A grocery store worker on Staten Island was arrested Sunday after slapping Rudy Giuliani while the former mayor campaigned for his son, a Republican candidate for governor.
Giuliani said he was walking through a ShopRite grocery store in the Charleston neighborhood with supporters when the employee disparaged him and slapped his back, then made an apparent reference to abortion.
“The one thing he said that was political was ‘you’re going to kill women, you’re going to kill women,’” said Mr. Giuliani, who said he understood the remark to be about the Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade on Friday.
Giuliani said that he had red marks on his back, but was not bleeding and had remained on his feet after being struck. He had been planning to hand out fliers for Andrew Giuliani ahead of Tuesday’s Republican primary for governor. The younger Mr. Giuliani was not on hand.
“My back hurts, but otherwise I’m able to walk and stuff like that,” the former mayor said. “He almost knocked me down. Thank God for a 78-year-old, I am in pretty good shape.”
Andrew Giuliani, the former mayor’s son, referred to the incident in a statement as an “assault” and said that he and his father would “not be intimidated by left- wing attacks.”
Mr. Giuliani said that the man should be charged on the same principle that animated “my broken windows theory” of policing.
“If you don’t stop it at this stage, it just gets worse and worse and worse,” he said.
The man was taken into custody. Police were still investigating and it was not immediately clear what, if any, charges the man could face.
