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    Policing and the New York Mayoral Race

    Listen and follow The Daily Apple Podcasts | Spotify | StitcherWhen the New York City mayoral race began, two issues dominated: the pandemic and the police. The city saw enormous protests last summer that prompted calls to rethink or defund the police department. In the last few months, however, the progressive consensus has unraveled. While overall crime was down at the end of 2020, acts of violence were on the incline: Murders were up 45 percent in New York, and shootings had increased by 97 percent. A central question of the contest has become: Is New York safer with more or fewer police officers?Today, we see this tension play out in a single household: Yumi Mannarelli and her mother, Misako Shimada.Ms. Mannarelli took part in the Black Lives Matter protests last summer and is an ardent supporter of defunding the police. Ms. Shimada, who was born in Japan, is unconvinced. The rise in anti-Asian hate crimes has meant she feels safer with a police presence. On today’s episodeMisako Shimada and Yumi Mannarelli, a mother and daughter who live in New York City. Early voting Sunday morning at Saratoga Village in the Bushwick neighborhood of Brooklyn. This is the first year that New York City voters have been able to vote early in a mayoral election.Sarah Blesener for The New York TimesBackground reading The New York City mayoral race has been fluid, but the centrality of crime and policing has remained constant. There are a lot of ways to listen to The Daily. Here’s how.Transcripts of each episode are available by the next workday. You can find them at the top of the page.The Daily is made by Lisa Tobin, Rachel Quester, Lynsea Garrison, Annie Brown, Clare Toeniskoetter, Paige Cowett, Michael Simon Johnson, Brad Fisher, Larissa Anderson, Wendy Dorr, Chris Wood, Jessica Cheung, Stella Tan, Alexandra Leigh Young, Lisa Chow, Eric Krupke, Marc Georges, Luke Vander Ploeg, M.J. Davis Lin, Austin Mitchell, Neena Pathak, Dan Powell, Dave Shaw, Sydney Harper, Daniel Guillemette, Robert Jimison, Mike Benoist, Liz O. Baylen, Asthaa Chaturvedi, Kaitlin Roberts, Rachelle Bonja, Diana Nguyen, Marion Lozano, Soraya Shockley, Corey Schreppel, Anita Badejo and Rob Szypko.Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Landsverk of Wonderly. Special thanks to Sam Dolnick, Theo Balcomb, Cliff Levy, Lauren Jackson, Julia Simon, Mahima Chablani, Nora Keller, Sofia Milan, Desiree Ibekwe, Erica Futterman and Wendy Dorr. More

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    Major Moments From the Final Democratic Mayoral Debate

    [Want to get New York Today by email? Here’s the sign-up.]It’s Thursday. Weather: Sunny again, with a high close to 80. Alternate-side parking: In effect through tomorrow. Suspended on Saturday for Juneteenth. WNBC-TV and NYC Campaign Finance BoardFive days of campaigning left.With Tuesday’s primary fast approaching, Democratic candidates for mayor of New York City sparred over matters of public safety, schooling and homelessness last night as they shared their closing arguments in the final debate before the vote closes.The early voting period lasts through Sunday, and the ranked-choice system has injected a large degree of unpredictability into the race. Still, Eric Adams, the Brooklyn borough president, remains a consistent front-runner in the sparse available polling.[Read more about the debate and the candidates’ visions for New York.]Here are a few of the standout moments:Attacks flew over an endorsementThis week, Andrew Yang, a former presidential candidate, received the endorsement of the Captains Endowment Association, the union that represents police captains. When asked at the debate to explain why he was the candidate best equipped to tackle a rise in shootings, Mr. Yang pointed to the endorsement.“The people you should ask about this are Eric’s former colleagues in the police captains’ union,” Mr. Yang said.Mr. Adams tried to dismiss the endorsement, suggesting that he had not even asked for it. Mr. Yang accused him of lying.The discussion about homelessness became heatedMr. Yang sounded alarms around matters of mental health and homelessness, saying that the issues were impeding the city’s recovery and that homeless people needed to be introduced to a “better environment.” He said he would rebuild “the stock of psych beds in our city.”Scott M. Stringer, the city comptroller, shot back: “That is the greatest non-answer I’ve ever heard,” he said, discussing a need to create tens of thousands of units of “truly affordable housing.”‘The worst idea you’ve heard from another candidate?’The question encouraged contenders to sling a little mud, and Mr. Yang and Mr. Adams again targeted each other. Kathryn Garcia, the former sanitation commissioner, ripped the “defund the police” movement. Maya Wiley challenged Mr. Adams on policing.“The worst idea I’ve ever heard is bringing back stop and frisk and the anti-crime unit from Eric Adams,” said Ms. Wiley, a civil rights lawyer. “Which, one, is racist; two, is unconstitutional; and, three, didn’t stop any crime; and, four, it will not happen in a Maya Wiley administration.”Mr. Adams responded that, if he was elected, the abuses of stop and frisk would not return.From The TimesMaya Wiley Takes Credit for Daniel Pantaleo’s Firing. Is That Justified?Barred From Her Own Home: How a Tool for Fighting Domestic Abuse FailsWhy New York Progressives Are Pinning Their Hopes on the City CouncilGoogle to Open Physical Store in New YorkNew York City Gets Another Major Marathon, in BrooklynSummer is here and New York City is reopening. Stay up to date on the best things to do, see and eat this season. Take a look at our latest newsletter on upcoming Juneteenth celebrations, and sign up here.Want more news? Check out our full coverage.The Mini Crossword: Here is today’s puzzle.What we’re readingHow one after-school program in Brooklyn transformed into a neighborhood support system during the pandemic. [Chalkbeat New York]The mayor announced that a parade next month would be held in recognition of essential workers during the pandemic. But one group was disappointed not to be mentioned. [Gothamist]The annual Queens World Film Festival is returning to the borough next week. Here are more details on what it will look like. [QNS]And finally: Renaming 16 parks for Black historyA Black feminist writer from Harlem. The first Black woman to have a play produced on Broadway. An actress and singer who lived in Manhattan and broke ground for Black performers..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-3btd0c{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-3btd0c{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-3btd0c strong{font-weight:600;}.css-3btd0c em{font-style:italic;}.css-w739ur{margin:0 auto 5px;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-w739ur{font-family:nyt-cheltenham,georgia,’times new roman’,times,serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.375rem;line-height:1.625rem;}@media (min-width:740px){#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-w739ur{font-size:1.6875rem;line-height:1.875rem;}}@media (min-width:740px){.css-w739ur{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-9s9ecg{margin-bottom:15px;}.css-uf1ume{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-box-pack:justify;-webkit-justify-content:space-between;-ms-flex-pack:justify;justify-content:space-between;}.css-wxi1cx{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-flex-direction:column;-ms-flex-direction:column;flex-direction:column;-webkit-align-self:flex-end;-ms-flex-item-align:end;align-self:flex-end;}.css-12vbvwq{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-12vbvwq{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-12vbvwq:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-12vbvwq{border:none;padding:10px 0 0;border-top:2px solid #121212;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-qjk116{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-qjk116 strong{font-weight:700;}.css-qjk116 em{font-style:italic;}.css-qjk116 a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-underline-offset:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:1px;text-decoration-thickness:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:visited{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}New York City officials announced on Wednesday that 16 parks across the five boroughs would be named for those figures and other Black leaders who made significant contributions in areas from education and entertainment to civil rights and community relations.“Our goal is to represent the culture and diversity of New York City,” the city’s parks commissioner, Mitchell J. Silver, said at a news conference at Mullaly Park in the Bronx. The roughly 15-acre park in the Concourse neighborhood of the borough was a focus of local activism as protests arose to push for officials to change its title, citing concerns about the record of its namesake, who published attacks on the Emancipation Proclamation.“For years, the community has expressed discontent and a desire to rename this beloved green space,” Mr. Silver said. A new name that honors the Rev. Wendell Foster, the first Black elected city official in the Bronx, will be adopted in September 2022, he said.The move comes amid a larger push to change some names of monuments and landmarks in New York and elsewhere, sometimes to leave behind references to figures with racist pasts and at other times to honor Black New Yorkers. Several top Democratic mayoral candidates have suggested they would support renaming sites including streets named for slaveholders.As for park spaces, those that will take on new names include the Prospect Park Bandshell in Brooklyn (changing to Lena Horne Bandshell); Hell’s Kitchen Park in Manhattan (to become Lorraine Hansberry Park); and St. Albans Oval in Queens (to be renamed Musicians Oval in honor of influential Black jazz musicians).It’s Thursday — get outside.Metropolitan Diary: Waiting for Denzel Dear Diary:My mother loves Denzel Washington. So it was only natural that we would go see him in the “The Iceman Cometh” when she visited a few years ago.My legs were stiff and my mouth was dry after the four-hour production ended, and I was ready to go home. But my mother loves Denzel Washington. So we waited outside the stage door for the cast to emerge.My mother was easily the oldest person there, but she was grinning like a teenager about to meet her hero.“Do you have a pen?” she asked me nervously.“These actors always carry pens,” I said with confidence. “Don’t worry.”Soon, though, I was frantically asking everyone around us for a pen while my mother continued to wait for the star to emerge.When I got back to where she was standing, I overheard her chatting with other members of the cast.Denzel Washington never came out that night, but my mother still proudly tells everyone back home how she invited half the cast of a Broadway show to visit her in Colorado.I’m glad I didn’t have a pen.— Sid GopinathNew York Today is published weekdays around 6 a.m. Sign up here to get it by email. You can also find it at nytoday.com. More

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    Battle for Black Voters in N.Y.C. Mayor’s Race Centers on Policing

    As New York’s Democratic primary nears, Black voters appear torn between Eric Adams and Maya Wiley and their divergent views on balancing public safety and civil rights.With concerns rising over violent crime in New York City, the Rev. Al Sharpton posed a sensitive question to several mayoral candidates at a recent forum in Harlem: Would they consider embracing the stop-and-frisk policing tactic as part of their public safety strategy?“Is that a serious question, Rev.?” said Maya Wiley, a civil rights lawyer. “We are not going backward to what beat us, what broke our ankles, busted our jaws and put our kids in jail for poverty.”But Eric Adams, a former police officer who, like Ms. Wiley, is Black, saw the issue differently.“It’s a constitutional policy given to law enforcement officers,” he said, while quickly acknowledging that the police had been allowed to abuse it by stopping people without probable cause.The sharp increase in shootings and homicides in New York has made crime the No. 1 issue for voters this year, polls show, but that concern is being felt even more deeply in predominantly Black neighborhoods that have struggled with both gun violence and the effects of overly aggressive policing.Black voters, who make up more than a quarter of the city’s electorate, are a valuable constituency: Their support played an instrumental role in the 1989 election of David N. Dinkins, the city’s first Black mayor, and in the 2013 win by Bill de Blasio, who is finishing up his second and final term.All 13 Democratic candidates for mayor have courted votes in Black neighborhoods and churches. But according to polls and interviews across the city, Black voters seem to be zeroing in on two of the seven Black candidates: Mr. Adams, who has led recent polls, and, to a lesser extent, Ms. Wiley.Their very different approaches to public safety and criminal justice concerns have become central to their attempts to win over Black voters, roughly a year after national protests against police brutality erupted after the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis.“Parallel with our concern about police violence is our concern about gun violence,” Mr. Sharpton said. “You have Black people that live in neighborhoods where we are afraid of the cops and the robbers.”At an early polling site at the Bronx County Courthouse, Zuri Washington, 30, said she ranked Ms. Wiley first and left Mr. Adams off her ballot because of their stances on policing and public safety.“I know that crime is up in the city, I understand that. But that doesn’t mean we need more police,” Ms. Washington, an actress, said after casting her ballot on Saturday. “There needs to be different strategies for moving forward, and Eric Adams is not that person.”But other early voters cited the rising crime numbers: As of June 6, shootings in New York City had risen by 68 percent from last year; homicides had risen by 12 percent over the same period.Fears of violent crime have led some leaders in predominantly Black neighborhoods to reject efforts to defund the police, highlighting a divide that cuts across racial, ideological and generational lines. “I would like to feel safe walking down the street,” said Barbara Mack, a retired guidance counselor who voted for Mr. Adams on Saturday in South Jamaica, Queens.“He’s been a police officer,” Ms. Mack said. “He’s supervised police. He’s tough. I don’t think he’ll accept garbage.”In the 2013 mayoral campaign, Mr. de Blasio seized on the Police Department’s overreliance on stop-and-frisk tactics, where officers stopped and questioned thousands of mostly Black and Latino men, the overwhelming majority of whom were found to have done nothing wrong.Mr. de Blasio aggressively opposed the police tactic, and was able to defeat a handful of more established Democratic rivals, including William C. Thompson, the former city comptroller who was the lone Black candidate that year.This year, four of the eight main candidates in the Democratic primary are Black: Mr. Adams; Ms. Wiley; Dianne Morales, a former nonprofit executive; and Raymond J. McGuire, a former vice chairman at Citi.Their positions on policing and public safety offer some clear distinctions, with Ms. Wiley and Ms. Morales on the left and Mr. Adams and Mr. McGuire toward the political center.Ms. Morales, who identifies as Afro-Latina, has embraced the defund the police movement by promising to cut $3 billion from the police budget and put the money toward social services.Mr. McGuire formerly served on the New York City Police Foundation, a nonprofit that supports the Police Department, and has come out firmly against the defund movement but said he will not increase the use of stop and frisk.Neither has made an impact in the limited public polling available, including among Black voters. In a poll released on Monday by the Marist Institute for Public Opinion, 43 percent of likely Black primary voters said they planned to rank Mr. Adams first; Ms. Wiley was a distant second with 11 percent.But Ms. Wiley has gained momentum, winning endorsements in recent weeks from influential left-leaning politicians like Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Jamaal Bowman, Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Jumaane Williams, the city’s public advocate.She has pledged to cut $1 billion from the police budget, cancel two classes of incoming police cadets and end the use of taxpayer money to defend officers in “egregious” instances of misconduct.“Stop and frisk is not coming back in a Maya Wiley administration, nor is the anti-crime unit,” Ms. Wiley said recently after greeting voters outside Yankee Stadium, referencing plainclothes units of officers that were focused on violent crime and were involved in a high number of shootings. They were disbanded last year but Mr. Adams has proposed bringing them back.Earlier this month, Ms. Wiley released an ad criticizing the Police Department’s response to the protests over the murder of Mr. Floyd. “They rammed into peaceful protesters, beat others to the ground and New York’s leaders defended it,” Ms. Wiley said in the ad.That same day, Mr. Adams also released an ad, titled “Safer,” which focused on how he plans to help New Yorkers “feel safe and secure” so that children could play “without getting hit by a stray bullet.”Maya Wiley, who has recently won endorsements from influential left-leaning politicians, argues that increasing policing is not the way to improve safety.Andrew Seng for The New York TimesFurther contrasts were clear after the shooting death of Justin Wallace, 10, in Queens. Ms. Wiley noted on Twitter that the “N.Y.P.D. couldn’t protect” the child, but it could “march through a park in riot gear, terrorizing people to enforce an arbitrary curfew,” referring to tactics employed at Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village.Mr. Adams said: “You can’t have a city where 10-year-old babies are shot.”Throughout the campaign, Mr. Adams has highlighted his background as a transit officer and as a Police Department captain who spoke out against discriminatory policies from within the agency. Mr. Adams’s testimony in 2013 helped a federal judge rule that the way the Police Department was using stop and frisk was unconstitutional..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-3btd0c{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-3btd0c{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-3btd0c strong{font-weight:600;}.css-3btd0c em{font-style:italic;}.css-w739ur{margin:0 auto 5px;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-w739ur{font-family:nyt-cheltenham,georgia,’times new roman’,times,serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.375rem;line-height:1.625rem;}@media (min-width:740px){#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-w739ur{font-size:1.6875rem;line-height:1.875rem;}}@media (min-width:740px){.css-w739ur{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-9s9ecg{margin-bottom:15px;}.css-uf1ume{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-box-pack:justify;-webkit-justify-content:space-between;-ms-flex-pack:justify;justify-content:space-between;}.css-wxi1cx{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-flex-direction:column;-ms-flex-direction:column;flex-direction:column;-webkit-align-self:flex-end;-ms-flex-item-align:end;align-self:flex-end;}.css-12vbvwq{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-12vbvwq{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-12vbvwq:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-12vbvwq{border:none;padding:10px 0 0;border-top:2px solid #121212;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-qjk116{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-qjk116 strong{font-weight:700;}.css-qjk116 em{font-style:italic;}.css-qjk116 a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-underline-offset:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:1px;text-decoration-thickness:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:visited{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}After a shooting in Times Square last month that injured several tourists, Mr. Adams held two crime-related news conferences within 24 hours, and renewed calls to reinstitute the plainclothes anti-crime unit to focus on guns and gangs. He proposed a 511 hotline for gun tips following a weekend in May when the police said more than two dozen people were shot across the city, and he has denounced graffiti, ATVs and dirt bikes as signs of lawlessness.And after several instances of violence on the subway, Mr. Adams rode the train to Brooklyn from Manhattan with members of the Transport Workers Union Local 100 to call for more police officers to patrol the system.“It’s really wild out here,” said Cassandra Solomon, 55, a legal administrative assistant from Bedford-Stuyvesant in Brooklyn, who spoke with Mr. Adams on the subway platform at West 4th Street. “I know the whole climate with the police and our young Black men, but we still need some kind of protection.”Mr. Adams has tried to moderate his message on policing by saying that he would improve police training and speed up the disciplinary process to remove abusive officers.Early voters in Southeast Queens over the weekend cited Mr. Adams’s familiarity with how both crime and police brutality can affect a neighborhood. Gail Whiteman, a fraud investigator with the city, and Karen DeGannes, a retired city police officer, said they both voted for Mr. Adams because of “the police situation,” as Ms. Whiteman called it.The two Black women said they believed Mr. Adams, as a former officer, was best suited to change police culture and reduce police brutality.Criminal justice reform advocates, however, say that Mr. Adams’s positions do not track with how the defund movement has shifted the conversation away from policing as the main source of public safety.“In the ’90s, the city saw the problems of joblessness and homelessness and the lack of mental health care, and the police were brought in to meet that need,” said Anthonine Pierre, a spokeswoman for the Communities United for Police Reform Action Fund. “That resulted in Black people being railroaded out of communities and into jail.”All four of the leading Black candidates say they would look for ways to move money from the police budget to schools, mental health and social services either through wholesale cuts or by cutting inefficiencies.But Mr. Adams is the only major Democratic candidate who has said that stop-and-frisk tactics should be used, as long as the interactions were analyzed to make sure officers are complying with the law.He has said he would protect officers who follow the rules, “but if you are abusive in my city you are going to be out of the department.” He has pledged to name a woman as police commissioner and said that he would give civilian panels the power to choose their precinct commanders.Yet even some Black legislators who have endorsed Mr. Adams disagree with his stance on stop and frisk.“I’m not a proponent of stop and frisk because it’s a net negative on Black and brown individuals, especially Black and brown youth,” said State Senator Jamaal Bailey, the chairman of the Bronx Democratic Party, even as his party endorsed Mr. Adams earlier this month. “But we can learn from someone who has had actual policing experience.”As the primary season entered its final days, Mr. Adams and Ms. Wiley have focused their attention on traditionally Black areas like Bedford-Stuyvesant, Southeast Queens and Harlem.On a recent Sunday, Mr. Adams held a rally with Black educators in front of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem. A few weeks earlier he gathered with a group of mostly Black male supporters at Frederick Douglass Circle.When Ms. Wiley received an endorsement from Representative Hakeem Jeffries, the state’s highest-ranking House Democrat, she did so at Restoration Plaza, a community anchor in Bedford-Stuyvesant. Community Voices Heard Power, a group focused on racial, social and economic justice, half of whose members are Black women, endorsed her at the Harriet Tubman Memorial in Harlem.“I am here to tell you that we will no longer allow the powers that be in this city to talk about us without answering to us,” said Afua Atta-Mensah, the group’s executive director, her voice rising as if she was drawing vitality from the towering 10-foot-tall bronze statue behind her. “It’s our time now.”Sean Piccoli contributed reporting. More

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    In the Manhattan D.A. Race, Arguing for a Fresh Point of View

    [Want to get New York Today by email? Here’s the sign-up.]It’s Tuesday. Weather: Clearing as the day goes on, but periods of showers or storms. High around 80. Alternate-side parking: In effect until Saturday (Juneteenth). Sarah Blesener for The New York TimesOne of the candidates for Manhattan district attorney, Eliza Orlins, has been a public defender for at least a decade. Another candidate, Tahanie Aboushi (above, center), has been a civil rights lawyer. A third candidate, Dan Quart, is a state assemblyman.None of the three has any experience being a prosecutor. And that, they say, is a good thing.Ms. Orlins, Ms. Aboushi and Mr. Quart have argued that true change in the criminal justice system — making it less punitive, for example, or less racist — can only come from someone who hasn’t been tainted by the establishment.But they are having trouble raising money, and distinguishing themselves from one another and even other candidates with prosecutorial backgrounds.[Over the past 45 years, the two men who have led the Manhattan district attorney’s office have come from the establishment. Some candidates say such experience is a bad thing.]The raceThere are eight Democratic candidates vying to replace Cyrus R. Vance Jr., the district attorney, who is not running for re-election. Aside from Ms. Orlins, Ms. Aboushi and Mr. Quart, they are all former prosecutors.Among the leading candidates, Alvin Bragg has been a prosecutor in the state attorney general’s office, and Tali Farhadian Weinstein has been a federal prosecutor and general counsel for the Brooklyn district attorney’s office.Mr. Bragg has pledged to reform the Manhattan district attorney’s office, saying he will work on reducing the number of people behind bars, create a unit to investigate police misconduct and overhaul the sex crimes unit. While Ms. Weinstein has staked out more moderate positions than other candidates, she has championed changes including forming a specialized unit to address gender-based violence.The outsider candidatesMs. Orlins and Ms. Aboushi have both said they will cut the size of the district attorney’s office in half and decline to prosecute many low-level crimes.Ms. Orlins has also spoken in favor of decriminalizing the buying and selling of sex. (Mr. Vance stopped prosecuting prostitution this spring.)Mr. Quart has taken a more moderate position and recently emphasized his commitment to public safety.From The TimesIs Bill de Blasio Secretly Backing Eric Adams for Mayor?Adams Attacks Garcia as Poll Shows They Lead Mayoral FieldYou Can’t Find a Cab. Uber Prices Are Soaring. Here’s Why.A Brooklyn Landmark Holds Its Head High Again‘C Is for Code Switching’ and Other LessonsWant more news? Check out our full coverage.The Mini Crossword: Here is today’s puzzle.What we’re readingA dead black bear with a large open wound was found in a parking lot on Staten Island, which has no known population of wild bears. [ABC 7]People who had been moved from homeless shelters into hotels during the pandemic are protesting a return to the status quo. [Gothamist]Eight years after Maya Wiley was tapped by Mayor Bill de Blasio to bring broadband to low-income neighborhoods, the program is still struggling. [The City]And finally: A trove of art in a humble apartmentThe Times’s Sandra E. Garcia reports:Observers of the art market have referred to the rising demand for work by contemporary African American artists in recent years as, among other things, a “furor” or “surging,” and the work itself as “a hot commodity.” Ten years ago, it was relatively rare to see a Black artist’s work set a record at auction.Now, such sales are routine, boosted by numerous high-profile lots, perhaps most famously Kerry James Marshall’s 1997 painting “Past Times” (purchased by the rapper and music producer Sean Combs for $21.1 million at a Sotheby’s sale in 2018) and, more recently, Jean Michel-Basquiat’s “In This Case” (1983), which sold at Christie’s in May for $93.1 million — an astronomical price, but still only the second-highest ever paid for a Basquiat.Given the hype surrounding such figures, it’s surprising that one of the more interesting collections of contemporary African American art is housed inside a fairly humble Manhattan two-bedroom apartment on Madison Avenue.It belongs to Alvin Hall, 68, a broadcaster, financial educator and author who, through good timing, taste and a bit of luck began collecting in the 1980s and has been able to buy masterpieces by artists whose work is now worth much more. At a time when art — and Black art in particular — has been inflated and commodified to the point of a quasi bank transaction, Hall is a model of best practices for non-billionaires hoping to amass a world-class collection. His apartment also illustrates some of the realities of how to live with art when you only have a minimal amount of space: He owns 377 works, 342 of which are in storage.It’s Tuesday — stop and look.Metropolitan Diary: Hardware Dear Diary:Walking up University Place toward Union Square, I saw a man coming out of a hardware store.As I walked by, a gray-haired woman holding a dog approached the man and asked whether he worked there.He tapped a cigarette out of a pack and nodded.“If I brought in a machete,” she said, “Could you sharpen it?”— Cindy AugustineNew York Today is published weekdays around 6 a.m. Sign up here to get it by email. You can also find it at nytoday.com.What would you like to see more (or less) of? Email us: nytoday@nytimes.com More

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    Voter Suppression Must Be the Central Issue

    The right to vote is everything in a democracy.Without influence over power, you are completely vulnerable to that power. There is no way to access prosperity or ensure personal protection when you live in a society in which people who share your interests are inhibited in their political participation. More

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    Democratic Report Raises 2022 Alarms on Messaging and Voter Outreach

    A new report, in perhaps the most thorough soul-searching done by either party this year, points to an urgent need for the party to present a positive economic agenda and rebut Republican misinformation.Democrats defeated President Donald J. Trump and captured the Senate last year with a racially diverse coalition that delivered victories by tiny margins in key states like Georgia, Arizona and Wisconsin.In the next election, they cannot count on repeating that feat, a new report warns.A review of the 2020 election, conducted by several prominent Democratic advocacy groups, has concluded that the party is at risk of losing ground with Black, Hispanic and Asian American voters unless it does a better job presenting an economic agenda and countering Republican efforts to spread misinformation and tie all Democratic candidates to the far left.The 70-page report, obtained by The New York Times, was assembled at the behest of three major Democratic interest groups: Third Way, a centrist think tank, and the Collective PAC and the Latino Victory Fund, which promote Black and Hispanic candidates. It appears to be the most thorough act of self-criticism carried out by Democrats or Republicans after the last campaign.The document is all the more striking because it is addressed to a victorious party: Despite their successes, Democrats had hoped to achieve more robust control of both chambers of Congress, rather than the ultra-precarious margins they enjoy.Read the reportThree prominent Democratic groups, Third Way, the Collective PAC and the Latino Victory Fund, conducted a review of the 2020 election.Read Document 73 pagesIn part, the study found, Democrats fell short of their aspirations because many House and Senate candidates failed to match Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s support with voters of color who loathed Mr. Trump but distrusted the Democratic Party as a whole. Those constituencies included Hispanic voters in Florida and Texas, Vietnamese American and Filipino American voters in California, and Black voters in North Carolina.Overall, the report warns, Democrats in 2020 lacked a core argument about the economy and recovering from the coronavirus pandemic — one that might have helped candidates repel Republican claims that they wanted to “keep the economy shut down,” or worse. The party “leaned too heavily on ‘anti-Trump’ rhetoric,” the report concludes.“Win or lose, self-described progressive or moderate, Democrats consistently raised a lack of strong Democratic Party brand as a significant concern in 2020,” the report states. “In the absence of strong party branding, the opposition latched on to G.O.P. talking points, suggesting our candidates would ‘burn down your house and take away the police.’”Former Representative Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, a Democrat who lost re-election in South Florida in November, said in an interview that she had spoken with the authors of the report and raised concerns about Democratic outreach to Hispanic voters and the party’s failure to rebut misinformation in Spanish-language media.“Unfortunately, the Democratic Party has in some ways lost touch with our electorate,” Ms. Mucarsel-Powell said. “There is this assumption that of course people of color, or the working class, are going to vote for Democrats. We can never assume anything.”The report, chiefly written by a pair of veteran Democratic operatives, Marlon Marshall and Lynda Tran, is among the most significant salvos yet in the Democratic Party’s internal debate about how it should approach the 2022 elections. It may stir skepticism from some quarters because of the involvement of Third Way, which much of the left regards with hostility.A fourth group that initially backed the study, the campaign finance reform group End Citizens United, backed away this spring. Tiffany Muller, the head of the group, said it had to abandon its involvement to focus instead on passing the For the People Act, a sweeping good-government bill that is stuck in the Senate.Former Representative Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, a Democrat, lost re-election in South Florida last year. She remains worried about her party’s outreach to Hispanic voters.Saul Martinez for The New York TimesMr. Marshall and Ms. Tran, as well as the groups sponsoring the review, have begun to share its conclusions with Democratic lawmakers and party officials in recent days, including Jaime Harrison, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee.The study spanned nearly six months of research and data analysis that scrutinized about three dozen races for the House and the Senate, and involved interviews with 143 people, including lawmakers, candidates and pollsters, people involved in assembling the report said. Among the campaigns reviewed were the Senate elections in Arizona, Georgia and North Carolina, as well as House races in the suburbs of Minneapolis, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Dallas, and in rural New Mexico and Maine.The study follows an internal review conducted by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee that was unveiled last month. Both projects found that Democratic candidates had been hobbled by flawed polling and pandemic-imposed limitations on campaigning.In the D.C.C.C. report, the committee attributed setbacks at the congressional level to a surge in turnout by Trump supporters and an inadequate Democratic response to attacks calling them police-hating socialists.Some lawmakers on the left have complained that criticism of left-wing messaging amounts to scapegoating activists for the party’s failures.Yet the review by Third Way, the Collective PAC and the Latino Victory Fund goes further in diagnosing the party’s messaging as deficient in ways that may have cost Democrats more than a dozen seats in the House. Its report offers a blunt assessment that in 2020, Republicans succeeded in misleading voters about the Democratic Party’s agenda and that Democrats had erred by speaking to voters of color as though they are a monolithic, left-leaning group.Representative Tony Cárdenas of California, who helms the Congressional Hispanic Caucus’s political action committee, embraced that critique of Democratic messaging and said the party should discard the assumption “that voters of color are inherently more progressive.”“That’s been a ridiculous idea and that’s never been true,” Mr. Cárdenas said, lamenting that Republicans had succeeded in “trying to confuse Latino voters with the socialism message, things of that nature, ‘defund the police.’”Quentin James, the president of the Collective PAC, said it was clear that “some of the rhetoric we see from coastal Democrats” had been problematic. Mr. James pointed to the activist demand to “defund” the police as especially harmful, even with supporters of policing overhauls.“We did a poll that showed Black voters, by and large, vastly support reforming the police and reallocating their budgets,” Mr. James said. “That terminology — ‘defund’ — was not popular in the Black community.”A report by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee attributed the party’s setbacks to a surge in turnout by Trump supporters and an inadequate Democratic response to Republican attacks.Alyssa Schukar for The New York TimesKara Eastman, a progressive Democrat who lost her bid for a House seat based in Omaha, said Republicans had succeeded in delivering a “barrage of messages” that tarred her and her party as being outside the mainstream. Ms. Eastman said she had told the authors of the 2020 review that she believed those labels were particularly damaging to women.Matt Bennett, a Third Way strategist, said the party needed to be far better prepared to mount a defense in the midterm campaign.“We have got to take very seriously these attacks on Democrats as radicals and stipulate that they land,” Mr. Bennett said. “A lot of this just didn’t land on Joe Biden.”Democrats maintained a large advantage with voters of color in the 2020 elections, but the report identified telling areas of weakness. Mr. Biden and other Democrats lost ground with Latino voters relative to the party’s performance in 2016, “especially among working-class and non-college voters in these communities,” the report found.The report found that a surge in Asian American turnout appeared to have secured Mr. Biden’s victory in Georgia but that Democratic House candidates ran behind Mr. Biden with Asian American voters in contested California and Texas races. In some important states, Democrats did not mobilize Black voters at the same rate that Republicans did conservative white voters.“A substantial boost in turnout netted Democrats more raw votes from Black voters than in 2016, but the explosive growth among white voters in most races outpaced these gains,” the report warns.There has been no comparable self-review on the Republican side after the party’s severe setbacks last year, mainly because G.O.P. leaders have no appetite for a debate about Mr. Trump’s impact.Republicans will continue to have structural advantages in Washington because of congressional gerrymandering and the disproportionate representation of rural white voters in the Senate and the Electoral College. Erin Scott for The New York TimesThe Republican Party faces serious political obstacles, arising from Mr. Trump’s unpopularity, the growing liberalism of young voters and the country’s growing diversity. Many of the party’s policies are unpopular, including cutting social-welfare and retirement-security programs and keeping taxes low for the wealthy and big corporations.Yet the structure of the American electoral system has tilted national campaigns toward the G.O.P., because of congressional gerrymandering and the disproportionate representation of rural white voters in the Senate and the Electoral College.Democratic hopes for the midterm elections have so far hinged on the prospect of a strong recovery from the coronavirus pandemic and on voters’ regarding Republicans as a party unsuited to governing.Representative Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey, a moderate Democrat who was briefed on the findings of the report, called it proof that the party needed a strong central message about the economy in 2022.“We need to continue to show the American people what we’ve done, and then talk incessantly across the country, in every town, about how Democrats are governing,” Ms. Sherrill said.Largely unaddressed in the report is the immense deficit Democrats face among lower-income white voters. In its conclusion, however, Mr. Marshall and Ms. Tran write that Democrats need to deliver a message that includes working-class whites and matches the G.O.P.’s clear “collective gospel” about low taxes and military strength.“Our gospel should be about championing all working people — including but not limited to white working people — and lifting up our values of opportunity, equity, inclusion,” they write. More

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    Ed Gainey Poised to Become Pittsburgh's First Black Mayor

    Ed Gainey won the Democratic primary in a city that is roughly a quarter Black. The incumbent, Bill Peduto, is the first Pittsburgh mayor to lose a bid to stay in office since 1933.PITTSBURGH — Ed Gainey, a five-term Pennsylvania state representative, is poised to become the first Black mayor of Pittsburgh, having won the Democratic primary for mayor on Tuesday night by defeating a two-term incumbent on a campaign of unequivocal progressivism.“A city is changed when we all come together to improve the quality of life for everybody,” Mr. Gainey told his supporters, sounding a theme he has focused on for months. “That’s why I ran for mayor, because I believe we can have a city for all.”In a city that is roughly a quarter Black, Mr. Gainey won 46 percent of the vote. The incumbent, Bill Peduto, an outspoken liberal with a national profile, trailed with 39 percent, the first Pittsburgh mayor to lose a bid to stay in office since 1933. There is no declared Republican candidate for the general election in November.Though Pittsburgh routinely shows up on various lists as one of the country’s “most livable” cities, the mayoral campaign was fought largely around one short question: Livable for whom?Mr. Gainey’s thoughts on that question were not drastically different from Mr. Peduto’s; both talked of addressing racial inequities and building more affordable housing. But Mr. Gainey, who is less known for his profile in the legislature than for his easy and avuncular rapport with constituents, pointed out that Mr. Peduto had already had two terms to do these things, and said he had fallen short.Bill Peduto is the first Pittsburgh mayor to lose a bid to stay in office since 1933.Andrew Rush/Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, via Associated PressWhen Mr. Peduto won the mayor’s office in 2013, talking aggressively of fighting climate change and pursuing criminal justice reform, he also emphasized the continued reinvention of Pittsburgh, once Steel City, into a tech and health care town. But highlighting the presence of companies like Google and Uber, as well as the hometown medical giant, UPMC, made Pittsburgh’s disparities appear harsher in contrast.Nearly 7,000 Black people left the city from 2014 to 2018, leading to a broad debate about whether rapid gentrification might be driving the exodus. A city-commissioned report found that, on certain metrics, including employment rates and maternal health, Black people in Pittsburgh, and Black women in particular, had a lower quality of life than Black people in nearly all U.S. cities. Pittsburgh police officers, who are overwhelmingly white, have been routinely found to arrest Black residents at starkly disproportionate rates.As inequities like these were drawing scrutiny, George Floyd was killed in Minneapolis and a summer of protest broke out. The protests in Pittsburgh were mostly peaceful, but the police cracked down hard on several occasions, firing tear gas and projectiles and at one point forcibly pulling one man into an unmarked van. The protests became in part about the police tactics in response, and on several nights demonstrators crowded in front of Mr. Peduto’s house demanding his resignation.As with many mayors who were in office in 2020, Mr. Peduto’s attempts to respond to the concerns of protesters but also support the city’s police proved an unwieldy political task. Indeed, local measures banning no-knock warrants and restricting the use of solitary confinement passed by overwhelming margins.In his concession speech, Mr. Peduto called Mr. Gainey’s win “a historic night for the city of Pittsburgh,” and pledged to support him.Western Pennsylvania may be synonymous with Trump Country to many, but Pittsburgh has been an electric hub for grass-roots progressivism. Activists have campaigned for races from the White House to the school board, battling for Republican-held legislative seats in the outer-ring suburbs and ousting establishment Democrats in upsets around Allegheny County.In 2018, Summer Lee and Sara Innamorato, both first-time candidates endorsed by the Democratic Socialists of America, won state legislative seats, beating older male incumbents with dynastic Democratic roots. Two years later, Ms. Lee, the first Black woman to represent a southwestern Pennsylvania district in the legislature, faced coordinated opposition from old-line Pittsburgh Democrats when she ran for re-election — and she won by an even bigger margin.Many of these new, avowedly progressive political figures backed Mr. Gainey’s campaign, seeing him as a better fit for an electorate impatient for change.“You’re not going to find anyone who says Pittsburgh is perfect just the way it is,” said Bethany Hallam, an Allegheny county councilor who was first elected last year. This, she said, “does not spell good news for incumbents who created the landscape we live in.” More

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    Maya Wiley Has ‘50 Ideas’ and One Goal: To Make History as Mayor

    Maya Wiley Has ‘50 Ideas’ and One Goal: To Make History as MayorMs. Wiley has unveiled an array of policies to fight inequality as she seeks to become the first woman elected mayor of New York. Can she break out of the pack?Maya Wiley, at a vaccine sign-up in Brooklyn last month, is a civil rights lawyer who has focused her mayoral campaign on addressing inequality and systemic racism.Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York TimesThe New York City mayoral race is one of the most consequential political contests in a generation, with immense challenges awaiting the winner. This is the fourth in a series of profiles of the major candidates.May 19, 2021If there was a single moment that captured the essence of Maya Wiley’s campaign for New York City mayor, the Women for Maya launch was it.She sat on a folding chair in Central Park at the event earlier this month, at the foot of a statue depicting three historical figures of women’s suffrage. To her immediate right was Representative Nydia Velázquez, the first Puerto Rican woman elected to Congress; to her left was Gloria Steinem, the feminist icon.Since entering the mayor’s race last year, Ms. Wiley had underscored how it was time for a woman — a Black woman — to finally lead New York, someone who understood the concerns of those who struggled even before the pandemic and who are worried that the recovery is leaving them behind.“You will no longer tell us we are not qualified,” Ms. Wiley said, before starting to chant “We lead!” with a crowd of supporters who gathered at the event.Ms. Wiley, 57, offers a mix of experience — she served as a former counsel to Mayor Bill de Blasio and led the Civilian Complaint Review Board — and a dose of celebrity: As a prominent analyst for MSNBC, she won the attention of its left-leaning viewership and sparked enthusiasm that she could become the standard-bearer for New York’s progressive left.Her comfort level with the on-the-fly jousting seen on cable news shows seemed to give her an advantage last week in the first official Democratic debate, as she repeatedly challenged Eric Adams, the Brooklyn borough president who is one of the contest’s front-runners.Three days later, she landed a key endorsement from Representative Hakeem Jeffries, the state’s highest-ranking House member. His support is expected to help Ms. Wiley with a key constituency Mr. Adams is also vying for: Black voters, especially from central Brooklyn.Ms. Wiley was endorsed by 1199 S.E.I.U., the city’s largest labor union, which represents health care workers, many of whom are women of color. She speaks often about making sure women are not left behind in the recovery.Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York TimesIf Ms. Wiley has a path to victory in the June 22 primary, it will also largely be paved by women. She has the support of the city’s largest labor union, Local 1199 of the Service Employees International Union, which represents 200,000 health care workers, many of whom are women of color. And she has the backing of Ms. Velázquez and Representative Yvette Clarke, two powerful congressional leaders in Brooklyn.She hopes to capitalize on the sexual misconduct allegations that were recently lodged against her chief rival for progressive voters in the Democratic primary, Scott M. Stringer, the city comptroller; Ms. Wiley called on Mr. Stringer to withdraw from the race, and she has picked up some of the endorsements he has lost.Her campaign is centered on a series of policy proposals that reflect her progressive values. She wants to cut $1 billion from the police budget and trim at least 2,250 officers. She wants to help poor families pay for child care by offering $5,000 grants to caregivers and building community centers with free child care. And she wants to create a $10 billion Works Progress Administration-style jobs program that funds infrastructure repairs and other projects.But she has yet to fully energize the left-wing of the party that she is trying to win over; she upset some activists by distancing herself from the defund the police slogan; she can also sound at times like her former boss, Mr. de Blasio, whose popularity has fallen sharply in his second and final term.Unlike Mr. Stringer and Mr. Adams, who have said they had always wanted to be mayor, Ms. Wiley readily acknowledges that running for office was never a lifelong ambition. She says she long believed she was more effective, and more natural, at pressuring elected officials from the outside.“I literally never thought I would run for public office, and I mean never,” she said in an interview. “It was not on my bucket list. I’ve been a civil rights lawyer and advocate my whole career, and politics is not appealing. What I wanted to make was change.”She said that her outlook began to shift several years ago, when her teenage daughter came to her almost in tears, worried she would be unable to pay rent in New York City while pursuing a career as a graphic novelist and illustrator. Ms. Wiley said the exchange brought home how increasingly unaffordable the city had become.“That was an emotional gut-punch moment that really stayed with me,” she said.While politics was not necessarily in Ms. Wiley’s blood, a commitment to social justice was.Ms. Wiley worked as Mayor Bill de Blasio’s counsel and served as chair of the Civilian Complaint Review Board. Her father, a prominent civil rights leader, founded the National Welfare Rights Organization.Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York TimesAt the event in Central Park, Ms. Steinem spoke about working with Ms. Wiley’s father, George Wiley, a prominent civil rights activist, in the 1970s.He founded the National Welfare Rights Organization and paid attention to “women in poverty as the single most important indicator of the country’s welfare when no other male spokesperson was doing that,” Ms. Steinem said.“I’m so sorry that Maya lost him young, but his spirit is in her,” she said.‘We had to find a way to live’The sudden death of Ms. Wiley’s father was especially traumatic.Mr. Wiley had taken his two children, Daniel and Maya, sailing off Chesapeake Beach, Md., on a summer day in 1973. The winds and seas were rough, and Mr. Wiley fell from the 23-foot pleasure craft into the Chesapeake Bay.His children threw him a line, but the tides and wind pulled him away, according to an Associated Press account of the episode. Days later, memorial services for Mr. Wiley, 42, were held across the nation.Ms. Wiley often speaks of her father’s death as a formative experience that shaped her and taught her a hard lesson in grief and perseverance. At her campaign kick-off event on the steps of the Brooklyn Museum in October, Ms. Wiley compared her loss to families who had watched a relative die from the coronavirus and could not hold them one last time.“My brother and I — two little kids, 9 and 10 years old — alone on a boat after watching the waves wash away our father, we had to find a way to live,” she said.She described how they found their way to the shore, and how the white beachgoers they encountered did not help them. They went from house to house asking for help until someone called the police.The seeming indifference from the people on the beach stayed with her. The experience, she told Bloomberg Opinion, made her realize that “racism is a deep illness.”Other parts of her biography often come up on the campaign trail. Ms. Wiley’s mother, Wretha, grew up in Abilene, Texas, and came to New York to attend Union Theological Seminary. Her parents met at Syracuse University and moved to the Lower East Side, where Ms. Wiley lived briefly as a baby, before they left for Washington.When she talks about education, Ms. Wiley notes that attending a segregated school as a child informed her thinking on the issue. She led a high-profile school diversity panel that in 2019 called for integrating city schools by eliminating gifted and talented programs.Yet when she is asked about fixing the city’s segregated school system, she has been vague at times, seeming cautious and political. Asked if she was afraid of talking about a combustible issue, Ms. Wiley pushed back.“I’m a kid who went to a segregated Black elementary school when I was young and was two years behind grade level despite the fact that my parents had collectively over eight years of graduate education between them,” she said.“I’m not afraid of third rails,” she added. “I wouldn’t be running for mayor if I was.”After her father’s death, Ms. Wiley moved to a private school where she caught up with her peers. She graduated from Dartmouth College and Columbia Law School. As a young lawyer, she worked as a staff attorney at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund for two years, as an assistant U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York for three years and at the American Civil Liberties Union as part of a fellowship.The job she held the longest was at the Center for Social Inclusion, a nonprofit she founded after the Sept. 11 attacks as a young mother “sitting in my living room with a baby in a bouncy seat.” She built it into a national organization dedicated to addressing racial inequity, with a $3 million annual budget and 13 employees.“As she came into her own, she opted not to go to a big private law firm, but to commit herself to public service,” said the Rev. Al Sharpton, who expressed admiration for Ms. Wiley’s dedication to social justice when she could have taken a different path. “She was progressive before the term was fashionable.”Ms. Wiley was in the running to lead the N.A.A.C.P., but withdrew from contention after joining Mr. de Blasio’s administration.Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York TimesA rocky experience inside city governmentMs. Wiley had never met Mr. de Blasio when she wrote a piece for The Nation magazine about broadband internet access that caught his attention. He invited her to three long get-to-know-you meetings at City Hall.She had been in the running to lead the N.A.A.C.P., but agreed to join Mr. de Blasio’s administration in 2014 as his chief legal adviser. She was proud to be the first Black woman to hold the job, and joked early on that her main goal was to “keep him out of jail.”Ms. Wiley, even in jest, was somewhat prescient: Mr. de Blasio was investigated for questionable fund-raising practices, leading Ms. Wiley to help craft the administration’s legal response. She also became known for her role in what became known as the “agents of the city” controversy, when she argued unsuccessfully in 2016 that Mr. de Blasio’s emails with outside advisers should be private.Ms. Wiley helped form Mr. de Blasio’s argument that communications with outside advisers should be as immune from public scrutiny as those of any city employee, even though many of the advisers also represented clients with business before the city.John Kaehny, executive director of the good-government group Reinvent Albany, said the efforts to hide the mayor’s emails were “desperate, doomed and destructive” and undermined Freedom of Information laws and ethics rules.“Agents of the city was a giant blunder by her and de Blasio and hopefully she learned from her mistakes,” he said.Ms. Wiley has gone to great lengths to say that her administration would be more transparent than Mr. de Blasio’s. She says that it was her job to provide the mayor with legal advice and it was his decision whether to follow that advice..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-3btd0c{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-3btd0c{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-3btd0c strong{font-weight:600;}.css-3btd0c em{font-style:italic;}.css-w739ur{margin:0 auto 5px;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-w739ur{font-family:nyt-cheltenham,georgia,’times new roman’,times,serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.375rem;line-height:1.625rem;}@media (min-width:740px){#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-w739ur{font-size:1.6875rem;line-height:1.875rem;}}@media (min-width:740px){.css-w739ur{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-1dg6kl4{margin-top:5px;margin-bottom:15px;}#masthead-bar-one{display:none;}#masthead-bar-one{display:none;}.css-12vbvwq{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-12vbvwq{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-12vbvwq:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-12vbvwq{border:none;padding:10px 0 0;border-top:2px solid #121212;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-1rh1sk1{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-1rh1sk1 strong{font-weight:700;}.css-1rh1sk1 em{font-style:italic;}.css-1rh1sk1 a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-underline-offset:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:1px;text-decoration-thickness:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#ccd9e3;text-decoration-color:#ccd9e3;}.css-1rh1sk1 a:visited{color:#333;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#ccc;text-decoration-color:#ccc;}.css-1rh1sk1 a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}“Those emails would have been public if I was the decision maker,” she said at a mayoral forum.Not long after the episode, Ms. Wiley resigned and became chairwoman of the Civilian Complaint Review Board, the agency that investigates police misconduct.While Ms. Wiley points to her time there as valuable experience in learning how to tackle police reform, groups like the New York Civil Liberties Union say she was too secretive about the disciplinary process and too sluggish in confronting the Police Department. The current chairman, the Rev. Fred Davie, has been more outspoken on issues like repealing 50-a, a law that until recently kept officer disciplinary records secret.Her experience at City Hall and the watchdog agency has enabled Ms. Wiley to argue that she knows city government, but it also ties her to Mr. de Blasio.As counsel to Mr. de Blasio, Ms. Wiley was known for her role in the “agents of the city” battle, when she tried to keep the mayor’s emails with outside advisers private.Nicole Bengiveno/The New York TimesMs. Wiley, like Mr. de Blasio, has been known to speak about inequality in broad terms. When she described homelessness as a public safety issue during a recent appearance on Brian Lehrer’s WNYC show, Mr. Lehrer shared a response from a listener: “de Blasio 2.0.”Ms. Wiley argues that women should not be judged by the men they worked for. She praised Mr. de Blasio’s achievements like universal prekindergarten and criticized him over his handling of the police killing of Eric Garner in 2014.“Women should not be defined by anything other than their record,” she said. “I’m not running against Bill de Blasio.”A push to ‘reimagine’ New YorkAs protests over police brutality rocked the nation last summer, Ms. Wiley gained attention on MSNBC for her clearheaded explanations of why some activists wanted to defund the police.Her national exposure created excitement when she entered the race, but also the expectation that she would catch fire as the leading progressive candidate. That has not happened for a variety of reasons.“This is a race that has a lot of progressive options,” said Eric Phillips, a former press secretary for Mr. de Blasio. “I think it’s natural that there would be real competition and one candidate wouldn’t automatically own that lane.”Ms. Wiley must prove that she can energize the left-wing of the party and be the most viable candidate to take on the two more moderate front-runners, Andrew Yang, the former presidential hopeful, and Mr. Adams. She is often in third or fourth place in the polls, along with Mr. Stringer.Ms. Wiley would cut $1 billion from the police budget, and hire a police commissioner from outside the department.Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York TimesBut the accusations lodged against Mr. Stringer have created some room for momentum: The powerful Working Families Party had named Mr. Stringer as its first choice for mayor, but withdrew the endorsement after the sexual misconduct allegations. The group is now supporting Ms. Wiley and Dianne Morales, a former nonprofit executive and the most left-leaning candidate in the race.Still, Mr. Stringer has a major fund-raising advantage: He has more than $7 million to pour into television ads. Ms. Wiley has about $2.5 million on hand.Mr. Sharpton said he believed that Ms. Wiley could make a “late surge” once more voters start tuning into the race. He is considering endorsing one of several of the candidates trying to become the city’s second Black mayor — Ms. Wiley, Mr. Adams, or Raymond J. McGuire, a former Wall Street executive — if Mr. Sharpton believes he could help one of them win, according to a person who is familiar with his thinking.To differentiate herself from some of her rivals, Ms. Wiley has been rolling out her “50 Ideas for NYC,” a new plan every day focused on issues like reducing the Black maternal mortality rate. Her most ambitious proposal is called “New Deal New York,” which involves spending $10 billion to help the city recover from the pandemic and to create 100,000 jobs. Her universal community care plan would make 100,000 families eligible for a $5,000 annual grant to care for children and older people. She also wants to hire 2,500 new teachers to lower class sizes.As concerns have grown about violent crime, she released a policing and public safety plan that includes hiring a civilian police commissioner and creating a new commission to decide whether to fire officers accused of misconduct. She was early in urging Mr. de Blasio to fire his police commissioner, Dermot F. Shea, after his aggressive response to last year’s protests.Yet she has also distanced herself from the defund slogan, saying the term “means different things to different people.” In contrast, Ms. Morales has embraced the movement and pledged to slash the $6 billion police budget in half — a stance that has endeared her to left-leaning voters, less so to more moderate ones.At the same time, some business and civic leaders fear that Ms. Wiley is too liberal; in a poll of business leaders, Ms. Wiley was near last place with just 3 percent. They also question whether Ms. Wiley has enough experience as a manager to run a sprawling bureaucracy with a $98 billion budget.“Maya is terrific, but business is looking for a manager, not an advocate,” said Kathryn Wylde, the leader of a prominent business group.At the moment, Ms. Wiley is simply looking to connect to as many voters as she can, in person and on social media, where she posts campaign diaries recorded at home.She lives in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn, with her partner, Harlan Mandel, in an elegant house built in the Prairie School architectural style made famous by Frank Lloyd Wright. They have two daughters, Naja, 20, and Kai, 17. Ms. Wiley is Christian and Mr. Mandel is Jewish, and they belong to Kolot Chayeinu, a reform congregation in Park Slope.The last woman who came close to being mayor, Christine Quinn, a former City Council speaker, said she regretted that she tried to soften her hard-charging personality during her campaign. Her advice for Ms. Wiley was to be herself.“The thing voters hate the most is someone who is not authentic,” Ms. Quinn said. “Maya needs to be exactly who she is.”Who Ms. Wiley is, she said in an interview, is the daughter of civil rights activists who will fight to make the city more fair.“I have been someone committed to racial justice and transformation my entire career,” Ms. Wiley said. “And that means bringing us all back, every single one of us, and not just back to January 2020, but to reimagine this city.” More