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It’s Wednesday.
Weather: A heat advisory is in effect until tonight. Mostly sunny, with a high in the mid-90s. Scattered storms this evening.
Alternate-side parking: In effect until July 19 (Eid al-Adha).
It’s been two weeks of partial updates and countless caveats. But finally, we have a result.
Eric Adams has won the Democratic nomination for mayor of New York City, according to a call of the contest by The Associated Press on Tuesday. The former police captain edged out his closest rival, Kathryn Garcia, by a single percentage point after elections officials tallied absentee ballots and ran through the ranked-choice elimination rounds.
He will be the overwhelming favorite in the November general election against Curtis Sliwa, the Republican nominee, given New York’s political makeup. He would become the second Black mayor in the city’s history.
[Read more about the results and Mr. Adams’s base of support.]
Here’s what to know:
The results
After Primary Day, as in-person, first-choice votes were tallied, Mr. Adams led the crowded field, with a roughly 10-point margin over the second-place candidate. But as ranked-choice selections were tabulated, Ms. Garcia and Maya Wiley moved into a tight three-way heat.
But after more than 100,000 absentee ballots were tallied, Ms. Garcia could not fully close the gap: She trailed by about 8,400 votes in an unofficial final-round matchup. Ms. Wiley finished in third place. The two were vying to become the city’s first female mayor.
Of the nearly 938,000 ballots counted overall, about 15 percent ranked neither Mr. Adams or Ms. Garcia. If a greater portion of them had ranked either candidate, the outcome of the race might have changed.
The reaction
Neither Ms. Garcia nor Ms. Wiley has conceded, and their campaign statements noted that the results had not yet been made official. It was not immediately clear whether either would bring legal challenges against the results, given the small margin. (All three leading candidates had filed to maintain the option to do so.)
If they do not, the results could be certified next week.
The remaining ballots
The tabulations on Tuesday included most but not all of the absentee ballots.
There are potentially several thousand votes still to be counted, which may include affidavit votes, as well as defective absentee ballots that voters can fix within the next week. The Adams campaign told my colleague Dana Rubinstein that there are maybe 3,000 votes left to count, which would make it mathematically impossible for Ms. Garcia to win.
From The Times
Cuomo Declares a Gun Violence Emergency in New York State
As Delta Risk Looms, New York City Scales Back Covid Monitoring
Man Charged With Hate Crimes After Racist Tirade Is Caught on Video
New York’s Fiscal Watchdog Sues to End Mayor’s Pandemic Spending Powers
Hot Vax Summer? Falstaff and Shakespeare in the Park Are Ready.
Want more news? Check out our full coverage.
The Mini Crossword: Here is today’s puzzle.
What we’re reading
The city’s three public library systems will return to nearly full service this month, reopening at their prepandemic schedules. [Gothamist]
More than 10,000 subway trips were canceled last month because of a shortage of train crew members, the most in a month since the earliest stages of the pandemic. [The City]
A second Shake Shack employee has sued the Police Department over an incident last June in which officials made unfounded claims that fast-food workers intentionally poisoned officers [Daily News]
And finally: Once again, life is a cabaret
Elysa Gardner writes:
“Thank you all for risking your lives by coming out tonight,” Joe Iconis quipped, welcoming a socially distanced crowd to the June reopening of the cabaret venue Feinstein’s/54 Below in Manhattan.
Iconis, a composer, lyricist and performer beloved among young musical theater fans, was joking, but before diving into an alternately goofy and poignant set with the actor and singer George Salazar, he added, earnestly, “It’s the most incredible thing to be able to do this show for real human beings, not computer screens.”
Moist-eyed reunions between artists and fans have been taking place across the city as Covid-19 restrictions have gradually relaxed. Storied establishments like the jazz clubs Birdland and Blue Note, newer spots such as the Green Room 42 and City Winery at Hudson River Park (which both reopened in April) and the East Village alt-cabaret oases Pangea and Club Cumming are once again offering food, drink and in-the-flesh entertainment. And cabaret veterans — along with other jazz and pop acts, and drag performers — are returning to the work that is their bread and butter.
“To see people physiologically responding to music again — toes tapping, heads bopping — that’s almost better than applause,” said the pianist and singer Michael Garin, one of many who used social media to stay connected with fans during the pandemic, and among the first to resume performances for live audiences.
But, Garin noted, “It’s not like we’re flipping a switch and bringing everything back to normal.” Particularly in the spring, not everyone was ready to pick up where they left off.
Still, it is the love of performing itself, and the perspective gained after a year of lost shows, that is driving many artists’ emotional responses to returning to the stage. Michael Feinstein, the multitasking American songbook champion and namesake for clubs in San Francisco and Los Angeles as well as New York, believes “that anyone who is a performer is coming out of this in a very different place, with a deeper sense of connection and joy and gratitude.”
“I cannot imagine any artist now taking any moment of what we do for granted,” he added.
It’s Wednesday — go see a show.
Metropolitan Diary: No. 7 buzz
Dear Diary:
I was standing on a No. 7 train heading into Manhattan when a wasp started buzzing around my head and then landed in my hair.
An older woman standing nearby noticed what was happening and the panicked expression on my face that said, “What do I do now?”
Without a word, she calmly rolled up her newspaper and gently hit me on the head.
The wasp, probably somewhat dazed, flew away.
— Joan McGrath
Illustrated by Agnes Lee. Read more Metropolitan Diary here.
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Source: Elections - nytimes.com
