Cuomo wins McCall's endorsement in Brooklyn

Warning of "forces out there that are preying on . . . fear," Attorney General Andrew Cuomo received an endorsement for governor Sunday from former Comptroller H. Carl McCall, who told a black Brooklyn congregation that Cuomo's opponent Carl Paladino is a "dangerous person."

"The opposition is dangerous - dangerous!" McCall told worshipers at Brown Memorial Baptist Church in Clinton Hill, where Cuomo was joined by his daughter Michaela.

"There's a man running on another party who is unfit to be governor," McCall said, echoing a statement he issued after Paladino's surprise primary victory. "A man who sent out racist, racist messages to people talking about us and our community and our president." McCall was referring to a series of e-mails Paladino forwarded but now concedes showed "poor judgment." Among other things, they depicted the president and the first lady as a pimp and a prostitute.

"Unless we do something about it, that dangerous person can become a leader in this state," McCall said.

Cuomo picked up the theme, one likely to become a mantra in the closing weeks of this election as he seeks to prod Democrats to vote in a tea party year.

"We are vulnerable today; you can feel it, people are anxious," he said, and warned that Paladino supporters "are preying on that fear and they are trying to divide us" with "extreme positions."

Among them: "Work camps. Work camps!" Cuomo said. "The opposition says we're going to take prisons in upstate New York and retrofit them for work camps, and send the welfare families to work camps."

There was little obvious warmth between McCall and Cuomo, who in 2002 challenged McCall for the Democratic nomination for governor before abandoning the race when it became clear he had succeeded only in offending the party's black leadership.

"We have to put aside anything that might have happened in the past," McCall said Sunday, saying Cuomo "is fit, he is qualified, he is experienced, he is compassionate and he is capable."

Cuomo followed the church visit with a stroll in the Pulaski Day Parade in Manhattan and a meeting back in Brooklyn with Jewish leaders. Paladino, from his campaign office, watched the Buffalo Bills lose to the Jets. But his staff played defense to a Daily News report that he had collected $3 million in Empire Zone tax breaks for investments that had created 25 jobs.

That prompted Cuomo's running mate, Rochester Mayor Robert Duffy, to demand that Paladino return the money from the tax breaks.

Paladino campaign manager Michael Caputo issued a statement saying most of the jobs created were for tenants of Paladino's buildings and would not show up in reports.