"There's so much chatter in my community and many people are feeling like they can't speak up, they can't say anything," Klingman told "America Reports" Thursday.
"They don't have a voice. The Democratic Socialist Party has kind of taken over that area with AOC, and they are seeing the crime on the streets, and they're seeing all the change."
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"And they just had quietly come up to me, talked to me and said, would you ever explore trying to do something like this? We know that you share viewpoints, and you have a little more courage. And I said, ‘Why not?’"
Ocasio-Cortez in 2018 notably unseated 20-year incumbent Rep. Joseph Crowley, D-N.Y., who at the time was the third-ranking Democrat in the House. The Democratic primary holds much more weight than the general in that congressional district, which has not seated a Republican since 1947.
Caban was narrowly defeated in the 2019 Queens County District Attorney's race to current county prosecutor Melinda Katz – a more moderate fellow Democrat who served many years as Queens Borough president.
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Councilwoman Tiffany Caban, D-Woodside/Astoria (REUTERS/Jeenah Moon)
Klingman said parents in the neighborhood have felt the crime, unsafe subways and "dirty streets" firsthand and argued critics who consider news coverage of those issues to be sensationalized are wrong.
"Everybody in New York wants the city back,' she said. "We want safe streets. We want to fund the police, not defund the police. And we want to focus on school choice for our children and make our children be successful."
"America Reports" anchor Sandra Smith noted Caban has continued to call for defunding police even as crime rises and becomes a bipartisan issue. Caban has called for curbing NYPD overtime costs, "reducing their bloated budget" and redirecting law enforcement funds to "programs and infrastructure scientifically proven to make us safer."
Klingman said the MTA subways are starting to feel safer as crime becomes a more high-profile issue, and that the last thing New York needs is a return in-earnest to the "defund" movement.
Republicans have made mild but rare inroads in New York City in recent years, with Assembs. Lester Chang, Vickie Paladino and Anna Vernikov picking up New York State Assembly seats in the outerboroughs – while the city council's longtime 3-seat Republican minority – two in Staten Island and one in Howard Beach – has doubled in recent years, against Democrats' current 45 seat tally.
Democratic Socialists have however also made gains in the state assembly, adding Caban and a handful of others to the Democrats' caucus in Albany, mostly based out of New York City and vicinity.
Guardian Angels founder Curtis Sliwa – the 2021 Republican candidate for mayor, who lost to Eric Adams – told the New York Post he has vowed to entreat moderate Democrats to help elect Republicans and unseat Democrats whose positions are out of line with the mainstream in areas such as crime and taxation.
"We’re going to take on AOC and Caban," the outspoken activist from Canarsie said. "We’re going into the belly of the beast of the Democratic Socialists of America in New York City."