Halloran Recounts Trip to Bulgaria

It was a scene far removed from the comfortable, quasi-suburban neighborhoods of Daniel Halloran's northeastern Queens council district — not to mention, City Hall.

Invited as a guest of the Bulgarian opposition Order, Law and Justice Party, Halloran spoke last Friday in this troubled Balkan nation's capital to an audience about basic freedoms, of which many had experienced, if at all, only in fleeting instances between a revolving door of communist and fascist dictatorships.

"They are struggling to create a democracy," said Halloran, R-Whitestone. "I came because I thought I could help."

Notable for the political buzz created in this former Communist nation by a New York City elected official of German, Danish and Irish heritage, the seeds of this weeklong visit were first planted during a recent visit by a member of Bulgaria's conservative opposition to Halloran's council office.

"Many of the problems we talked about, like corruption, are the same as what we're dealing with here," Halloran said. "Though it's on a totally different scale, of course."

Among the items discussed during Halloran's visit were calls for transparency and reform in the country's government. 

And as one of five Republicans in an overwhelmingly Democratic City Council, Halloran said he was eager to share his pointers for members of an Order, Law and Justice Party which commanded only 10 percent of the vote in Bulgaria's most recent national elections.

Responding to a question regarding the purpose of an international visit not directly tied to ancestry, tourism or increased trade with New York City, Halloran called upon his background as an attorney knowledgeable in constitutional law looking to help an emerging democracy get its sea-legs in a shifting geopolitical landscape.

"It's critical for us to talk about freedoms, especially when the U.S. government actually looks the other way when those rights are trampled when it's in our national interest," Halloran said.

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