BUFFALO — A petition calling on New York State Education Commissioner MaryEllen Elia to remove Carl Paladino from the Buffalo School Board over remarks he made this past week in Artvoice, has topped 10,000 signatures.
Paladino had said that he hopes in 2017 President Barack Obama dies of mad cow disease and that Michelle Obama returns to being a man and moves to Zimbabwe to live in a cave with a gorilla. Paladino says the comments are deprecating humor and refused to retract them called upon to do so by some in the community.
Elia is the only person who can remove Paladino from the elected position. Several people have called for his resignation, including Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz. Others still have denounced the statements by Paladino without going so far as calling for his removal. Those include a spokesperson for the Donald Trump Transition Team — of which Paladino is a member, St. Bonaventure University — of which Paladino is an alumnus, and Ellicott Development Company — of which Paladino is the former CEO. Paladino’s son William penned the denouncement on the company’s Facebook page on Saturday.
The petition, started three days ago, topped the 10,000 mark around 8 p.m. Sunday. As of the writing of this story, it has 10,447 in hopes of reaching 15,000.
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