Pirate’s Booty founder Robert Ehrlich compares himself to Anne Frank after blowout election loss — and plans to start issuing ‘executive orders’
Voters threw him overboard, but he’s still making waves.
The founder of popular Pirate’s Booty cheese puff snack who got clobbered in his longshot Long Island village mayoral bid claimed the tally was rigged and shockingly compared his blowout loss to the plight of Anne Frank.
Robert Ehrlich, the self-described “Captain of Booty,” chalked up his Sea Cliff election loss to “voter suppression” on Wednesday — a day after notching just 62 write-in votes to incumbent Mayor Elena Villafane’s 1,064.
“Today I was shocked,” Ehrlich, 66, said in a text message to The Post.
“To see the entire village of Sea Cliff turn into Anne Frank and the election was the SS looking at the books,” Ehrlich’s lengthy message continued.
Ehrlich has a history of accusing the Nassau County village of antisemitism.
During a 2004 zoning dispute, he accused Sea Cliff officials of discriminating against him and his businesses because he is Jewish, losing this case and having to pay back $900,000 to the village.
Now, he references the Nassau County Police Department “raiding” his coffee shop and threatening to arrest him after holding his own “vote” on Tuesday — where Ehrlich claims to have captured nearly 1,000 votes on homemade ballots — still less than Villafane.
On Election Day, Ehrlich told The Post that he expected this “official result,” accusing the village of “manufacturing” its vote tally.
“They tried to give me a number that was so low that I couldn’t even say I had 10% to challenge,” he told The Post after the results were released.
Ehrlich declared himself the “winner” just 30 minutes after the polls opened Tuesday and is still claiming the title of mayor for what he calls the “Incorporated Village of Sea Cliff Residents” — which he says he created through a little-known state law called the Citizen Empowerment Act.
The 2009 state law empowers residents to dissolve or reformulate their community if they can gather signatures from 10% of the town.
On the day he stormed the village hall last week, Ehrlich claimed he had 1,800 signatures, but he refused to publicize them, claiming he was protecting the signers afraid of retribution from the 5,000 person town.
“What if they see my name and then I’m blacklisted from ever getting another permit again,” an anonymous Ehrlich voter told The Post on Election Day.
Ehrlich said he is now strategizing how to move forward after the election.
He said he plans to start issuing “executive orders” for Sea Cliff in the coming weeks, including issuing permits for septic systems, outdoor seating, and more.
He vowed to pay for any litigation or fines for the residents and businesses he issues these allowances to, and urged Gov. Kathy Hochul to come to Long Island and “set the record straight” for Sea Cliff.
Villafane, however, said she will no longer “tolerate any further attempts to undermine the governance of this Village.”
“Any efforts to disrupt or interfere with their work will be addressed through all appropriate and lawful means,” she said.
Last election, Villafane won with just 182 votes, but this year’s tiny local election churned out a nearly sixfold increase in turnout.
“I probably wouldn’t have voted today if it wasn’t for all of the craziness,” Tim Wegner, a 29-year-old Sea Cliff resident, told The Post outside of the polling location Tuesday.
Residents like Wegner told The Post that due to Ehrlich’s antics, they felt this year’s ballot weighed more than previous years — bringing out voters, like Wegner, who had never participated in past local elections.
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