An NYC councilwoman working for Congress owes $25,000 in again lease after squatting for 5 months in a luxurious high-rise, in keeping with her ex-landlord and courtroom paperwork.
Councilwoman Julie Received (D-Queens) and her household vacated a one-bedroom apartment at swanky Skyline Towers on Lengthy Island Metropolis’s waterfront on Monday — three days after being slapped with eviction papers by the apartment’s proprietor, Justin Chae, a prime NYC political marketing consultant and former household buddy.
The gleaming-glass, 67-story skyscraper features a health heart with a swimming pool, a sauna and spa, a yoga room, and different A-list facilities.
Nonetheless, Received insisted to The Put up that she and her political strategist husband Eugene Noh by no means signed any lease on the posh pad, claiming Chae solid her identify onto a bogus lease settlement.
Chae, whose unit is valued at almost $1 million, stated he agreed to let the facility couple and their two younger kids transfer in rent-free in November 2024, beneath a one-year lease that he shared with The Put up.
He provided the free lease as a bonus to Noh, a fellow Korean-American, for agreeing to work as vice chairman of campaigns at Chae’s firm, Legion Outreach Consultants. Their households have identified one another because the Nineteen Eighties, Chae stated.
The enterprise relationship by no means labored out, and Noh’s employment was terminated on June 26, in keeping with the petition Chae filed in Queens Housing Court docket.
Chae informed The Put up he agreed to let the household reside there rent-free till the top of 2025 after which cost $5,000 month-to-month lease in the event that they needed to remain.
Nonetheless, the couple by no means paid a cent and began “ghosting” Chae in April by ignoring calls and different messages, the owner claims.
Chae stated he plans to file further courtroom papers looking for $25,000 owed in lease for the primary 5 months of the yr. There’s a listening to on the case scheduled for June 30.
“Chae can’t consider his buddies would reap the benefits of him this fashion,” stated his spokesman, longtime Democratic marketing consultant Hank Sheinkopf.
Received, nevertheless, accused Chae of “politically extorting her” whereas she’s working for increased workplace and predicted the lease settlement he offered to The Put up won’t ever maintain up in courtroom. She additionally threatened to countersue him over a “clearly political smear job.”
“It is a gross misrepresentation of actuality however sadly hundreds of households face the identical form of intimidation and abuse by landlords throughout the town,” she stated. “I stay up for setting the document straight in courtroom particularly since there’s no executed lease — nor has there been a service of a predicate discover as required by legislation.”
Nonetheless, Received failed to handle an Oct. 17, 2024 e-mail trade between Chae and Noh offered to The Put up that reveals her husband saying he “signed” the lease — and whether or not it’s doable he additionally signed her identify, too. The couple additionally didn’t deal with allegations that they by no means paid lease.
Received, who’s working in a crowded area within the June 23 Democratic major to interchange retiring Rep. Nydia Velázquez in New York’s seventh Congressional District (overlaying components of Queens and Brooklyn), claimed in a Could 26 interview revealed by The New York Editorial Board that she and her husband presently pay “over $4,000” month-to-month for lease.
She didn’t point out her ongoing landlord-tenant dispute however stated she moved to LIC “the place it’s extraordinarily costly” as a result of “Council safety” prompt she enroll her “kids in a college the place there’s extra Asian kids, in order that they’ll mix in additional.”
Received — who represents LIC, Sunnyside and different components of Western Queens — earns $148,500 yearly.
Noh reportedly deliberate to purchase out components of Chae’s consulting enterprise final yr, however Chae stated they by no means agreed to a deal.
Noh now operates his personal political consulting enterprise related in identify to Chae’s — referred to as Legion Consulting. It’s earned $268,696 in metropolis, state and federal marketing campaign work since August, in keeping with data.
Noh’s greatest shopper since breaking off from Chae is ex-Mayor Eric Adams. He racked up $104,735 in funds working as Adams’ contracted marketing campaign supervisor through the Democratic ex-mayor’s failed 2025 re-election bid as an impartial.
Received, a member of the Council’s Progressive Caucus, endorsed now-Mayor Zohran Mamdani in final yr’s Democratic major.
The couple claimed to QNS.com in July that they had been unfairly focused by “sexist” and “misogynistic” media scrutiny of their relationship as a result of they backed completely different mayoral candidates.
Velázquez has endorsed Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso to succeed her, whereas Mamdani is backing fellow socialist and state Assemblywoman Claire Valdez (D-Queens).
