A Candidate Drops Out, Turning the Race for Governor Upside Down

It’s Friday. Today we’ll look at the surprise announcement from Letitia James, who said she was dropping out of the race for governor to run for another term as state attorney general. We’ll also take a look at a new bookstore in Chinatown.

“I have come to the conclusion that I must continue my work as attorney general.”

It was the opening line of a message on Twitter that left out the most important part: Letitia James was dropping out of the race for governor. She said she would run for a second term as attorney general of New York.

My colleagues Katie Glueck and Nicholas Fandos write that there is now no question that Gov. Kathy Hochul will enter 2022 as the most formidable candidate in the race.

James had been treated as a top contender in the six weeks since she declared her candidacy, following her office’s blockbuster report on sexual harassment claims against former Gov. Andrew Cuomo that prompted his resignation. James, a Democrat from Brooklyn, hoped to assemble a coalition of Black and Latino voters and become the first Black female governor in the nation.

But recent polls had indicated that James was trailing Hochul, who replaced Cuomo, by double digits among Democratic primary voters. She was also thought to lag in fund-raising and in the competition for high-profile endorsements, while Hochul has been rolling out a steady stream. One state senator said colleagues in Albany had been reluctant to risk alienating Hochul by endorsing James.

[Letitia James Drops Out of N.Y. Governor’s Race]

James said in her Twitter message that she wanted to “finish the job” on several “important investigations and cases.” She did not go in details. But her announcement came on the same day that it became known that her office intended to subpoena former President Donald Trump to testify next month in a civil fraud investigation. If James finds evidence of wrongdoing, she could file a lawsuit against Trump.

Ronald Fischetti, a lawyer for Trump, said he would move to have the subpoena quashed. Trump’s lawyers could argue that compelling him to testify would violate the constitutional protection against self-incrimination because the testimony could be unfairly used against him in a criminal investigation being overseen by the Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus Vance Jr.

Both James and Vance have tried to determine whether Trump listed pumped-up valuations on his properties to obtain financing. Because the two investigations overlap, Fischetti said Trump — who has repeatedly called the investigations politically motivated witch hunts — could refuse to give a deposition once James formally subpoenaed him.

James is also litigating a closely watched case against the National Rifle Association, as well as lawsuits involving Facebook, Google, Amazon and the New York Police Department.

As for withdrawing from the governor’s race, she made the decision on Wednesday and her campaign notified allies early on Thursday, according to people with direct knowledge of her conversations with advisers and supporters she called. One person who was contacted on Thursday said no explanation was given for the course change. Another said she emphasized her work in her current role.

Weather

Look for a partly sunny start to the weekend, with temps in the high 40s. At night, it will be mostly cloudy. Expect a chance of showers in the wee hours of the morning and temps in the mid-40s.

alternate-side parking

In effect until Dec. 24 (Christmas Eve).

The latest New York news

Labor

• Workers at one Buffalo-area Starbucks have voted to form a union.

• Student workers on strike at Columbia University formed picket lines after an email from the university said that students who remained on strike were not guaranteed jobs next term.

Other Big Stories

• The chancellor of the State University of New York, Jim Malatras, will resign. Pressure had been building for him to step down over text messages that showed he had belittled a woman who later accused Andrew Cuomo of sexual harassment.

• New legislation will require hosts of short-term rentals to register with the city.

• Over a week since Ghislaine Maxwell’s trial on federal sex-trafficking charges began, she and her defense team are now presented with a choice: Will she take the stand?

• Allergan agreed to pay $200 million in a settlement reached just before closing arguments began in a monthslong opioid trial.

Yu and Me, for one and all

My colleague Ashley Wong got an advance look at a bookstore that is opening tomorrow at 44 Mulberry Street in Manhattan’s Chinatown. It’s called Yu and Me, a play on the name of the owner, Lucy Yu, who is 27 and committed to selling a diverse range of authors historically underrepresented in book publishing.

Yu will join only a handful of female Asian American booksellers in the city and will probably be the first to operate in Manhattan’s Chinatown, according to Vic Lee, co-founder of Welcome to Chinatown, a group created during the pandemic to promote businesses there.

Yu, who grew up in Southern California, was trained as a chemical engineer and has never been in the book business. But she said she had spent her life seeking out literature that made her feel seen — books by and about immigrants, exploring complicated mother-daughter relationships. Stocking her shelves with such works is a tribute to her own mother, who is from China and used to take her to Chinatown in Los Angeles on weekends, where they found a common language over errands, art classes and snacks like you tiao and soy milk.

“I never saw representation for myself in the books I read growing up,” she said. “Seeing the need for diverse representation and stories outside of our own, it really pushed me to continue on this path.” She said she would also offer books from authors across the Asian and Pacific Islander diaspora, a personal quest that intensified after watching anti-Asian hate crimes rise over the past year.

Her arrival is being welcomed as Chinatown tries to rebound from the pandemic. She is “coming into a market that is highly in need,” said Wellington Chen, the executive director of the Chinatown Partnership, which works on community projects with the Chinatown Business Improvement District.

He said that foot traffic in Chinatown was lagging, at least on weekdays, because potential customers have not returned to offices in Lower Manhattan. He said bookstores drew shoppers who linger and who he hopes will check out other businesses in the area. Yu said she decided to open a bookstore after one of her closest friends, James MacDonald, died last year in an accident. She and MacDonald had been in a book club together, she said, and his death prompted her to re-evaluate what she really wanted to do with her life. A section of the store is dedicated to him, filled with books he loved.

For the first month, Yu plans to juggle bookselling with her full-time job as a chemical engineer. The store will be open 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday, sandwiched between hours spent at her chemical engineering job. Starting next year, she’ll also serve espresso, wine, locally brewed beer and pastries from Fay Da Bakery on Mott Street.

What we’re reading

• The City spoke to homeowners and renters whose lives were upended by Hurricane Ida.

• “The Little Prince,” an enduringly popular 1943 novella, comes to Broadway.

MetROPOLITAN diary

At Rapoport’s

Dear Diary:

Rapoport’s, a Jewish kosher dairy restaurant on the Lower East Side, was one of my favorites.

The food was delicious, the décor was functional and the bowl of sour tomatoes, pickles and other vegetables always looked like you were not the first customer to serve yourself. And the U-bet chocolate syrup was yours for making an egg cream.

Soon after my wife and I married, I introduced her to Rapoport’s. We both ordered blintzes. They did not disappoint. Although we were no longer hungry, we felt compelled to try one of the restaurant’s legendary pastries for dessert.

I called the waiter over to order.

He looked down at our plates and then into my eyes.

“No dessert,” he said.

I was devastated.

“No dessert?” I whined.

“You didn’t finish your blintzes,” he said.

We looked down at our plates. He was right. My wife and I proceeded to obediently finish the last bits.

The waiter returned with our rugelach.

— Arno Selco

Illustrated by Agnes Lee. Vote for the best Metropolitan Diary entry of 2021, send submissions here and read more Metropolitan Diary here.

Glad we could get together here. See you Monday. — J.B.

P.S. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword and Spelling Bee. You can find all our puzzles here.

Melissa Guerrero, Andrew Hinderaker, Rick Martinez and Olivia Parker contributed to New York Today. You can reach the team at nytoday@nytimes.com.

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