Eighteen members voted no. They were:

Alan Maisel, Hakeem Jeffries, William Colton, Jim Brennan, Peter Abbate, Nick Perry, Annette Robinson, all of Brooklyn; Jeff Aubry and Mark Weprin--who is running for City Council--both from Queens; Carl Heastie, Marcos Crespo, Vanessa Gibson, Nelson Castro, Jose Rivera, and his daughter Naomi Rivera of the Bronx, and Danny O’Donnell and Deborah Glick of Manhattan.

Bing joins Assemblyman Danny O'Donnell of the West Side, who is also supporting Aborn.

The statement from the campaign, quotes Bing saying Aborn "has a vision to revitalize the office to ensure that Assistant District Attorneys are asking how to prevent crime, not just react to it. His long record as a prosecutor, national gun control leader, and managing partner of a law firm demonstrate he has the experience, guts, and vision for the office.”

In other endorsement news, Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum endorsed Cy Vance earlier. It's the first endorsement in the D.A. race from a citywide official.

“When it comes to which person will crack down on crime while protecting civil liberties and defending progressive values, there is no one more qualified for Manhattan D.A. than Richard Aborn,” O’Donnell said in a public statement released by the campaign. “Whether it’s taking on the NRA on guns, investigating police misconduct, or ensuring equal access to justice, Richard has shown he never backs down from a fight.”

O'Donnell's endorsement is an interesting one--essentially supporting a candidate for a law-and-order post on explicitly civil-libertarian, civil-rights grounds. Along with the backing of Bratton--the police commissioner, significantly, who fell out with Rudy Giuliani--it's an effort to set Aborn apart as the liberal in the race.

(Asked for comment, campaign spokesman Blake Zeff said the campaign's endorsements show Aborn "is both a recognized crimefighter and a strong progressive.")

Earlier, Aborn announced he wanted an independent review of recent arrests in gay sex shops, which have been criticized as unfairly targeting gay men.

Leslie Crocker Snyder, who ran in 2005, has also steered left this time around, stating that she no longer supports the death penalty—in fact, she's says she never really supported it that much in the first place.

Aborn pounced on Snyder’s shift as an “election year conversion.”

Also running in the race is Cyrus Vance, who is picking up much of the support from retiring incumbent, Robert Morgenthau.

"That's right," he told me. "I'm a little nervous."

He said that the bill was reported out of the judiciary committee yesterday "with no negative votes by the Democrats," but he stopped short of making any predictions about its fate.

It should be said that the mere fact that the Assembly is having this debate is historic, and it certainly has the potential -- depending on how things go -- to become national news.

They Assembly is in session now, and the debate is expected later today. You can watch the session live here.

“This is not something he’s primarily focused on, and he’s made that clear,” Assemblywoman Deborah Glick told me for a piece in this week's Observer.

Not that the governor's help isn't wanted. The bill’s prime sponsor in the Assembly, Danny O’Donnell, thinks a kinder, softer Spitzer can actually help the bill pass the house.

“I would say that he is much more effective when he asks people to do things than when he tries to tell them to do things,” he said. “And when he asks, he can be very effective."

More from the story here.

Daniel O'Donnell has been waiting his turn for years, waiting for a chance to launch a career in electoral politics. In the meantime, he has presided over countless meetings, talked to a thousand Josephinas and signed up for the requisite good causes (he worked for seven years with the Legal Aid Society) and worthy crusades. On this night at the Broadway Democrats, Mr. O'Donnell had reason to believe his waiting, his work in the unglamorous world of neighborhood politics, would soon be over.

It had been an open secret on the Upper West Side that the 37-year-old Mr. O'Donnell had his eyes on the State Senate seat occupied by Franz Leichter, a venerable Democrat known for his unapologetic liberalism and his exhaustive investigations of political perfidy. Even as the State Senator was contemplating his future, Mr. O'Donnell hired an extremely enthusiastic press secretary and did everything a candidate-in-waiting ought to do. And when Mr. Leichter announced on April 20 that he would not seek re-election, it was just a matter of minutes before Mr. O'Donnell had an announcement of his own-that he would, in fact, seek election from the tumultuous West Side.

State Senators and their colleagues in the Assembly are among the most obscure political animals in New York, so much so that a competitive race for an open seat on the West Side probably would not command much attention in the media. But this one already has, not only in the local press, but in USA Today and other outlets. While Mr. O'Donnell's politics and community service fit the profile of an earnest liberal Democrat from an earnest liberal district, he also happens to be Rosie O'Donnell's older brother. Not even the West Side is immune from celebrity politics.

The Shadow Knows

Mr. O'Donnell knows there will be no escaping his sister's shadow in the months leading to September's Democratic primary-he even looks like a male version of his sister. "You play the hand you're dealt," he said. "I happen to have one person in my family who is very successful; she is well known for what she does, and, I'd assume, very well paid. She loves her brother. But no one serves [in the Legal Aid Society] for seven years because his sister is going to become the queen of daytime TV."

In fact, many of the people Mr. O'Donnell has been working with in the community had no idea that they were in the presence of Celebrity Kin. Maritta Dunn, chairman of Community Board 9, tells how she figured it all out a full year after Mr. O'Donnell had begun attending board meetings. "We were laughing about something," she said, "and I said, 'People always say I look like Gladys Knight,' and he said, 'Who do I look like?' And when I thought about it and figured it out, I was so surprised. We all were."

Of course, as one Democrat pointed out, it's not as though he's related to Itzhak Rabin, a name more likely to resonate with the sophisticated voters of the West Side who won't necessarily be impressed by the brother of a television talk-show host. "I think Upper West Siders are just as likely to give celebrity status to the president of a tenants [group] or a block association," said City Council member Thomas Duane, who is running for the State Senate seat vacated by Catherine Abate in the district southeast of the area Mr. O'Donnell wishes to represent.

There's no denying, however, that Mr. O'Donnell has an advantage in name recognition and in fund-raising. At least two other longtime community activists, Eric Schneiderman and Jerry Goldfeder, figure to be in the race. Both fit the demographic and ideological profile of the district, but neither has Mr. O'Donnell's star power-not that they put much credence in the celebrity angle. "Danny O'Donnell is a guy who I like very much," Mr. Schneiderman said. "I just think my record of work and accomplishment on behalf of progressive causes is better than the other candidates'."

But Curtis Arluck, a Democratic district leader who has endorsed Mr. O'Donnell, acknowledged that Mr. O'Donnell's family connection will help him stand out in a race that will feature candidates who agree on many issues. "There will be a tendency to see the candidates as three well-meaning men in suits," Mr. Arluck said, "and because Rosie O'Donnell is not a well-meaning politician in a suit, people will see Dan differently. It makes him more exciting, more memorable. It takes what is a very good résumé and illuminates it."

Thanks to his sister, Mr. O'Donnell's biography is well known. He grew up in Commack, L.I., one of five siblings. The family was intensely interested in politics; dinner featured discussions of Jimmy Breslin's columns in the Daily News , and Mr. O'Donnell himself canvassed his neighborhood on behalf of George McGovern in 1972-when he was 11 years old. A year later, the O'Donnell children lost their mother to breast cancer, a tragedy Ms. O'Donnell often talks about on her show.

A Local Hero

Mr. O'Donnell attended the City University of New York's public interest law program, went to work for Legal Aid and then opened his own practice. He moved to Morningside Heights in 1990, and quickly became a regular at local community board and political meetings. (He serves as chair of Board 9's housing and land use committee.)

He would be the first openly gay man in the Legislature, and he would be serving in a State Senate dominated by Republicans who oppose passage of a hate-crimes bill that has been floundering in Albany for years. "It'll be hard for [Senate Majority Leader] Joe Bruno … to look a gay colleague in the face and dispute anti-bias legislation," said William Zwart, the top-ranking member of Mr. Leichter's staff, who has signed on as Mr. O'Donnell's campaign manager.

While Mr. O'Donnell's positions are similar to Mr. Leichter's, he will be harder to parody as an out-of-touch, overprivileged West Side liberal. For example, while Mr. O'Donnell no doubt will continue to fight against rent deregulation, he doesn't live in a rent-controlled apartment.

Although the Democratic primary still is months away, Mr. O'Donnell and his opponents already are making the rounds of political clubs. They converged as official candidates for the first time at the Ansonia Democratic Club on April 23 to explain to members that while they each plan to serve in the time-honored tradition of political independence, they differ in emphasis and background. Mr. Schneiderman emphasized his work as an advocate for tenants rights; Mr. Goldfeder noted that he has spent years fighting developers and other West Side villains. Absent from the proceedings, but said to be contemplating a campaign, was City Council member June Eisland of the Bronx, who lives in the northern reaches of the district.

The three announced candidates don't have a harsh word to say about each other. That may change, however, as the primary approaches and the candidates try to outflank each other from the left. West Side politics, after all, can be a blood sport.

And not even a famous sister will protect Mr. O'Donnell from the inevitable slings and arrows.