Cuomo picks up endorsement as he and Nixon tout support for abortion rights

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and Cynthia Nixon, his rival for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination , continued to argue over pro-choice credentials Wednesday in the wake of President Donald Trump’s nomination of a new judge to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Cuomo held two more campaign-style rallies Wednesday, including one in Farmingdale. The incumbent also picked up the endorsement of Planned Parenthood.

“We need an experienced leader who will fight to protect New Yorkers from federal attacks on our rights and values – and that leader is Andrew Cuomo,” Robin Chappelle Golston, chairwoman of Planned Parenthood’s New York political-action committee, said in a statement.

Cuomo has held at least five rallies this week, contending the Supreme Court could soon overturn the landmark abortion-rights decision, Roe v. Wade. He’s asked the Republican-led state Senate to return to Albany to pass a bill codifying Roe v. Wade into state law, though his action was seen more as a campaign gesture since the GOP has said it doesn’t plan on returning.

Nixon, meanwhile, has held her own rallies, criticizing Cuomo for tacitly supporting a power-sharing agreement between Senate Republicans and breakaway Democrats that has kept the GOP in charge of the chamber. Tuesday in Union Square, Nixon held up a wire clothes hanger, told supporters that her mother once had an illegal abortion and said the court shouldn’t turn back the clock on a woman’s right to choose, according to reports.

Nixon allies noted that, in June, she received the endorsement from a competing abortion-rights group, #VoteProChoice.