Congressman Peter King called New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio's decision not to attend Hillary Clinton's campaign kickoff rally on Roosevelt Island this weekend "a knife in the back."
The Republican from New York also suggested that de Blasio's own presidential aspirations may be behind the mayor's decision to distance himself from the Clintons.
"He was her campaign manager for the Senate back in 2000," King told radio host Joe Piscopo, in an interview on New York's AM 970 The Answer. "You would think, as the mayor of the city where she was the Senator, that that would be an ideal relationship between the two of them -- but no."
"I think de Blasio, Bill de Blasio, really thinks that he has a chance. If there's a stalemate, if Hillary collapses, and people are not gonna take Bernie Sanders seriously, why not take the mayor of New York City seriously?" King continued.
King told Piscopo that he thought a de Blasio bid would be "disastrous," but that he could understand the mayor's thinking.
"Let's face it -- the country is changing, the world is changing," said King. "Maybe he feels that anything could happen."
King went on to suggest that the Clintons should be hurt by de Blasio's betrayal.
"If I were Hillary, I would really feel a little bit of a knife in the back there," King claimed, "because again, she and Bill Clinton did an awful lot to move Bill de Blasio along, and she's saying all the things now that de Blasio is saying."
"I guess de Blasio's answer is that he really means them, and she doesn't."