New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio naps in his office after he goes to the gym in the morning for a workout, which has caused some problems for his staff, according to a new report.
Following his exercise at a Brooklyn gym, De Blasio regularly takes midday naps on the couch in his office–with his face covered by a newspaper to shut out the daylight, the New York Post reports.
"He would tell his front-office staff: 'Don't bother me for the next 30, 45 minutes. I'm going to take a nap," one source told the Post.
"He would arrive at 10 a.m. after working out and then would be napping," an ex-staffer added.
De Blasio's need for naps has caused problems for his staff, who are busy at work while their boss is asleep but cannot get things done because the mayor would be unavailable. Some said there were problems trying to schedule meetings for the mayor because of his habit.
"We couldn't plan our days that first year at City Hall," a source told the Post. "Regardless of what you think of [previous Mayor Michael] Bloomberg, that guy was professional. Now, we've got this incompetence."
The Post's sources said that de Blasio's frequent attendance at late night events helped contribute to his routine napping.
De Blasio's spokesman, Eric Phillips, denied that his boss routinely sleeps on the job and took a shot at the Post's reporting.
"These sources are anonymous because the suggestion that the mayor's regularly napping is absurd and untrue," Phillips said.
De Blasio has previously said that lack of sleep was the reason for his lateness at a memorial service in 2014 for American Airlines Flight 587, which crashed in Queens in 2001 and left a total of 265 dead as the city was still coping with 9/11. The mayor's late arrival caused him to miss the initial bell tolling at the ceremony.