A Brooklyn state senator has suspended a campaign volunteer after she was arrested for allegedly striking a rival volunteer in the face.
Steve Chan, a retired NYPD sergeant seeking re-election to a second term, said Wednesday that Liu Zhen, 73, is off his campaign for now. Zhen was arrested Tuesday and charged with assault in the third degree after the clash along 86th Street in Bensonhurst, where competing campaign tables were set up about 50 feet apart.
“She definitely shouldn’t have done that,” Chan said. “I suspended her for the time being.”
The incident occurred across from the site of a planned homeless shelter that has drawn months of protests. Zhen, who volunteered for the Republican incumbent, walked over to the table of Democratic opponent Larry He and allegedly attacked one of his volunteers, sources said. A video shows a woman appearing to be Zhen reaching over the table to swipe at the rival campaign worker, who fell.
Chan accompanied Zhen to a police car after the arrest, he said. She was given a desk appearance ticket and released.
The senator maintained that while his volunteer should not have approached the rival table, the assault accusation itself was bogus. He claimed the fall was deliberately staged for effect.
“It was a setup. [Zhen] didn’t push hard enough for someone to fall. The fall was staged. She didn’t hurt anyone,” Chan said.
The competing campaigns were both working the busy Brooklyn thoroughfare on Tuesday when tensions boiled over. The shelter site nearby has been a flashpoint in the neighborhood, with protests raging for months.
Politics in southern Brooklyn has seen physical confrontations before. Brooklyn Councilwoman Susan Zhuang, a Democrat backing Larry He, allegedly bit an NYPD detective during a chaotic protest at the same planned homeless shelter site. Assault charges against Zhuang were dropped after she completed a restorative justice program.
Chan, 47, is running for re-election to the state Senate seat he first won in 2022.