New York State Assembly candidate David Orkin isn't working out of a traditional office. Instead, his campaign HQ, where he sat down to speak with Hell Gate just three weeks before the June 23 primary, occupies a former Dunkin' on Myrtle Avenue whose storefront is decorated with an orange, green, and yellow mural featuring him as a doughnut. It's eye-catching and inviting, with an intriguing backstory: The mural was painted by one of Orkin's would-be constituents, with whom the candidate connected after her wife's signature mysteriously—and, Orkin contends, illegally—appeared on his opponent Assemblymember Jenifer Rajkumar's petition sheet.
Orkin, a 34-year-old community organizer and a former immigration lawyer, is running on NYC-DSA's slate of state legislature candidates. He made headlines in April for suing Rajkumar for campaign fraud, accusing her team of forging at least nine signatures (including one of an editor at the Queens Chronicle)—a charge that, if confirmed, would have gotten Rajkumar kicked off the ballot. But in May, a Queens judge dismissed the case on procedural grounds. Still, Orkin told Hell Gate that he is entering the final stretch of his primary campaign feeling confident that he can still beat the incumbent.
"I'm not a person that had envisioned themselves running for office, and I don't consider myself to be a traditional candidate in many ways," Orkin said. "But it's just the most incredible experience to knock on 1,000 doors, and to have people respond really well to your message, and to have people really value the work that you've done, and really want you to be the person to represent them."
We spoke to Orkin—who sat on a two-seater camping chair during our conversation, with a poster featuring his head pasted onto Dolly Parton's body and the slogan "'Orkin 9 to 5" decorating the wall behind him—about what he believes the people of AD-38 need from their assemblymember, what his priorities would be in Albany, and why the hardest part about running for office has been talking about his own accomplishments.