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(Fox News) - As congressional Democrats deal with simmering tensions on Capitol Hill, New York Democrats are fighting a battle of their own. The New York Times reports a top aide to State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is urging officials not to embrace Caroline Kennedy as a replacement for Senator Hillary Clinton, even though Cuomo said he was staying out of the competition. Clinton will vacate her Senate seat if she is confirmed as secretary of state.

Sources — who spoke on the condition of anonymity –— tell The Times that Joseph Percoco said, "Don't you think it should be someone who understands upstate? Shouldn’t it be somebody who knows New York better?"

A top union official says Percoco suggested to him that Cuomo wanted the job saying, "You should, wink-wink, nudge-nudge, know that he kind of wants it."

A Cuomo spokesman denies any effort to undermine Kennedy’s Senate ambitions.