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Rachel Noerdlinger

In this Jan. 18, 2014, file photo, Rachel Noerdlinger, former Al Sharpton aide who is now chief of staff to New York City's first lady Chirlane McCray, attends a meeting at Sharpton's National Action Network headquarters in New York. (P Photo/Richard Drew, File)

MANHATTAN -- The Rev. Al Sharpton offered an impassioned defense Saturday of his former aide whose prominent role at City Hall has come under intense scrutiny, claiming that the criticism has been fueled by a movement to curb his own influence with Mayor Bill de Blasio.

The civil rights leader and fierce NYPD critic said he warned his then-spokeswoman Rachel Noerdlinger in January when she accepted a position to be chief of staff to powerful first lady Chirlane McCrary.

"I said to her then: 'Don't think now that they aren't going to put a target on your back,'" said Sharpton at his weekly rally at the National Action Network in Harlem. "They'll dig to find something. If not, they'll make it up. They've been doing it to me for 30 years."

Police unions and some newspaper columnists have called for Noerdlinger's dismissal after a series of damaging revelations, including that she did not disclose during her background check that her live-in boyfriend Hassaun McFarlan was a convicted killer who taunted police on Facebook.

De Blasio has steadfastly supportedNoerdlinger, who has helped shape his administration's response to the chokehold death of Eric Garner in NYPD custody.

Sharpton has been a longtime ally of de Blasio and helped set the stage for his election by defying conventional wisdom and declining to endorse the mayoral race's one black candidate, William Thompson.

De Blasio, who is white, has a strong base of support in the city's African-American community, in part due to the popularity of his wife, who is black. He frequently consults with Sharpton and gave him equal footing with Police Commissioner William Bratton at a City Hall forum convenedafter Garner's death. That infuriated the police unions,one of which took out a full page ad in The New York Times to suggest that de Blasio's policies and relationship with Sharpton were making the city less safe.

Sharpton has not been shy to boast about his access to de Blasio, scoffing Saturday at the suggestion that he needed to "put" Noerdlinger in City Hall to have a channel to the mayor.

Originally posted here:
Al Sharpton defends de Blasio aide under fire