Crime and Criminals

Subterms

    More stories

    • 125 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      What Does Eric Adams, Working-Class Champion, Mean for the Democrats?

      by

      Mr. Adams, who ran a campaign focused on appealing to blue-collar Black and Latino voters, said America does not want “fancy candidates.”He bluntly challenged left-wing leaders in his party over matters of policing and public safety. He campaigned heavily in Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx, often ignoring Manhattan neighborhoods besides Harlem and Washington Heights. And he branded himself a blue-collar candidate with a keen personal understanding of the challenges and concerns facing working-class New Yorkers of color.With his substantial early lead in the Democratic mayoral primary when votes were counted Tuesday night, Eric Adams, the Brooklyn borough president, demonstrated the enduring power of a candidate who can connect to working- and middle-class Black and Latino voters, while also appealing to some white voters with moderate views.Mr. Adams is not yet assured of victory. But if he prevails, it would be a triumph for a campaign that focused more heavily on those constituencies than any other winning New York City mayoral candidate in recent history.As the national Democratic Party navigates debates over identity and ideology, the mayoral primary in the largest city in the United States is highlighting critical questions about which voters make up the party’s base in the Biden era, and who best speaks for them.Barely a year has passed since President Biden clinched the Democratic nomination, defeating several more progressive rivals on the strength of support from Black voters and older moderate voters across the board, and running as a blue-collar candidate himself. But Democrats are now straining to hold together a coalition that includes college-educated liberals and centrists, young left-wing activists and working-class voters of color.“America is saying, we want to have justice and safety and end inequalities,” Mr. Adams declared at a news conference on Thursday, offering his take on the party’s direction. “And we don’t want fancy candidates.”Mr. Adams’s allies and advisers say that from the start, he based his campaign strategy on connecting with working- and middle-class voters of color.“Over the last few cycles, the winners of the mayor’s race have started with a whiter, wealthier base generally, and then expanded out,” said Evan Thies, an Adams spokesman and adviser. Mr. Adams’s campaign, he said, started “with low-income, middle-income, Black, Latino, immigrant communities, and then reached into middle-income communities.”Mr. Adams would be New York’s second Black mayor, after David N. Dinkins. Mr. Dinkins, who described the city as a “gorgeous mosaic,” was more focused than Mr. Adams on trying to win over liberal white voters.Mr. Adams was the first choice of about 32 percent of New York Democrats who voted in person on Tuesday or during the early voting period. Maya Wiley, a former counsel to Mayor Bill de Blasio and a progressive favorite, pulled in about 22 percent of that vote. Kathryn Garcia, a former sanitation commissioner who touted her managerial experience, got 19.5 percent.Under the city’s new ranked-choice system, in which voters could rank up to five candidates, the Democratic nominee will now be determined through a process of elimination. Ms. Garcia or Ms. Wiley could ultimately surpass Mr. Adams, although that appears to be an uphill battle, and a final winner may not be determined for weeks.Kathryn Garcia, a former city sanitation commissioner, is in third place after the initial, Primary Day counting of votes.Desiree Rios for The New York TimesIf Mr. Adams does win, it will be partly because he had major institutional advantages.He was well financed and spent heavily on advertising. He received the support of several of the city’s most influential labor unions, which represent many Black and Latino New Yorkers. His name was also well known after years in city politics, including as a state senator.And although some of the most prominent members of New York’s congressional delegation supported Ms. Wiley as their first choice, Mr. Adams landed other important endorsements, including those of the Queens and Bronx borough presidents and Representative Adriano Espaillat, the first Dominican-American member of Congress, and a powerful figure in Washington Heights.Just as importantly, in his supporters’ eyes, Mr. Adams was perceived as having credibility on what emerged as the most consequential, and divisive, issue in the race: public safety.Mr. Adams, who experienced economic hardship as a child and has said he was once beaten by police officers, grew up to join the Police Department, rising to captain. Critics within the department saw him as something of a rabble-rouser, while many progressive voters now think his answers to complex problems too often involve an emphasis on law enforcement.But to some voters, he long ago cemented a reputation as someone who challenged misconduct from within the system, giving him authority to talk about bringing down crime.“He was in the police force, he knows what they represent,” said Gloria Dees, 63, a Brooklyn resident who voted for Mr. Adams and described being deeply concerned about both rising crime and police violence against people of color. “You have to understand something in order to make it work better.”Polls this spring showed public safety increasingly becoming the most important issue to Democratic voters amid random subway attacks, a spate of bias crimes and a spike in shootings. On the Sunday before the primary, Mr. Adams’s campaign staff said that a volunteer had been stabbed in the Bronx.“Being an ex-cop, being able to have safety and justice at the same time, was a message that resonated with folks in the Bronx,” said Assemblywoman Karines Reyes, a Democrat who represents parts of the borough and who did not endorse anyone in the race. Mr. Adams won the Bronx overwhelmingly in the first vote tally. “They’re looking for somebody to address the crime.”Voters cast ballots in the Bronx’s Mott Haven neighborhood on Primary Day. Public safety emerged as the dominant issue in the race. Desiree Rios for The New York TimesThe rate of violent crime in the city is far below where it was decades ago, but shootings have been up in some neighborhoods, and among older voters especially, there is a visceral fear of returning to the “bad old days.”Donovan Richards, the Queens borough president and a supporter of Mr. Adams, cited the recent fatal shooting of a 10-year-old boy in the Rockaways as something that hit home for many people in the area.“We’re nowhere near where we were in the ’80s or ’70s,” he said. But, he added, “when you see a shooting in front of you, no one cares about statistics.”Interviews on Thursday with voters on either side of Brooklyn’s Eastern Parkway illustrated vividly Mr. Adams’s appeal and limitations. In parts of Crown Heights, the parkway was a physical dividing line, early results show, between voters who went for Ms. Wiley and those who preferred Mr. Adams.Among older, working-class voters of color who live south of the parkway, Mr. Adams held a commanding lead. “He’ll support the poor people and the Black and brown people,” said one, Janice Brathwaite, 66, who is disabled and said she had voted for Mr. Adams.“He’ll support the poor people and the Black and brown people,” Janice Brathwaite, who lives in Brooklyn’s Crown Heights neighborhood, said of Mr. Adams. Andrew Seng for The New York TimesMs. Brathwaite ruled out Ms. Wiley after hearing her plans for overhauling the Police Department, including a reallocation of $1 billion from the police budget to social service programs and anti-violence measures.“She is someone who is against the policeman who is protecting me, making sure nobody is shooting me,” Ms. Brathwaite said.Ms. Wiley has said there are times when armed officers are needed, but she has also argued that in some instances, mental health experts can halt crime more effectively.That approach appealed to Allison Behringer, 31, an audio journalist and podcast producer who lives north of the parkway, where Mr. Adams’s challenges were on display among some of the young professionals who live in the area.“She was the best progressive candidate,” Ms. Behringer said of Ms. Wiley, whom she ranked as her first choice. “She talked about reimagining what public safety is, that really resonated with me.”Ms. Behringer alluded to concerns about ethical issues that have been raised about Mr. Adams. He has faced scrutiny over his taxes, real estate holdings, fund-raising practices and residency.A fresh round of voting results to be released on Tuesday will provide further clarity about the race. They may show whether those issues hurt Mr. Adams among some highly engaged voters in Manhattan and elsewhere. The new results could also indicate whether Ms. Wiley or Ms. Garcia had sufficiently broad appeal to cut into his lead.As in Brooklyn, there was a clear geographic divide among voters in Manhattan: East 96th Street, with those who ranked Ms. Garcia first mostly to the south, and those who favored Mr. Adams or Ms. Wiley further uptown.Ms. Garcia, a relatively moderate technocrat who was endorsed by The New York Times’s editorial board, among others, won Manhattan handily. Like Ms. Wiley, she hopes to beat Mr. Adams by being many voters’ second choice, and with the benefit of absentee votes that have not been counted.Maya Wiley, center, ranked second in first-choice votes in the initial count of in-person ballots.Hilary Swift for The New York TimesIn Harlem one afternoon this month, Carmen Flores had just cast her early vote for Mr. Adams when she came across one of his rallies. She said she found his trajectory inspiring.“He’s coming from the bottom up,” she said, adding, “He’s been in every facet of life.”Whatever the final vote tally, Democratic strategists caution against drawing sweeping political conclusions from a post-pandemic, municipal election held in June. If Mr. Adams becomes mayor, as the Democratic nominee almost certainly will, progressive leaders can still point to signs of strength in other city races and elsewhere in the state.Asked about the mayor’s race, Waleed Shahid, a spokesman for the left-wing organization Justice Democrats, said, “fear-mongering works when crime is rising,” while noting that several left-wing candidates in the city were leading their races. He also argued that some people who supported Mr. Adams could have done so for reasons that were not ideological.“There might be some voters who voted for Eric Adams based on his policy platform,” Mr. Shahid said. “But there are probably many more voters who voted for Eric Adams based on how they felt about him. It’s often whether they identify with a candidate.”Nate Schweber contributed reporting. More

    • 138 Shares99 Views

      in Elections

      Eric Adams Promises to ‘Show America How to Run a City’

      by

      Mr. Adams, who is leading in the mayoral primary, laid out a middle road between progressive and conservative approaches to policing.Two days after Eric Adams emerged as the likely Democratic nominee for mayor of New York City, he made it clear that he would revamp New York’s approach to dealing with crime and suggested that other big cities and the national Democratic Party would be wise to follow suit.Speaking in the tones of a mayor-elect, Mr. Adams laid out a middle road between progressives and conservatives: Fight racism in policing, but step back from a progressive movement that has seen cities slash police budgets, ban police chokeholds and allow more people charged with crimes to be released without bail.On gun control, he called for changing the national focus from assault rifles — which capture attention for their use in mass shootings, especially in suburban schools — to handguns. They are the main weapons in shootings in cities from New York to Atlanta and Detroit, he said, but because most of the victims, like most of the shooters, are “Black and brown, we’ve decided it’s not an issue.”“If the Democratic Party fails to recognize what we did here in New York, they’re going to have a problem in the midterm elections, and they’re going to have a problem in the presidential election,” Mr. Adams said at a news conference outside Brooklyn Borough Hall.Mr. Adams, the Brooklyn borough president, holds a commanding lead in the race for the Democratic nomination; after a count of most ballots cast in person, he had nearly 32 percent of first-place votes. He led Maya Wiley, a former counsel to Mayor Bill de Blasio, by nine points, and Kathryn Garcia, a former sanitation commissioner, by 12 points.The final outcome awaits the city’s new system of ranked-choice voting, where voters select as many as five candidates in order of preference. Thousands of votes will be shifted among the candidates before a final winner is declared. Tens of thousands of absentee ballots must also be counted, and the entire process may take until July 12.But Mr. Adams spent Thursday on a semi-victory lap, taking a bike ride across Brooklyn and using a series of television interviews to lay out his vision for New York and beyond.“I am the face of the new Democratic Party,” he said to cheers from several Black civil servants who were on the way to work in Downtown Brooklyn, and to friendly horn toots from a passing city bus. “I’m going to show America how to run a city.”Much of Mr. Adams’s campaign has been centered on public safety, and he continued to focus on that theme on Thursday.He said he planned to choose a woman as police commissioner, adding that he had already talked to three candidates. He said he would judge candidates by “character” and by their willingness to “create new incentives” for precinct commanders, to promote not based on how many arrests they make, but “how many crimes they prevent.”He urged people to consider what he called “shades of gray” on several contentious policing issues, including a policy change last year in New York that barred judges, in most cases, from requiring cash bail payments. That let more people charged with crimes go free until trial.The current police commissioner, Dermot F. Shea, has blamed the city’s spike in violent crime on that shift, without concrete evidence. Mr. Adams said on MSNBC that while some judges have kept people needlessly behind bars, “too many people are being released that are dangerous.”With a first-time firearms-possession arrest, he said, there may be a way to “put this person on the right pathway” without jail, but someone with several such arrests needs to do prison time, he said.Mr. Adams, a former police captain, also took a nuanced position on police chokeholds; a City Council bill banning the use of the practice was recently overturned in State Supreme Court because the wording of the legislation was vague, the court found.He said that he was opposed to the use of chokeholds because of cases of people being killed by police using the tactic. But he said the City Council bill banning the practice was “not realistic” because it did not take into account the times when an officer might be “fighting for life and death” or to protect civilians.“I know what it is to try to wrestle a knife out of someone’s hand,” said Mr. Adams, adding that he was in favor of revising the law.Even as he rejected some progressive-branded policies, Mr. Adams also embraced some ideas popular with the young, multiracial constituency that supported candidates like Ms. Wiley and Dianne Morales and their call for using strategies outside policing, like improving mental health and social services, to prevent crimes.“We need to change the ecosystem of public safety,” he said, with layered strategies of “prevention, a long-term plan and an intervention” to deal with the current spike in crime. He made it clear that he believed that he could marry the two ideals of safety and ensuring social justice.“America is saying, we want to have justice, and safety, and end inequality,” he said. Mr. Adams acknowledged that that message alone was not enough to win the votes of a majority of New Yorkers; even though he held a significant lead, nearly 70 percent of voters ranked other candidates as their first choice. Still, in four of the city’s five boroughs, he collected the most in-person votes, trailing Ms. Garcia only in Manhattan.Mr. Adams said the discrepancy showed that voters in wealthier, whiter districts saw the public safety crisis through a different lens.“It’s unfortunate that I think a numerical minority that live, basically, they live in safe spaces, don’t understand what’s happening in this city,” Mr. Adams said. If elected mayor, Mr. Adams will no doubt face challenges from the City Council, which is facing a complete overhaul next year: All 51 seats are up for election, and a new officeholder is guaranteed in 32 of them. The turnover is expected to shift the Council, which already favored more aggressive policing reform, even more to the left. “It’s not going to be a repeat of the Giuliani years,” said Susan Kang, an associate professor of political science at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. “The City Council is not going to just say whatever you say.”The mayoral race is not over. Both Ms. Wiley and Ms. Garcia believe they have paths to victory. Ms. Garcia’s campaign shared a memo saying they expected her to cut into Mr. Adams’s lead after the absentee ballots — slightly more than 100,000 had been received from Democratic voters — are counted. Many of those received by the Board of Elections have come from areas like Manhattan’s Upper West Side, where Ms. Garcia did well.Ms. Wiley’s advisers said they expect her to outperform Mr. Adams and Ms. Garcia in second- and third-choice votes. All three candidates have said that they support ranked-choice voting and will respect the outcome, including Mr. Adams, who has retreated from his and allies’ earlier suggestion that his rivals’ ranked-choice campaign tactics were an effort to suppress Black and Latino votes. More

    • 88 Shares99 Views

      in Elections

      Policing and the New York Mayoral Race

      by

      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

    • 125 Shares139 Views

      in Elections

      Giuliani Embraces Eric Adams Before Primary. Adams Says No Thanks

      by

      Eric Adams may not want Rudy Giuliani’s support, but he got it anyway on Friday when the former mayor of New York City said that if he were a Democrat he would back Mr. Adams in the mayoral primary.“There’s no question that Adams gives us some hope,” Mr. Giuliani said, stopping short of a full-throated endorsement. The former mayor highlighted Mr. Adams’s approach to crime, a top issue for voters across the city.In a subsequent campaign appearance on Friday, Mr. Adams did not seem particularly pleased by Mr. Giuliani’s comments and suggested it was an attempt by the former mayor to sabotage the campaign of a sometimes former critic.“I don’t need Giuliani’s endorsement, and we don’t want his endorsement,” Mr. Adams said. “One of the ways you sabotage a campaign is that you come out and endorse the opponent that you don’t want to win, and that’s what I believe he has attempted to do.”Mr. Adams became a Republican during Giuliani’s tenure, only to return to the Democratic Party later. Over the years, he has sent mixed messages about the former mayor, criticizing police brutality under his watch while also crediting him for the city’s falling crime rate.Mr. Adams is currently the frontrunner in the mayor’s race, though credible polling is sparse and the race remains fluid. He has also won praise from right-wing TV host Tucker Carlson, praise that Mr. Adams has also rejected.After Mr. Giuliani’s remarks, Mr. Adams’s opponents pounced.“Eric Adams is RUDY GIULIANI’S #1 pick in the Democratic primary,” said Eric Soufer, an adviser to Andrew Yang, the former presidential candidate, on Twitter.That prompted Rebecca Kirszner Katz, a campaign adviser to the campaign Scott Stringer, the New York City comptroller, to note that Stephen Miller, the architect of former President Donald J. Trump’s anti-immigration policies, has praised Mr. Yang for taking “positions antithetical to the progressive left in a very progressive primary.”“Andrew Yang is Stephen Miller’s #1,” she said on Twitter. “Don’t rank either of them.” More

    • 150 Shares139 Views

      in Elections

      2 Children Out Walking Get Caught Between a Gunman and His Target

      by

      The harrowing scene in the Bronx, captured on surveillance video, came about a week after a 10-year-old Queens boy was fatally shot.Two children were caught in the middle of a shooting in the Bronx on Thursday. They were not hurt and were not related to the gunman’s intended target, officials said.via New York Police DepartmentGunfire erupts on a Bronx sidewalk, and several passers-by, including a 5-year-old boy and his 10-year-old sister, rush toward a bodega’s entrance for shelter. But the children collide with a man who is also racing for cover, and all three fall to the pavement before finding safety.As they tumble down together, the children at one point are lying directly between the man, the gunman’s obvious target, and the gunman himself, who continues firing at close range.The girl yanks her brother’s wrist, pulling him to the ground and wrapping him in her chest as his left shoe comes off in the commotion. After about eight seconds, the gunman sprints off.Amazingly, the harrowing scene, captured on surveillance video, ended without either of the children being hurt and the 24-year-old man they were tangled up with in stable condition and expected to survive after being shot in the back and both legs, the police said.Still, the episode was a vivid example of how even the most innocent New Yorkers can suddenly get caught in the crossfire of a recent surge in shootings that has plagued some city neighborhoods and helped make crime a dominant issue in this year’s mayoral race.Just over a week before the Bronx shooting shown in the video, in the Claremont section on Thursday evening, a 10-year-old Queens boy was fatally shot while leaving an aunt’s house in the Rockaways. In May, a 4-year-old girl was among several people shot in Times Square.Cities of all sizes across the United States are confronting increases in gun violence that began amid the pandemic and have persisted through the first half of this year. In New York, 721 people had been shot as of June 13, the most to that point in the year since 2002, Police Department statistics show.The spike comes after a period during which violent crime in the city fell to its lowest levels in more than six decades, with the raw numbers still well below both what some smaller cities have recorded and New York’s own peak levels of the 1980s and ’90s.The city’s overall crime rate — which is based on seven major crimes, including murder, assault and rape — is also the lowest it has been in several decades, thanks largely to declines in reported burglaries and robberies.The rise in gun violence in New York has mostly been concentrated in a few parts of the city, including the Bronx neighborhood where the shooting on Thursday occurred.The area falls in the 44th Precinct, which, in addition to Claremont, covers parts of the Concourse and Highbridge sections and other slices of the southwest Bronx. The precinct had recorded 41 shootings as of June 13, compared with 13 in the same period in 2020, police data shows. Over the past decade, the number has rarely topped 20 by that date.“This is a good neighborhood,” Ante Rodriguez, a home health care aide who lives on the block where the shooting happened, said Friday evening. “You can see that everybody knows each other.”But Mr. Rodriguez, 20, also said he was aware there had been an uptick in shootings in the area.“I’ve seen shootouts before,” he said. “I’ve been shot at myself.”.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;}The two children, whom the police did not identify beyond their ages and saying they were siblings, were walking on the sidewalk when the shooting began near a storefront tucked between apartment buildings on Sheridan Avenue, officials said. They were not related to the man who was shot, the police said.After the gunman finished firing, he jumped onto a waiting scooter being driven by a second man and the two left the area, the police said. No arrests had been made as of Friday evening.Experts and city officials are watching closely to determine whether shootings continue at their current pace through the summer and whether the recent spike is a blip or a harbinger of a long-term trend.The latest weekly figures have begun to more closely resemble last year’s, police data shows, which gun-violence experts noted could suggest that things were not worsening, but also not getting better. They warned, however, that it was too early to draw solid conclusions.On Friday evening, the block where the shooting occurred had returned to a calmer pace: Children were playing on the sidewalk, watched by adults who were sitting on their front steps as others stood and talked nearby.Some residents were nonetheless shaken by the video footage.Noriann Rosado, 45, said she had moved to a new apartment on the block this week, picking up her keys three days ago and starting to bring her belongings over on Thursday. She said that she became aware of the shooting only after seeing it on an Instagram post but that it worried her.“They said it was a good building,” Ms. Rosado said. Now, though, she added, she had begun to wonder about the neighborhood. “I don’t feel OK.” More

    • 138 Shares149 Views

      in Elections

      Top Mayoral Rivals Attack Adams and Clash on Policing and Ethics

      by

      The debaters’ focus on Mr. Adams, centering on questions of his residency, reflected his front-runner status in the race for New York City mayor.The top Democratic candidates in the New York City mayor’s race clashed sharply over political visions and personal ethics in a debate that began with sustained attacks against one candidate, Eric Adams, over questions of his residency and transparency.Two days before early voting begins and less than two weeks before the June 22 Democratic primary that will almost certainly decide the city’s next mayor, five leading contenders gathered on Thursday for an in-person, penultimate debate that centered on issues of public safety, managing the mayor’s relationship with Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and qualifications to lead the nation’s largest city.The one-hour debate arrived at an unsettled moment in an extraordinarily consequential race, as several contenders battled controversies, while sparse public polling shows a tight and unpredictable contest that will be settled by ranked-choice voting.It began on a highly contentious note, as four of the five candidates onstage were asked whether they believed that Mr. Adams, who is considered the leading candidate, indeed lived in New York City, following a Politico New York report that Mr. Adams used conflicting addresses in official records, and that he was spending nights at Brooklyn Borough Hall in the homestretch of the campaign.Mr. Adams, who has said that he moved into Borough Hall for a time after the pandemic hit to focus on the workload, has said his primary residence is an apartment in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn. He also co-owns a co-op with his partner in Fort Lee, N.J.“Eric, unfortunately, has not only been not straightforward, but he’s been hypocritical,” charged Andrew Yang, the former presidential candidate and perhaps Mr. Adams’s most persistent critic on the stage on Thursday. “He spent months attacking me for not being a New Yorker. Meanwhile, he was attacking me from New Jersey.”Maya D. Wiley, a former counsel to Mayor Bill de Blasio, alluded to other controversies including investigations of Mr. Adams’s fund-raising practices, and said that “the issue is honesty.”“I served as a police officer in Brooklyn, I became a state senator elected from Brooklyn and now I am the Brooklyn borough president,” Mr. Adams shot back. Taking a swipe at Mr. Yang, who spent part of the pandemic at a weekend home in the Hudson Valley in New York, he continued, “I know what people are concerned about on the ground because I’m on the ground. I don’t live in New Paltz, I live in Brooklyn.”Mr. Adams’s participation in the debate, co-hosted by WCBS-TV, had been in question. He indicated on Tuesday that he would skip the event, saying he would instead attend a vigil for a 10-year-old killed in gun violence in Queens. On Thursday, he reversed course. In between, a firestorm ensued tied to questions surrounding Mr. Adams’s residency.Beyond the substance of the questions, the fusillade of attacks also reflected Mr. Adams’s standing in the race: He has increasingly led available surveys as he presses a message that he says is focused on issues of both public safety and criminal justice. More than any other candidate, Mr. Adams has discussed issues of rising gun violence and other crime, at a time when polls show public safety to be a top priority for New York Democratic voters. At the debate, the contenders focused on issues of gun violence as well as hate crimes.“We have seen an uptick in anti-Asian hate crime, but we’ve also seen an uptick in anti-Semitism,” said Kathryn Garcia, the former sanitation commissioner, who was a far more forceful presence in Thursday’s debate than she has been in previous contests. She went on to sketch out plans for confronting mental illness and homelessness as part of the solution. And as in previous debates, some of the clearest distinctions in the field emerged over issues of public safety, as Ms. Wiley staked out some of the most left-leaning positions on the stage.Asked about the idea of taking guns away from New York Police Department officers, every candidate except for Ms. Wiley said no. She did not answer directly, instead discussing the importance of “smart policing.”“I am not prepared to make that decision in a debate,” she said, even as she also said that “the mayor’s job is safety. Safety is job one, and I’m going to keep New Yorkers safe when I’m mayor.”The answer stood in contrast to one offered by Scott M. Stringer, the city comptroller, who, like Ms. Wiley, has sought to appeal to the most progressive voters in New York.“We’re not taking guns away from the police,” Mr. Stringer said flatly. “We’re going to make sure that we create a police force that focuses on rooting out violent crime, and at the same time ensures the civil rights of our young people.”Ms. Wiley also argued passionately that investments in the social safety net, especially a proposal for more trauma-informed care in schools, would go a long way toward preventing violence like the shooting in Queens.“Justin Wallace is not dead because we don’t have enough police officers,” she said, referencing the 10-year-old. “He is dead because we have never in this city done the very thing that communities like in the Far Rockaways, or Washington Heights or Mott Haven, have been asking us for, which is trauma-informed care in our schools, which is in my plan.”Mr. Yang offered an impassioned critique of a law enforcement system that would allow people who have been arrested several times to remain unsupervised, citing a man who was accused of punching an Asian woman, one incident in a long series of arrests..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 Yorkers deserve to be safe on our own streets,” he said. “We have to get people who need help, the help that they need, regardless of whether they have the capacity to raise their hands and seek it.”On the whole, the debate was more civil and less chaotic than the previous matchup, which at times devolved into a brawl. Certainly, there were key areas of agreement: All five of the candidates onstage said that New York should consider renaming sites that had been named for slaveholders.But clear differences were on display, too, on policy and politics. The candidates clashed over the most effective way to deal with Mr. Cuomo, given that governors and mayors in New York historically have had tense relationships.“I’ve had a number of calls with Governor Cuomo, I worked with his brother at CNN, I can work with Governor Cuomo, but I can work with anyone who’s going to help us deliver for the people of New York,” said Mr. Yang, a former CNN contributor. “Our interests are the same because the state’s recovery relies upon New York City’s recovery.”“Andrew, your approach is naïve,” Mr. Stringer replied. “This is not how Albany works, Albany will go after you. Albany will collapse you if you don’t understand that the forces around the state do not want us to get the funding that we deserve.”Mr. Stringer has cast himself as a seasoned government hand with a slate of progressive policies. His ability to engage younger left-wing voters, though, was hampered after a woman earlier this spring accused him of making unwanted sexual advances during a 2001 campaign, allegations he denied.Last week, a second woman accused Mr. Stringer of making unwanted sexual advances when, she said, she worked at a bar he co-owned decades ago. Mr. Stringer said he did not recall Teresa Logan, the woman making the allegations, but said he apologized if he had met her and made her uncomfortable.“I want to be held accountable to anyone who wishes, the press or otherwise, to investigate what took place 30 years ago and 20 years ago,” he said. “Unfortunately, in the middle of a campaign, it has been a struggle to find a way to communicate that. Now it’s up to the voters to look at my 30-year record of service and personal history and make a decision as to who’s best qualified for mayor.”“It takes two to view any sexual conduct as welcome,” Ms. Wiley interjected. Mr. Stringer said he agreed. Ms. Wiley is seeking to emerge as the standard-bearer for the left wing of the Democratic Party, part of her effort to build a coalition that includes voters of color from across the ideological spectrum as well as white progressives.Over the last week, prominent progressive lawmakers and leaders have made a major push to consolidate around her campaign: Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez backed her last weekend; Jumaane D. Williams, the New York City public advocate, did the same on Wednesday.Dianne Morales, a former nonprofit executive, had also been battling for support from the left-wing grass-roots, but amid a campaign uprising and fight over unionizing efforts, she terminated dozens of workers this week, according to the union. She was not invited to participate in Thursday’s debate, nor were two other candidates who have participated in prior debates: Shaun Donovan, the former federal housing secretary, and Raymond J. McGuire, a former Citi executive.Natalie Prieb contributed reporting. More

    • 125 Shares139 Views

      in Elections

      Crime and Qualifications at Issue in Heated N.Y.C. Mayoral Debate

      by

      The eight Democratic contenders jousted over the economy, education and the fundamental question of who among them was qualified to run New York City.The Democratic candidates for mayor of New York City forcefully attacked their opponents’ records and ethics in starkly personal terms on Wednesday night, tangling over how they would address growing concerns over rising violent crime and the city’s economic recovery.In their first in-person debate of the campaign, the eight leading contenders battled over crime, justice and the power of the police, questions of education and charter schools and, in the debate’s most heated moments, the issue of who is qualified to lead the nation’s largest city.The debate was the first opportunity for the candidates to confront each other face to face, and the setting and the timing — just 20 days before the June 22 Democratic primary — elevated the importance and the tension of the gathering.One of the most heated exchanges unfolded between Eric Adams, the Brooklyn borough president, and Andrew Yang, the former presidential candidate — two contenders who have generally been considered the front-runners, though the race is tightening.“Eric, we all know that you’ve been investigated for corruption everywhere you’ve gone,” Mr. Yang charged, accusing Mr. Adams of involvement in a “trifecta of corruption investigations.”“Is that really what we want in the next mayor? he asked. “Did you think you were going to enter City Hall, and it’s going to be different? We all know it’s going to be exactly the same.”Mr. Adams, who defended his integrity, noted Mr. Yang’s lack of past political experience in the city and remarked, “You do not vote in municipal elections at all. I just don’t know — how the hell do we have you become our mayor, with this record like this?”The candidates laid out their ambitions on vital city issues, including how to account for educational losses during the pandemic and the need to boost small businesses.The debate also touched on broader thematic questions: whether New York needed a political outsider with boldly ambitious ideas, or a leader with traditional experience in city government who might be more knowledgeable about how to tackle the staggering challenges that await the next mayor.

      .s-carousel{margin:0;padding:0;max-width:600px;margin:auto}.s-carousel__slides{position:relative;padding-top:min(600px,100%);background:#000}.s-carousel img,.s-carousel video{margin:0;padding:0;width:100%;height:100%;object-fit:contain}.s-carousel figure{margin:0;padding:0;position:relative}.s-carousel__credit{z-index:10;position:absolute;bottom:15px;left:15px;text-align:left;font-family:nyt-franklin,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;font-weight:500;font-size:.75rem;color:#fff;opacity:.6}.s-carousel figcaption{z-index:10;top:15px;left:15px;width:75%;letter-spacing:.01em;position:absolute;text-align:left;font-family:nyt-franklin,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;font-weight:700;text-shadow:0 0 10px rgba(0,0,0,.25),1px 1px 1px rgba(0,0,0,.35),-1px -1px 1px rgba(0,0,0,.35);font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#fff}.s-carousel li,.s-carousel ol{list-style:none;margin:0;padding:0}.s-carousel__viewport{width:100%;position:absolute;top:0;left:0;bottom:0;display:flex;overflow-x:scroll;overflow-y:hidden;scroll-behavior:smooth;scroll-snap-type:x mandatory}@media (prefers-reduced-motion){.s-carousel__viewport{scroll-behavior:auto}}.s-carousel__viewport{-ms-overflow-style:none;scrollbar-width:none;scrollbar-color:transparent transparent;-webkit-user-select:none;user-select:none}.s-carousel__viewport::-webkit-scrollbar{width:0;display:none}.s-carousel__viewport::-webkit-scrollbar-track{background:0 0}.s-carousel__viewport::-webkit-scrollbar-thumb{background:0 0;border:none}.s-carousel figure:focus,.s-carousel image:focus,.s-carousel video:focus{outline:0;box-shadow:none}.s-carousel__slide{width:100%;height:100%;position:relative;flex:0 0 100%;scroll-snap-align:start}.s-carousel__slide figure{width:100%;height:100%;display:flex;align-items:center}.s-carousel__tap-to-unmute-overlay{height:100%;width:100%;position:absolute;z-index:100;animation:fade-in .5s ease-out forwards;background-color:transparent;border:none}.s-carousel__tap-to-unmute-icon{pointer-events:none;background-color:#00000099;padding:10px;border-radius:50%;position:absolute;top:15px;right:15px}.s-carousel__tap-to-unmute-icon svg{display:block;fill:#fff;width:20px;height:20px}.s-carousel__tap-to-unmute-icon svg path{stroke:#fff}.s-carousel__kebob{display:flex;justify-content:center;margin-top:15px}.s-carousel__bob{display:inline-block;width:6px;height:6px;background:#121212;opacity:.3;background-clip:content-box;border:3px solid transparent;border-radius:50%;font-size:0;transition:transform .4s}.s-carousel__bob[data-active=true]{opacity:.8}.s-carousel__navigation{margin-top:15px;display:flex;justify-content:space-between;align-items:center}.s-carousel__arrows{width:50px;display:flex;justify-content:space-between;align-items:center}@media (hover:none){.s-carousel__arrows{visibility:hidden}}.s-carousel__arrow{all:unset;cursor:pointer}.s-carousel__arrow svg{pointer-events:none;fill:#333;transition:fill .15s}.s-carousel__arrow:hover svg{fill:#ccc}.s-carousel__closed-captions-container{position:absolute;z-index:11;bottom:35px;margin:0 auto;left:0;right:0;text-align:center}.s-carousel__closed-captions{font-size:1rem;color:#fff;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,.9);padding:5px;font-family:nyt-franklin,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;visibility:hidden}@media (max-width:600px){.s-carousel figcaption{width:75%;letter-spacing:.01em}.s-carousel__closed-captions{font-size:.8125rem}}Eric AdamsJames Estrin/The New York TimesAndrew YangJames Estrin/The New York TimesMaya WileyJames Estrin/The New York TimesRaymond J. McGuireJames Estrin/The New York TimesShaun DonovanJames Estrin/The New York Timesslide 1slide 2slide 3slide 4slide 5 Mr. Yang, who spent months running as an above-the-fray front-runner who billed himself as a cheerleader for New York City, has demonstrated a growing willingness to lace into his opponents — especially Mr. Adams — in recent days. He is seeking to cast the race as a choice between a change candidate and sclerotic status quo contenders, as he competes against others who have the kind of significant city government experience he lacks.The candidates took the stage at a moment of extraordinary uncertainty in the race, even as the contest nears its conclusion.In recent weeks, Kathryn Garcia, the former sanitation commissioner, has demonstrated real traction in both sparse public polling and more concretely, in fund-raising numbers — potentially joining Mr. Yang and Mr. Adams as front-runners.Those three candidates all have distinct bases, but they are in direct competition over some moderate white voters, and Mr. Yang and Mr. Adams have both criticized Ms. Garcia in recent weeks in a sign of her emerging strength — and a sharp departure from their previous friendly postures toward her.But onstage, the fire was directed more often at Mr. Yang and Mr. Adams than at Ms. Garcia, who pitched herself as a steady and serious government expert. She stayed out of the fray during the debate, but also at times was out of the spotlight.“We don’t need a politician right now,” Ms. Garcia said. “And perhaps from this stage, maybe you will agree with me.”The first hour of the debate, co-hosted by WABC-TV, aired on broadcast television and may have been the biggest stage yet for the mayoral candidates, though the station pre-empted the second hour with a game show, “Press Your Luck,” forcing viewers to switch to another channel or an online stream. After months of staid online forums, the debate on Wednesday took on the trappings of a prize fight, with fans of the candidates holding rallies outside the Upper West Side television studio, waving signs, blaring music and mixing with the contenders.Inside, several of the candidates appeared eager for confrontation. In the tense exchanges between Mr. Yang and Mr. Adams, Mr. Yang suggested that Mr. Adams’s advice about confronting others over the use of illicit fireworks led to a woman’s death, and Mr. Adams said at another point that people of color are “wrongly accused often in this country” and called on Mr. Yang to apologize for his insinuations on corruption.Scott M. Stringer, the city comptroller who maintained a low profile in the first debate, issued bitter denunciations of several of his rivals. “As your consultants have told you time and time again, they admit you are an empty vessel,” Mr. Stringer said to Mr. Yang, peering over his podium to address the former presidential candidate directly. “I actually don’t think you are an empty vessel. I think you are a Republican who continues to focus on the issues that will not bring back the economy.”Mr. Stringer, who is casting himself as a progressive with deep government experience, also ripped Maya Wiley, the former counsel to Mayor Bill de Blasio, claiming she had been a “rubber stamp” for the Police Benevolent Association when she chaired the Civilian Complaint Review Board.And he suggested that Mr. Adams and others believe “the only solution to preventing crime is going back to the Giuliani days with stop-and-frisk and a Republican agenda that put a lot of kids in our criminal justice system.”Ms. Wiley, who defended her tenure, slammed Mr. Yang’s record leading Venture for America, the nonprofit he ran before running for president, over its record of job creation and how, records show, he failed to recruit many participants of color. And in one of the most revealing exchanges of the night, she and Mr. Adams had an extended back-and-forth over remarks he made about guns.“Mr. Adams has said he’s carried a gun to church, he has asked off-duty officers to carry guns to church, he’s said he will carry a gun as mayor,” Ms. Wiley said. “Eric, isn’t this the wrong message to send our kids we’re telling not to pick up the guns?”Mr. Adams stressed that he saw a distinction between off-duty officers carrying guns and the proliferation of illegal guns, describing an incident that occurred when he was a transit police officer, and he stopped an anti-Asian hate crime on a subway train..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;}“I was off-duty, I was able to stop those armed perpetrators from carrying out the actions while off-duty,” he said. “The state law states that a police officer can carry off-duty because he has to respond 24 hours a day to any crime that is taking place in this city.”“We also had an off-duty officer shoot his friend and murder him carrying his gun,” Ms. Wiley shot back.Ms. Wiley is working to assemble a coalition of both voters of color and white progressives, and she has increasingly billed herself as “the progressive candidate that can win this race,” as she seeks to emerge as the left-wing standard-bearer in the race. On Tuesday, she released a striking ad highlighting the police attacking peaceful protesters, betting that the attitudes around reining in police power that animated Democrats and others following the killing of George Floyd last year remain resonant.Mr. Adams, a Black former police captain who pushed for change from within the system, has in some ways made a very different bet about the mood of the electorate regarding public safety. Amid a spike in shootings, jarring episodes of crime on the subway and a spate of hate crimes around the city, he has argued that public safety is the “prerequisite” to prosperity even as he also presses for policing reforms. He sees a need for more police in the subway system, while Ms. Wiley has said the focus should be on more mental health professionals.“No one is coming to New York, in our multibillion dollar tourism industry, if you have 3-year-old children shot in Times Square,” Mr. Adams said. “No one is coming here, if you have people being pushed on the subway because of mental health illnesses. If we’re going to turn around our economy, we have to make this city a safe city.”“We can’t do safety at the expense of justice,” Ms. Wiley said. In an implicit swipe at Mr. Adams’s positions, she added, “We cannot, and that means we can’t have stop-and-frisk back, or the anti-crime unit.”For much of the race, the battle for the left has been crowded, as Mr. Stringer and Dianne Morales, a former nonprofit executive, sought to engage the most deeply progressive voters in the city along with Ms. Wiley.Mr. Stringer is a well-funded candidate with significant labor support, but an accusation that he made unwanted sexual advances 20 years ago — which he denies — sapped his momentum and appears to have complicated his ability to grow beyond his Upper West Side base. Onstage, though, he was one of the most vigorous combatants.Ms. Morales was a favorite of the activist left, but her campaign has been embroiled in inner turmoil to an extraordinary degree, with a bitter unionization battle spilling into public view.Ms. Wiley’s challenge is to both unite and energize the most liberal voters in the party around her candidacy, and her ability to do so is not yet clear.Shaun Donovan, the former federal housing secretary, and Raymond J. McGuire, a former Citi executive, both took the debate stage as well-funded candidates who have struggled to gain significant traction.In different ways, both Mr. Donovan and Mr. McGuire sought to cast themselves as city government outsiders with serious executive experience who can fix the problems that have daunted others more closely tied to the current administration.“Other candidates on this stage have had a chance, these last eight years, to make progress,” Mr. Donovan said. “I would leave New York in a new and better direction.”Or as Mr. McGuire put it, borrowing from President Barack Obama, “I’m the change that you can vote for. I’m the change that you can believe in.”Emma G. Fitzsimmons More