Exclusive | Jessica Ramos wants to oversee NYCs $112 billion budget but defaults on $80K in student loans
Mayoral candidate Jessica Ramos wants to manage the city’s $112 billion budget, but she’s failed to get her own fiscal house in order — defaulting on nearly $80,000 in student loans, The Post has learned.Two filings in Queens state supreme court from 2019 show that Ramos, a state senator from the borough, defaulted on a pair of loans: one for $35,757.21 and the other for $42,550.25.Six years later, she apparently still owes the $78,307.46 in combined loans — with her telling The Post, “I’m part of the generation that is saddled with student debt.”The candidate’s mother, Melfy Londono, is listed as a co-plaintiff on the default judgments, which were filed the year after Ramos became a state senator.In both cases, court papers filed by lawyers Forster & Garbus on behalf of the student-loan lender said, “No part of said sum has been paid although duly demanded.”Even some of Ramos’s fellow Democrats said her financial debt is a problem for her campaign.“It hurts her candidacy,” said Frank Seddio, the former Brooklyn Democratic Party leader who is backing Andrew Cuomo for mayor.“That’s certainly an indication of her ability to manage costs and expenses of the city,” he said of her outstanding defaulted student loans.“She can’t manage her own debt.
She’s going to manage the city’s?”Ramos’s campaign has raised $232, 292 in private funds and spent $231,253.She has yet to qualify for public matching funds for the June 24 Democratic primary.Polling for the Democratic primary for mayor shows her with single-digit support.Ramos, 39, who attended Hofstra University and has two school-age sons, said her loan debt symbolizes the problems facing New Yorkers of modest means struggling to afford a college education and supporting a family.“Like millions in my generation, I faced the impossible choice between financial survival and student-loan payments,” Ramos told The Post.“I prioritized building a safe, stable life for my fa...