real integrity and honesty, and I trust her," Mr. Ferrer said in an interview Friday, though he had not been asked any questions about Ms. Fields. "We've got to move on from this, and move on to the real issues of the campaign."

Some observers said they did not expect the incident to affect her chances, emphasizing that voters tended to have little interest in internal campaign issues. Others said that the furor could actually solidify her support among black voters.

"Surprisingly, some people who had been supportive but lukewarm were offended by Mercurio's comments, and were very supportive of her," said the Rev. Al Sharpton, who said he would still consider endorsing Ms. Fields in the primary. "Sometimes when leaders are attacked, people close ranks behind them."

But other analysts, including some on good terms with Ms. Fields, said that the mud-slinging might hurt her efforts to raise money, a result she can ill afford. Despite consistently ranking second in the polls, she has raised the least money among the Democratic candidates.