Elections, Mayors

Subterms

    More stories

    • 125 Shares189 Views

      in Elections

      Inside Stephen Ross' Plan to Influence New York’s Mayoral Race

      by

      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }N.Y.C. Mayoral RaceWho’s Running?5 TakeawaysCandidates’ N.Y.C. MomentsAn Overview of the RaceAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyInside a Billionaire’s Plan to Influence New York’s Mayoral RaceStephen Ross, the head of the Related Companies, is organizing a meeting of business leaders to “help us get this mayoral election right.”Stephen Ross said he hopes to boost voter turnout among “moderate thinking, pro-growth, and pro-jobs Democrats who typically do not vote in primaries.”Credit…Peter Foley/EPA, via ShutterstockMarch 9, 2021Updated 8:37 p.m. ETThe billionaire developer Stephen M. Ross is rallying fellow business leaders to commit tens of millions of dollars in an effort to push moderate Democrats to vote in the June mayoral primary in New York and “change the future course of the city.”Mr. Ross has scheduled a meeting for Monday to detail his plans to launch the super PAC to “help us get this mayoral election right,” according to an email he sent to colleagues that was reviewed by The New York Times.The campaign would not initially support a specific candidate, but Mr. Ross, the chairman and founder of Related Companies, stressed that the “winner of the Democratic primary for mayor in June will decide if NYC will rebound or languish.”The effort is the starkest example of business leaders using their money and influence to elect a pro-business mayor who would steer New York’s recovery from the pandemic, and to hurt the chances of progressive-leaning candidates whose positions — like slashing the Police Department budget and raising taxes on the rich — alarm many business leaders.“This is truly the most important election of our lifetime and in NYC’s history,” Mr. Ross wrote in the email. “Fortunately, we can do something to change the future course of the city we love.”Candidates considered more palatable to the business sector include Eric Adams, the Brooklyn borough president; Andrew Yang, a former presidential candidate; Kathryn Garcia, the former sanitation commissioner; Raymond J. McGuire, a former Wall Street executive; and Shaun Donovan, a former Obama administration cabinet member.Mr. Yang is the early front-runner, followed by Mr. Adams, according to a recent poll by Emerson College. Mr. McGuire, thought to be a favorite of some in the business community, was in eighth place in the poll.Via a spokesman, Mr. Ross did not rule out backing a particular candidate, when the time comes.But when asked who that candidate might be, Mr. Ross was circumspect.“The one who is best and can help all New Yorkers,” he said. More

    • 150 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      The A Train and the Macarena: 5 Highlights From the Mayor’s Race

      by

      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }N.Y.C. Mayoral RaceWho’s Running?5 TakeawaysCandidates’ N.Y.C. MomentsAn Overview of the RaceAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyThe A Train and the Macarena: 5 Highlights From the Mayor’s RaceCandidates sparred over their subway smarts and did some virtual dancing, while the former sanitation commissioner got support from influential women.When Andrew Yang wrote on Twitter that he was “Bronx bound” while on the A train, the criticism was immediate.Credit…Brendan Mcdermid/ReutersJeffery C. Mays, Dana Rubinstein and March 8, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ETWhile Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s troubles dominated the headlines, the bevy of candidates running for New York City mayor trudged onward, dutifully showing up for yet more online forums and occasionally taking swings at their opponents’ foibles.The city’s new ranked-choice voting scheme is supposed to make the mayoral race nicer, since candidates are vying not only for first place, but also for second, third, fourth and fifth place, too. In such a scenario, it doesn’t pay to alienate a competitor’s supporters.That friendliness was on display after the Hotel Trades Council, a powerful union, endorsed Eric Adams, the Brooklyn borough president.Andrew Yang’s co-campaign managers made a point of saying nice things on Twitter. But the bonhomie didn’t last long.Adams and Yang spar over subwaysWhen Mr. Yang wrote on Twitter that he was “Bronx bound” while on the A train — a line that ends in Upper Manhattan — he gave new life to criticism that he lacked expertise about the city he hopes to govern.“Someone get Andrew Yang a subway map,” the New York Daily News wrote.The ribbing didn’t end there. The next day, Mr. Adams, who has placed second behind Mr. Yang in most polls, posted a photo of himself on Twitter suggesting that he knew how to get to the Bronx by subway.Chris Coffey, Mr. Yang’s co-campaign manager, quickly responded: “Did your car and driver meet you in the Bronx?”Mr. Coffey pointed out that Mr. Yang had switched from the A train to the D train at 125th Street and traveled to 167th Street in the Bronx to tour small businesses with Vanessa L. Gibson, a councilwoman from the borough who is running for borough president.It wasn’t the first time last week that Mr. Adams had targeted Mr. Yang for criticism. The two men are also sparring over universal basic income, Mr. Yang’s signature proposal from his run for the Democratic nomination for president.Mr. Yang introduced a version of the plan for New York City that calls for providing 500,000 of the city’s poorest residents with an average of $2,000 per year, and would cost about $1 billion.Speaking Friday at a virtual event hosted by the Association for a Better New York, Mr. Adams touted his plan to boost the city’s earned-income tax credit to provide 900,000 New Yorkers with up to $4,000 per year.Mr. Adams never mentioned Mr. Yang’s name but his language was caustic: He referred to his opponent’s proposal as “UBLie” and “snake oil,” and said the city did not need “empty promises” from “hollow salesmen.”Mr. Adams’s criticisms are a sign that he’s worried, Mr. Coffey suggested.“Hitting Andrew Yang, who is widely credited with making cash relief mainstream, at the same time as stimulus is starting to go out defies logic,” he said. “It’s almost as silly as trying to mock a lifetime subway rider when you have had a car and driver for seven years.”Truth, dare or dance?The high school students at the Teens Take Charge mayoral forum on Thursday grilled the candidates on tough issues such as summer jobs, funding for the City University of New York and the specialized high school entrance exam. They were ruthless moderators, holding the candidates to the allotted time to answer questions and even cutting them off when necessary.But that doesn’t mean they didn’t have fun at an event that many participants called the best mayoral forum so far.During the first “truth, dare or dance” round of the 2021 mayoral election season, the candidates could choose a truth, a dare or a 15-second dance to a song that the students had randomly chosen.No candidates chose to dance, but as the segment was ending, Shaun Donovan, a former federal housing secretary, was apparently dismayed that he had not gotten a chance to bust a move.“Can we dance now?” Mr. Donovan asked. One of the hosts, Carmen Lopez Villamil, offered 15 seconds to allow all the candidates to dance at once.“For real, we’re going to dance?” Dianne Morales, a nonprofit executive, said with a shocked look.As the song “Macarena” began to play, Mr. Yang was the first one out of his seat, followed closely by Mr. Donovan and Maya Wiley, the former legal counsel for Mayor Bill de Blasio.“You’ve got to turn it up a little bit,” said Ms. Wiley.Ms. Morales swayed to the beat with verve and rhythm. Mr. Donovan did a spin. Mr. Yang looked like he was doing a bit of salsa dancing, while Scott Stringer, the New York City comptroller, stuck to a quick two-step while wiggling a bit. Ms. Wiley also looked like she was grooving, but she was too close to the camera for the audience to check out her moves.“I love to dance but hoped for the Black Eyed Peas,” Ms. Wiley told The Times. “The Macarena isn’t my flava.”Unfortunately — or maybe fortunately — no one actually did the Macarena.Mr. Donovan admitted to not knowing how to do the dance but said he saw the opportunity as the “antidote” to hours of Zoom conferences. Adams lands the second big union endorsementThe Hotel Trades Council endorsed Eric Adams last week.Credit…Jose A. Alvarado Jr. for The New York TimesMr. Adams has taken to saying that he will be a “blue-collar mayor.” He talks about how his mother cleaned houses to support their family when he was growing up. Last week, the Hotel Trades Council endorsed Mr. Adams, calling him the “candidate of and for working-class New Yorkers.”The well-connected union has 31,000 workers, 22,000 of whom are registered to vote in the city. That can mean crucial votes in a crowded field, more small-dollar donations and campaign workers on the ground.It was the second big union endorsement in the race after Ms. Wiley was recently endorsed by Local 1199 of the Service Employees International Union. It came as the pandemic has shut many city hotels and left workers unemployed. The number of visitors to New York City was down 66 percent in 2020 compared with the year before. Even with vaccination numbers on the rise, NYC & Company projects that tourism may not rebound until 2025. Mr. Adams recently endorsed a plan with another mayoral candidate, Carlos Menchaca, a councilman from Brooklyn, to turn underutilized hotels outside of Manhattan into affordable housing. Many of those hotels are nonunion.Mr. Adams is also in favor of a special citywide hotel permit for hotel construction, a policy Mr. de Blasio is trying to push through before his term is out. The Hotel Trades Council is backing the measure.If the city’s hospitality industry is to rebound, it needs tax relief, public safety, real-time reporting on vaccination rates and a “robust marketing effort,” Mr. Adams said.A biking mayor?There is a good chance that the next mayor will be a regular cyclist.The candidates showed off their cycling bona fides at a forum last week: Raymond J. McGuire showed off a sleek bike perched behind him in his elaborate Zoom setup, and Mr. Adams said he goes for a ride when he is feeling stressed.Mr. Yang said he got a bike when his first son was born and rode it from Hell’s Kitchen to the Financial District to take him to school. “It was a game changer for me,” Mr. Yang said. Many of the candidates said they want to continue to add protected bike lanes. Mr. Stringer plans to double bike ridership, move toward a car-free Manhattan and make sure that bike lanes are clearly separated from traffic so that his sons can ride safely.“We have to use our children as the barometer for whether we think a bike lane is safe,” he said at the forum.Mr. Donovan was perhaps the most serious cyclist: He once biked through the South to retrace the 1961 Freedom Rides.“I’m pretty sure no other candidate in this race has cycled 1,000 miles retracing the route of the Freedom Rides,” he said.Executive women support GarciaKathryn Garcia’s reform of the commercial garbage collection system has drawn admirers.Credit…Brendan Mcdermid/ReutersLet one thing be clear: Kathryn S. Wylde, the executive of the Wall Street-backed Partnership for New York City, is not endorsing Kathryn Garcia for mayor. She said she does not endorse because she will have to work with whoever gets elected.But she does think that Ms. Garcia, along with a couple of other candidates, would make for a very good mayor. That’s why she co-hosted a fund-raiser for Ms. Garcia, the former Sanitation Department commissioner, last week.So, too, did another business executive — Alicia Glen, a former deputy mayor in the de Blasio administration and one of the few de Blasio officials to earn plaudits from New York’s business class.Ms. Garcia said she interpreted Ms. Glen’s support as an endorsement, but deferred to Ms. Glen, who didn’t respond to requests for comment.Ms. Wylde said that she encouraged Ms. Garcia to run, much as she encouraged Mr. Donovan and Mr. McGuire, because she thinks Ms. Garcia would run the city well. She was particularly impressed by Ms. Garcia’s reform of the notoriously dangerous and inefficient commercial garbage collection system.“She’s somebody that brings people together to solve problems, and I’d like to see our next mayor be that kind of person,” Ms. Wylde said.Ms. Wylde has been working in politics since the late 1960s, when there were virtually no women in elected government. No woman has ever been mayor of New York. Ms. Wylde deflected when asked if she thought a woman could win this time around.“Historically, in any profession in New York City, women have a tough time getting ahead,” she said.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

    • 75 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      Face Time With Eight Mayoral Candidates

      by

      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }N.Y.C. Mayoral RaceWho’s Running?11 Candidates’ N.Y.C. MomentsAn Overview of the Race5 TakeawaysAdvertisementContinue reading the main storyOpinionSupported byContinue reading the main storyFace Time With Eight Mayoral CandidatesHere’s what you need to know.Ms. Gay is a member of the editorial board.March 7, 2021, 11:12 a.m. ETCredit…Illustration by The New York Times; photography by James Estrin/The New York Times, Benjamin Norman for The New York Times, and Bebeto Matthews, via Associated PressRunning for mayor of New York City once involved, well, some running — from shaking hands on the Staten Island Ferry to schmoozing with donors at fund-raisers and awkwardly dancing in parades across the five boroughs. This year, the candidates have spent a lot of their time on Zoom. It’s been weird.But the internet — in this case, Skype — is how I last talked with Kathryn Garcia, a wry, thoughtful former sanitation commissioner and candidate for mayor who deserves more attention than she has so far received in the race.“Is it OK if I record this?” I asked. “I’ve never met a reporter who didn’t record me, so I’m fine with it,” she shot back with a smile. (It’s nice to see that at least some things remain unchanged.) What followed was a conversation that had me hoping more New Yorkers will come to know her name — and fearing that the limits of campaigning during a pandemic may be leaving voters ill-informed about the people who are vying to run their city.Ms. Garcia isn’t the only candidate worthy of a closer look. With the pandemic still raging, public attention is focused on schools; masks; and, above all, the hope of a jab in the arm. For weary New Yorkers, the race for mayor can seem like an afterthought.It isn’t only the pandemic that makes this year’s mayor’s race different. This year’s primaries are in June instead of September, as in years past. This will also be the first mayoral election in which New Yorkers use ranked choice voting to cast their ballots. Paying attention now is all the more important since Primary Day is just a few months away, on June 22. Because Democrats outnumber Republicans nearly seven to one in the city, the winner of the primary is almost certain to become the city’s next mayor. Time is ticking.The wide open field has been called lackluster. That’s not quite right. What the field lacks in star power it makes up for in formidable résumés and deeply experienced public servants.Some of the top candidates are women. That’s exciting, since New York has never had a female mayor.There’s Maya Wiley, a civil rights lawyer who served as counsel under Mayor Bill de Blasio, then led the city’s police oversight agency. Ms. Wiley, who until recently was a political analyst at MSNBC, is a deep policy thinker.There’s Dianne Morales, a former nonprofit leader and former teacher who is wary of development and speaks passionately about the experiences and needs of working-class New Yorkers.And there’s Ms. Garcia, who earned a reputation as a deft manager at the Sanitation Department and a bringer of accountability to the city’s troubled public housing authority.Another experienced public servant in the race is Scott Stringer, the city’s comptroller, who has offered a series of clear, real plans for how to get New York back on its feet. In a city facing budget cuts and hard decisions, Mr. Stringer’s seasoned understanding of how to use government to help New Yorkers is an asset. He has a plan for nearly every problem and wouldn’t have to learn on the job.Eric Adams, Brooklyn’s sometimes quirky borough president, has also served as a state senator and a captain in the Police Department. Mr. Adams, who is Black and has spoken openly about having experienced abuse at the hands of the police, would undoubtedly bring a potent mix of life experiences to City Hall. “The Police Department is not going to play games with me,” Mr. Adams told me.Shaun Donovan, the housing secretary and then a budget director in the Obama White House who had also served as a housing commissioner in the Bloomberg administration. He has a rich understanding of budgeting and how to build affordable housing, something this city desperately needs.Also in the mix of New Yorkers is Ray McGuire, a former head of investment banking at Citigroup. He has impressive management experience and has promised to use his Wall Street acumen to expand the city’s economy, create 500,000 jobs and build more housing. In candidate forums and interviews, Mr. McGuire displays a sober intensity, the kind it often takes to succeed at the highest levels if you are a Black man in America.Then, of course, there is Andrew Yang, the enigmatic former presidential candidate and tech veteran who once served as chief executive of a test-prep company. Mr. Yang has sucked up an enormous amount of oxygen in the race so far. If he is elected, he would be the city’s first Asian-American mayor.The lack of attention on the race might be one reason early polls have Mr. Yang, who came into the race with high name recognition after his presidential bid, far ahead of his rivals.It isn’t always clear what this front-runner has in store for New York or how well he knows the city — including where the A train begins and ends. But all the candidates have solid ideas that would make the city a better place to live.Ms. Garcia wants to create “green belts,” expanding tree canopies, getting waste-spewing trucks off the road and making sidewalks safer, healthier, more relaxing places to spend time. Mr. Donovan wants to create a city of “15-minute neighborhoods,” in which every resident is within a 15-minute walk of public transit and parks, good schools, fresh food and health care.Ms. Wiley has proposed a $10 billion capital plan she calls “New Deal New York,” with the goal of creating 100,000 new jobs. Mr. Adams wants to overhaul the food the city serves in schools, homeless shelters and jails.Mr. Stringer wants to make child care free for the lowest-income New Yorkers and subsidize it for thousands of others. Mr. Yang’s idea to give cash relief to low-income New Yorkers is attractive, though it isn’t likely the city could afford to give enough to make a significant difference.Ms. Morales’s intense focus on the needs and aspirations of working-class and low-income New Yorkers makes her an important voice in the race. Mr. McGuire’s steady confidence that he can bring hundreds of thousands of jobs back to New York sooner than any of the other candidates is reason enough for voters to give him a close look.For all their good ideas, there are bad ideas, too. A suggestion to build a casino on Governors Island is silly, for instance. An even worse idea floating around is to ease up on enforcement of a group of ultra-Orthodox yeshivas suspected of failing to give students a basic education as required by state law.Serious candidates in this race are laser-focused on how to create good jobs and improve schools, build affordable housing and better transportation, and give New Yorkers cleaner air and safer streets. There’s a lot at stake and a lot to consider, if voters would only take a look.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

    • 113 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      How 8 Mayoral Hopefuls Plan to Fix the Economy

      by

      How 8 Mayoral Candidates Plan to Fix New York’s EconomyNew York is facing a financial crisis, mainly because of the pandemic. The next mayor will have to guide the city out of a $5 billion budget gap while helping people and businesses recover from the devastation of Covid-19.Here’s how eight mayoral candidates say they would fund their priorities → More

    • 125 Shares109 Views

      in Elections

      New York Mayoral Candidates Weigh How Hard to Hit Cuomo

      by

      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }N.Y.C. Mayoral RaceWho’s Running?11 Candidates’ N.Y.C. MomentsAn Overview of the Race5 TakeawaysAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyNew York Mayoral Candidates Weigh How Hard to Hit CuomoThe feud between Mayor Bill de Blasio and Gov. Andrew Cuomo has hurt New York City, but Mr. Cuomo’s recent troubles may alter the dynamic for the next mayor.Gov. Andrew Cuomo is facing inquiries into sexual harassment claims and how his administration handled virus-related deaths in nursing homes.Credit…Hans Pennink/Associated PressMarch 3, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ETGov. Andrew M. Cuomo was having one of the worst weeks of his administration, and he tried to divert attention to the New York City mayor’s race.In one of his famed slide show presentations, Mr. Cuomo listed the many challenges facing the city — a rising murder rate, a homelessness crisis, people deciding to move away — and questioned if the candidates were up to the task.“What have you managed before? What have you accomplished before?” Mr. Cuomo said in late February. “This is not about rhetoric. This is not about slogans.”Mr. Cuomo failed to mention another top challenge for the next mayor: Figuring out how to get along with him.Mr. Cuomo, a Democrat in his third term, has been significantly weakened by a growing crisis over allegations of sexual harassment and his handling of coronavirus-related nursing home deaths. But if Mr. Cuomo remains in office, the next mayor will have to work with him to help the city recover from the pandemic.Now the candidates must decide how strongly to criticize Mr. Cuomo; several candidates are calling for Mr. Cuomo to face impeachment proceedings or to resign if the harassment allegations are confirmed.But the governor is unlikely to forget those who attacked him, and Mayor Bill de Blasio’s tenure has shown how a troubled relationship with Mr. Cuomo can thwart a mayor’s agenda. Mr. de Blasio never mastered how to work with the governor, even during the darkest days of the pandemic when the leaders fought over shutting down the city.Over the last seven years, the feud between Mr. Cuomo and Mr. de Blasio has had real implications for the city when they failed to work together on the vaccine rollout, reopening schools, a Legionnaires’ disease outbreak, and fixing the subway and public housing.The candidates running to succeed Mr. de Blasio had been talking about how they would have a better relationship with Mr. Cuomo, but the tone drastically changed in recent days, after three women detailed accusations of sexual harassment against the governor.On Monday, after a woman told The New York Times that Mr. Cuomo tried to kiss her at a wedding in 2019, Kathryn Garcia, the city’s former sanitation commissioner, said she had heard enough and Mr. Cuomo “should do the right thing and step aside.”Andrew Yang, the former presidential hopeful, and Eric Adams, the Brooklyn borough president, have called for an independent investigation. Maya Wiley, a former counsel to Mr. de Blasio, criticized Mr. Cuomo for disappearing from public appearances while the state was still facing a health crisis.“No one should throw around words like impeachment or resignation lightly,” she said. “But as a state, we must see immediate action to address the disgusting behavior” described by two female accusers of Mr. Cuomo.Maya Wiley called for “immediate action” to address Mr. Cuomo’s alleged behavior, but cautioned against using “words like impeachment or resignation lightly.”Credit…Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York TimesScott M. Stringer, the city comptroller, said on Saturday that he believed in a zero-tolerance policy for sexual harassment.“I continue to support a thorough and truly independent investigation of the governor’s conduct, and if it supports these serious and credible allegations, Governor Cuomo must resign,” Mr. Stringer said.Dianne Morales, a former nonprofit executive, and Carlos Menchaca, a City Council member in Brooklyn, have called for impeachment proceedings to begin.The condemnations are unlikely to affect Mr. Cuomo’s involvement in the June 22 Democratic primary for mayor, which is likely to determine the winner in the general election. The governor seems unlikely to endorse a candidate; even in the presidential race, he waited until very late to endorse his friend Joseph R. Biden Jr.Mr. Cuomo knows two leading candidates well: Mr. Stringer, a former state assemblyman, and Mr. Adams, a former state senator. Mr. Stringer has found ways to work with the governor, leading Carl Heastie, the State Assembly speaker, to call Mr. Stringer a “rubber stamp” for Mr. Cuomo in 2018 during a battle over pay raises for state lawmakers.But Mr. Adams has openly criticized Mr. Cuomo, over his management of the subway and his feud with the mayor. In April, when Mr. Cuomo and Mr. de Blasio fought over closing the city’s schools, Mr. Adams told them to “cut the crap.” This past week, after the sexual harassment claims were lodged, he said that when powerful men prey on women, “swift action must be taken against them.”Mr. Yang and Raymond J. McGuire, a former Wall Street executive, have said they had an in with the governor — pointing to their relationship with his brother, Chris Cuomo, the CNN host. Mr. Yang, however, voted in 2018 for Cynthia Nixon, the actress and a fierce critic of Mr. Cuomo in the Democratic primary that year — a choice that he publicized on Twitter.Another guilt-by-association relationship could stem from one of Mr. Yang’s first endorsers: Ron Kim, the state assemblyman who has gone to war with Mr. Cuomo over virus-related deaths in nursing homes. In the 2018 Democratic primary for governor, Andrew Yang, left, voted for Cynthia Nixon, the actress who ran and lost against Mr. Cuomo in a bitterly fought contest.Credit…Chang W. Lee/The New York TimesHaving a relationship with Mr. Cuomo is not necessarily predictive of how the next mayor might get along with the governor. Mr. Cuomo and Mr. de Blasio had known each other well: Mr. Cuomo, as the secretary of the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, hired Mr. de Blasio to oversee the New York region during the Clinton administration.When Michael R. Bloomberg was mayor, he seemingly got along better with Mr. Cuomo. But behind the scenes, the leaders also had a tense relationship, jockeying for credit on issues like the state’s passage of a same-sex marriage law in 2011.The stakes have never been higher. Besides dealing with the coronavirus recovery, plenty of other key issues will be decided in Albany: raising taxes on the wealthy, schools funding, fixing the subway and desegregating specialized high schools.Democrats who have wrangled with Mr. Cuomo in the past believe that direct confrontation is the best approach. Monica Klein, a political consultant who worked for Mr. de Blasio and has organized protests outside the governor’s office, said Mr. Cuomo only responds to sustained political pressure and bad headlines.“You can’t cede ground to a bully,” she said.Some political consultants contend that Mr. Cuomo might prefer a candidate who has little experience in city government.“Even a weakened Governor Cuomo would run circles around Andrew Yang,” said Eric Phillips, a former press secretary for Mr. de Blasio.Mr. Stringer may have had an edge — at least before he brought up Mr. Cuomo’s resignation. In December, Mr. Stringer joined more than two dozen of Mr. Cuomo’s top allies in Albany, including Bill and Hillary Clinton. No other mayoral candidate was there for the historic moment: to cast the state’s official elector ballots to elect Mr. Biden as president.Scott Stringer, the city comptroller and a former state lawmaker, has found ways to work with the governor.Credit…Benjamin Norman for The New York TimesMr. de Blasio was not invited, even though the mayors of smaller cities like Buffalo and Rochester attended. Mr. de Blasio was left off the list because he ran in the Democratic primary against Mr. Biden, organizers said.The friendly gesture did not stop Mr. Cuomo from attacking Mr. Stringer a short time later.“The comptroller is an incumbent — where have you been?” Mr. Cuomo said to reporters in February, criticizing Mr. Stringer on police reform after huge protests in the city last summer. “What have you done? Where were you when Rome was burning?”Mr. Stringer may also face a difficult tightrope, trying to work with the governor while answering to progressive allies who are at odds with Mr. Cuomo, including State Senators Jessica Ramos and Alessandra Biaggi — both of whom endorsed Mr. Stringer.Mr. Stringer has made clear that he would try to be a stronger voice for the city than Mr. de Blasio.“I’m not going to have my lunch money stolen from Albany,” he said. “You can be sure of that.”Mr. Cuomo likely would have preferred Ruben Diaz Jr., the Bronx borough president, or Christine Quinn, the former City Council speaker, two allies who decided against running for mayor. At a recent news conference, Mr. Cuomo said he had been asked about an endorsement and wanted to know more about candidates’ plans.“You need a real manager with a real vision who can really get things done,” Mr. Cuomo said.Jay Jacobs, an ally of Mr. Cuomo’s and chairman of the New York State Democratic Committee, said he had given no thought to picking a favorite in the mayoral field.Still, he added: “It doesn’t help anybody’s chances to get something from the governor, or anyone for that matter, if they’ve been spending several years banging him over the head — that’s just common sense.”Katie Glueck and Dana Rubinstein contributed reporting.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

    • 138 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      Why These 2 N.Y.C. Mayoral Candidates Are on a Collision Course

      by

      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }N.Y.C. Mayoral RaceWho’s Running?11 Candidates’ N.Y.C. MomentsAn Overview of the Race5 TakeawaysAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyWhy These 2 N.Y.C. Mayoral Candidates Are on a Collision CourseEric Adams, the Brooklyn borough president, and Ray McGuire, a former Citi executive, have become fast rivals in the New York City mayoral race.Ever since Ray McGuire, right, entered New York’s mayoral race, he has vied with Eric Adams, left, to capture Black political influencers and voters.Credit…Jose A. Alvarado Jr. for The New York TimesMarch 2, 2021, 3:00 a.m. ETJust a few days after Raymond J. McGuire officially joined the New York City mayor’s race in December, a courtesy call came in from one of his Democratic rivals, Eric Adams.Mr. Adams, who, like Mr. McGuire, is Black, offered some provocative words of wisdom.“Being in politics is just like being in a prison yard,” Mr. Adams said, according to several people familiar with the video call. “You need to put a wall around your family because you might get shanked.”Mr. Adams’s campaign described the sentiment as “friendly advice.” Several people in Mr. McGuire’s campaign saw it differently, characterizing it as a “veiled threat” from a front-runner trying to intimidate a new challenger.For two years, Mr. Adams, the Brooklyn borough president, had been regarded as one of the favorites in the 2021 mayor’s race.He was a former police officer who had nuanced views of how social justice demands could coexist with policing needs. He had broad support in Brooklyn, and had raised more than $8 million to fuel his campaign — more than anyone else in the field.In a field of progressive rivals, he had appeared to be the leading Black moderate, representing a key city constituency. But now his stature in the race is suddenly being challenged.Mr. McGuire, a former global head of corporate and investment banking at Citi, quickly began making inroads among political power brokers in the Black community. He hired Basil Smikle, a former executive director of the State Democratic Party, to be his campaign manager; other Black political operatives who have strong connections to Representative Gregory W. Meeks, chairman of the Queens Democratic Party, and Representative Hakeem Jeffries of Brooklyn, also signed on.The filmmaker Spike Lee, whose brand is the borough of Brooklyn, narrated Mr. McGuire’s campaign announcement. Mr. McGuire raised $5 million in just three months, and landed the endorsement of Gwen Carr, the mother of Eric Garner, a Staten Island man whose death in 2014 after being placed in a police chokehold became a flash point for the Black Lives Matter movement.“Eric came into this race believing that he would run a race of inevitability, not just as the borough president of Brooklyn, but the senior Black candidate in the race,” Mr. Smikle said. “Now, that’s not the case.”Mr. McGuire, talking with Councilman Rafael Salamanca in the Bronx, has raised $5 million in three months.Credit…Todd Heisler/The New York TimesMr. McGuire and Mr. Adams have quickly become rivals, and their interactions as well as several interviews with people familiar with their relationship reveal a complicated story born at the intersection of race and class.It’s a natural rivalry between two successful Black men from humble beginnings who took different paths — Mr. McGuire through the Ivy League and the upper echelons of Wall Street, Mr. Adams through night school and the upper ranks of the New York Police Department — to become candidates for mayor.For Mr. Adams, the comparison is slightly irksome, adding to a perception that he might lack the polish to lead the city. He does not have the white-shoe law firm experience of Mr. Jeffries, the power broker and No. 5 House Democrat who The Washington Post once suggested was “Brooklyn’s Barack Obama,” or Mr. McGuire’s experience managing multibillion-dollar transactions.“Coming where I come from, I think people didn’t think I’d put it together, but now I have more money to spend on a campaign than any Black person running for office in New York City’s history,” Mr. Adams said.Four Black and Afro-Latino candidates sit among the Democratic mayoral primary’s top echelon, the most in recent memory. All talk extensively about how being Black and brown in America has affected their lives and will affect how they govern.Initial polls suggest that Mr. Adams is running second to Andrew Yang, the former 2020 presidential candidate; Maya Wiley, a civil rights lawyer who served as Mayor Bill de Blasio’s legal counsel, is roughly in fourth place; Mr. McGuire trails behind, along with Dianne Morales, an Afro-Latina who led a nonprofit in the Bronx dedicated to eradicating poverty.Ms. Wiley and Ms. Morales are also further behind in fund-raising; neither has yet qualified for the city’s generous matching-funds program. But while the two are competing for the progressive vote, they have largely stayed out of each other’s way, even naming the other as their second choice for mayor.Mr. Adams and Mr. McGuire, on the other hand, seem destined for a collision course.“I can’t remember a time where you had this many strong African-American candidates, because what normally occurs is one will emerge out of a group of several with everybody else standing down,” said Mr. Jeffries, who has not decided if he will endorse anyone in the race. “There’s no expectation that will happen in this particular instance.”Evan Thies, a spokesman for Mr. Adams, described the prison yard remarks during the video call as “nothing more than friendly advice about the intense world of city politics.”“To infer otherwise,” he continued, “is an example of the kind of bias that Eric has been fighting his entire life.”But Mr. Adams’s video call in December was not the only time he had directed criticism at Mr. McGuire. At a forum in January, Mr. Adams said that he “didn’t go to the Hamptons” when the pandemic struck New York City — an apparent jab at Mr. McGuire, who said he had spent a total of three weeks in the Hamptons with his family last summer.The remarks were similar to ones Mr. Adams made at a virtual meeting with the Fred Wilson Democratic Club in Queens in December, when he said that he didn’t attend Harvard and didn’t need to introduce himself to voters.Mr. McGuire, who left his job at Citigroupto run for mayor, has also sought to draw a contrast with his rivals, often saying that he has not been “termed out” and isn’t “looking for a promotion” — a likely reference to Mr. Adams and Scott M. Stringer, the city comptroller, who are both barred by city law from running for third consecutive terms.As moderate Democrats, Mr. Adams and McGuire share several policy positions. Both are in favor of revamping Police Department protocols, but have not called for defunding the police. Mr. Adams was originally in favor of a plan from Mr. de Blasio to scrap the Specialized High Schools Admissions Test, but changed his position and now believes — as Mr. McGuire does — that the test should not be the only criteria for admission.One area where they differ is on taxing the wealthy. Mr. Adams wants to increase taxes on those who earn more than $5 million per year for two years, and use the money to help the city recover from the pandemic. Mr. McGuire, who has business community support, has said that wealthy New Yorkers such as himself should pay their fair share but also believes that the city has to grow itself out of its financial deficit.Mr. Adams has tried to accentuate his working-class background, telling voters that he washed dishes before becoming a police officer.Credit…Hiroko Masuike/The New York TimesThe Black electorate in New York City is diverse, made up of Caribbean-Americans and African-Americans; of native New Yorkers, immigrants and transplants from other states. In the 2013 mayoral race, Mr. de Blasio won partly because of his enormous popularity among Black voters: Ninety-six percent of Black New Yorkers voted for him, according to exit polls, a higher percentage than David N. Dinkins captured in 1989 when he was elected as the city’s first Black mayor.In the 2013 Democratic primary, Mr. de Blasio garnered 18,000 more votes in predominantly African-American neighborhoods than a Black rival, the former city comptroller, William C. Thompson Jr., largely based on how they proposed handling the policing tactic of stop and frisk.Given the financial difficulty wrought by the pandemic, Mr. McGuire’s financial pedigree may help with voters in places like central Brooklyn and southeast Queens, said Anthony D. Andrews Jr., the leader of the Fred Wilson Democratic Club in Southeast Queens. He said that residents there are concerned about the city’s unequal property tax system and whether government jobs will be eliminated.“Some people will say the complexity of the city requires someone with a certain kind of education to be able to manage a $100 billion enterprise,” said Marc H. Morial, the former mayor of New Orleans and current president of the National Urban League, who knows both men. “But there may be other people who say, ‘Is that guy in touch with me? Does he know my pain?’”Mr. McGuire, who was urged by business leaders to run for mayor, has tried to accentuate his rise from a modest upbringing in his stump speeches. He was so poor growing up, he has said, that he washed and reused aluminum foil, and pressed scraps of soap together until they formed a bar.Having never met his father, Mr. McGuire was raised by his mother and his grandparents in a house full of foster siblings on the “wrong side of the tracks” in Dayton, Ohio. He found his way to a prestigious private school, went on to earn three degrees at Harvard, and became one of the highest-ranking Black executives on Wall Street, a mentor to young people of color and a behind-the-scenes patron of Black causes.“A Black man who grew up the way I grew up, I know exactly what they are going through,” Mr. McGuire said. “I know about the struggle.”Mr. Adams has touched on similar hardships of his youth, recalling at mayoral forums that neighbors used to leave food and clothes outside his family’s home. He said he first took an interest in becoming an officer after he was beaten by the police as a teenager.Mr. Adams worked his way up the ranks of the Police Department and founded 100 Blacks in Law Enforcement Who Care, an advocacy group to confront institutional racism in the profession. He attended night school to attain a bachelor’s and a master’s degree, and has taken to saying that he will be a “blue-collar” mayor.“I’m not fancy,” Mr. Adams said at a recent Queens County Democratic Party forum. “I was a dishwasher. I worked in a mailroom.”“Acknowledging the problems Black people face,” Mr. Adams said, “is different from understanding the problems.”Mr. Adams was recently endorsed by four wrongfully convicted men, dozens of ministers and leaders from the city’s African community. Four Black City Council members, including I. Daneek Miller, co-chairman of the Black, Latino and Asian Caucus, have also endorsed Mr. Adams.Of Mr. Adams’s supporters on the Council, another caucus member, Laurie A. Cumbo, the majority leader, has been among the most forceful in her criticism of Mr. McGuire.At a mayoral forum, Ms. Cumbo, who represents a Brooklyn district, questioned whether Mr. McGuire had made a “visible commitment to the community” before deciding to run for mayor. She criticized his charitable work in the art world as too “highbrow,” and said that he should make sure that his campaign was “more in alignment with the people.”Not long after, Mr. Adams and Mr. McGuire appeared at a Martin Luther King’s Birthday celebration in Harlem. Hoping to keep the peace, Mr. Adams pulled Mr. McGuire aside and told him that Ms. Cumbo’s comments were not coordinated with his campaign.Ms. Cumbo was not interested in peacemaking.“Ray McGuire is running a ‘Hello, my name is Ray McGuire’ kind of campaign,” she said. “Eric is running a ‘Hey sis, I just saw your mom yesterday getting the vaccine’ kind of campaign.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

    • 138 Shares169 Views

      in Elections

      Cuomo in Crisis, Republicans Emerging: Updates From New York’s Mayoral Race

      by

      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }Harassment Claims Against CuomoWhat We KnowCuomo’s ApologySecond AccusationFirst AccusationMayoral Candidates ReactAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyCuomo in Crisis, Republicans Emerging: Updates From New York’s Mayoral RaceSeveral major candidates called for an investigation into Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, as two Republicans vied for key endorsements.At least two Democratic mayoral candidates have called on Gov. Andrew Cuomo to resign if a series of sex harassment allegations are substantiated.Credit…Gabby Jones for The New York TimesEmma G. Fitzsimmons, Jeffery C. Mays and March 1, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ETThe big political story in New York City is the growing crisis surrounding Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, who faced new allegations of sexual harassment over the weekend.Several Democratic mayoral candidates responded with calls for an independent investigation, and some said Mr. Cuomo, a Democrat, should resign if the allegations are substantiated.And as the Republican field begins to take shape, and many candidates are holding more in-person events, the contest — with the primaries now just four months away — is starting to feel a lot like a normal election, even with the coronavirus still a concern.Here’s what you need to know about the race:A rebuke for CuomoMaya Wiley was among a slew of mayoral candidates who expressed disgust over the allegations against the governor, saying that she believed the accuser’s account.Credit…Gabriela Bhaskar for The New York TimesMany candidates responded to a New York Times article disclosing that a second woman had accused Mr. Cuomo of sexual harassment by calling for an independent investigation, expressing disgust and demanding his resignation if the allegations were further substantiated.Charlotte Bennett, 25, a former executive assistant and health policy adviser for the governor, said he asked questions about her sex life, including whether she had ever had sex with older men. The charges come after Lindsey Boylan, a former state economic development official, accused Mr. Cuomo of giving her an unwanted kiss.Mr. Cuomo called Ms. Boylan’s allegations untrue and said he was sorry that some of the things he had said to Ms. Bennett “have been misinterpreted as an unwanted flirtation.” The governor is also facing questions over how he handled the state’s nursing homes during the pandemic and over charges of bullying behavior.Among the candidates, Scott M. Stringer and Raymond J. McGuire went the furthest, calling for Mr. Cuomo to resign if an independent investigation substantiated the sexual harassment allegations.Mr. McGuire called the allegations “deeply disturbing” and said the accused conduct was “abhorrent.” He said the governor “should resign” if they were further substantiated.Mr. Stringer said the governor “must resign” if an investigation “supports these serious and credible allegations.”Dianne Morales had already called for impeachment proceedings to begin against Mr. Cuomo because of allegations of bullying and the way he had handled nursing homes.“It’s time to address the complete abuses of power that Cuomo has exercised for far too long,” Ms. Morales said in a statement.Kathryn Garcia, Andrew Yang and Shaun Donovan called for independent investigations into the allegations.Mr. Yang said that victims of sexual harassment should “feel empowered” to share their stories “without fear or retaliation” and that “Albany must show they take all allegations seriously through action.”Ms. Wiley registered her disgust in a statement on Saturday, saying, “I believe Charlotte Bennett.” She followed up with a statement on Sunday that had at least 20 or so questions about the situation.Republicans jockey for endorsementsCurtis Sliwa, best known as the founder of the Guardian Angels, has entered the Republican mayoral primary race.Credit…Peter Foley/EPA, via ShutterstockAnother Republican has entered the mayoral race: Curtis Sliwa, the red beret-wearing founder of the Guardian Angels, who is running on a law-and-order message.Mr. Sliwa registered with the city Campaign Finance Board recently and was endorsed by Republican leaders on Staten Island. That prompted Fernando Mateo to announce endorsements from the Republican Party in Manhattan, the Bronx and Queens. The two are expected to be top contenders for the Republican nomination, though either would be an extreme long shot in the general election, given that the vast majority of voters in the city are Democrats.“The reason I’m running for mayor is our city is a ghost town,” Mr. Sliwa said in an interview on Newsmax, criticizing rising crime and homelessness.Mr. Sliwa knocked Mr. Yang, the former presidential candidate, saying he wants to “give out money that we don’t have” — a reference to universal basic income — and he argued that the Democratic field wants to defund the police. (Most of the Democrats have been reluctant to embrace the defund movement, but they do want to change department policies.)Mr. Sliwa said the Police Department had been “neutered” since George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis last year, and he promised to restore police funding and boost morale by visiting every precinct as mayor.“I’ll pat these cops on the back so hard they’ll have to go for a chiropractic adjustment,” he said.Mr. Mateo, who was born in the Dominican Republic, has highlighted his appeal to Hispanic voters. The Bronx Republican Party said in a statement that Republicans had made “significant inroads” in minority communities, especially with Hispanics.“With Mateo at the top of the Republican ticket in 2021, we can replicate that success citywide and continue to expand the Republican coalition,” the group said.Ditching the video campaign, if only for an afternoonAndrew Yang made far more in-person campaign appearances than his rivals, but all of the leading mayoral candidates made campaign stops across the city last week.Credit…Spencer Platt/Getty ImagesThere are walking tours and outdoor lunches, policy rollouts and church visits.As the weather begins to warm and the primary election nears, the Democratic mayoral candidates are slowly getting back out onto the campaign trail, appearing increasingly willing to balance the risks of campaigning in a pandemic with the need to engage and excite more voters beyond Zoom.In the last week, all of the leading mayoral candidates made campaign stops across the city, in some cases several stops in one day. Ms. Wiley spent Friday afternoon in the Bronx; Mr. Stringer offered his housing plan outdoors; Mr. McGuire spent Saturday campaigning in southeast Queens.Mr. Yang, who had to quarantine after testing positive for the coronavirus last month, has from the beginning of his campaign shown more comfort with in-person events, and he was the pacesetter again last week, taking a five-day tour through the five boroughs.The strategy can pay off. Mr. Yang rode the Staten Island Ferry and made positive headlines for helping defend a photographer from an attack.Eric Adams, the Brooklyn borough president, and Carlos Menchaca, a Brooklyn city councilman, even held an unusual joint campaign event in front of the Phoenix Hotel in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, to call for converting empty hotels into affordable housing.Mr. Adams said in an interview that his long days usually start with meditation at 6 a.m., and a recent evening ended with a dinner with South Asian leaders at 9 p.m.“Every second is utilized,” he said. “From the time I wake up to the time I hit my pillow.”A campaign of (stolen) ideasOne candidate accusing another candidate of appropriating their campaign’s ideas: It’s a time-honored complaint on the trail. The Democratic primary for mayor is no different. Several candidates for mayor are proponents of some version of universal basic income, one of Mr. Yang’s campaign platforms from his run for president. Now, some candidates are accusing Mr. Yang of pilfering their campaign ideas.Mr. Adams’s campaign faults Mr. Yang’s campaign for stealing ideas to provide pregnant women with doulas and use shuttered storefronts as vaccine distribution centers.Stu Loeser, an adviser on Mr. McGuire’s campaign, accused the Yang campaign of appropriating their idea to allow small businesses to keep their sales tax receipts for a year to help recover from the pandemic, and to create a teachers’ corps to tutor students.Mr. McGuire’s campaign grew so annoyed that they decided to do a bit of internet trolling: Anyone who heads to yangpolicy.com is automatically redirected to Mr. McGuire’s campaign website. The official registration for the web address is anonymous, but Mr. McGuire’s campaign claimed credit.“Lots of candidates say they will take on wasteful duplication. We set up yangpolicy.com to actually do something about it,” said Lupe Todd-Medina, a spokeswoman for Mr. McGuire.Mr. Yang’s campaign ridiculed the accusations, suggesting that Mr. McGuire’s campaign and others have used ideas they first proposed.“You know what’s not a new idea? Last-place candidate going after first-place candidate to get attention,” said Alyssa Cass, Mr. Yang’s communications director.As for Mr. Adams’s idea about doulas, Ms. Cass said Mr. Yang agreed with Mr. Adams and had spoken with others about the idea.“Eric has had 15-plus years as an elected official and never gotten it done,” Ms. Cass said. “We’ll make it a Year 1 priority.”Who will save Broadway?Kathryn Garcia said that she would serve as the city’s cheerleader as mayor, visiting museums and Broadway shows to get New Yorkers excited about returning to them.Credit…Brendan Mcdermid/ReutersOne central issue in the race is how to bring back Broadway and the city’s struggling cultural institutions.Ms. Garcia, the former sanitation commissioner, released her plan last week called “Reopen to Stay Open,” which calls for removing red tape for small businesses and working with streaming services to broadcast Broadway shows.Ms. Garcia said she will be the city’s cheerleader, visiting museums and Broadway shows to get New Yorkers excited about returning to them. She held a recent Broadway-themed fund-raiser with Will Roland, an actor from the musical “Dear Evan Hansen.”Ms. Wiley, a former counsel to Mayor Bill de Blasio, has talked about rebuilding the arts and proposed spending $1 billion on a recovery plan for artists and culture workers as part of her “New Deal New York” proposal.Ms. Wiley also said she wants to be a cheerleader for the city and would not run away from the job, referring to Mr. de Blasio’s penchant for spending time outside the city during a failed presidential run in 2019.“You don’t have to worry about me going to Iowa,” Ms. Wiley said at a candidate forum. “I’d much rather be on Broadway celebrating its survival.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

    • 163 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      Want to Be Mayor of New York? Better Know Your Wings and Dumplings

      by

      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }N.Y.C. Mayoral RaceWho’s Running?11 Candidates’ N.Y.C. MomentsAn Overview of the Race5 TakeawaysAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyWant to Be Mayor of New York? Better Know Your Wings and DumplingsFood can be a unifying or divisive factor in New York City politics, with people taking sides on pizza slices, deli choices and utensil selection.Andrew Yang has dined around the city, including in Chinatown earlier this month, to highlight restaurants that are struggling during the pandemic.Credit…Chang W. Lee/The New York TimesFeb. 25, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ETAmong all the things that help shape a New York City mayor’s image, it’s not always the most consequential topics that tend to stick — especially on matters that concern food.Just ask Mayor Bill de Blasio.On second thought, maybe don’t ask him: Mr. de Blasio is still remembered for making the mistake of eating a slice at Goodfella’s, a popular pizzeria on Staten Island, with a knife and fork. It was his second week in office.Food can be a strangely unifying or divisive factor in New York City politics, with people taking sides on pizza slices, deli choices and, of course, bagels.That remains true even now, with New York City in crisis, and the mayor’s race perhaps the most important in a generation. Yet with the pandemic forcing much of the campaign inside and online, discussing food — and consuming it at sporadic in-person campaign events — has been a pleasant diversion.Andrew Yang, the former presidential hopeful, keeps a photo diary of his campaign snacks on Twitter: gourmet pickles on the Lower East Side of Manhattan; pizza at Gino’s restaurant in Bay Ridge in Brooklyn; Dominican food in Hunts Point in the Bronx.When Mr. Yang stopped recently for soup dumplings and scallion pancakes in Chinatown, he said that he wanted to highlight restaurants that are struggling during the pandemic.“As much as I enjoyed running for president, the culinary options of New York City are very different than those in Iowa and New Hampshire,” he said. “It’s been delightful for me to think of a type of a food that I want, and it’s available.”Mr. Yang is not the only candidate dining al fresco.After Mr. Yang posted a photo of his lunch with Donovan Richards, the Queens borough president, at Szechuan Mountain House in January, Maya Wiley soon followed with news of having had “slammin’ chicken wings” with Mr. Richards at Queens Bully, a gastro pub.Even before she entered the race, Ms. Wiley, a former MSNBC analyst and ex-counsel to Mr. de Blasio, posted a photo last summer of her Caribbean meal at Code Red in the Bronx with Carl Heastie, the State Assembly speaker — a coveted ally who has not made an endorsement yet.Eating on the campaign trail can be trickier for Eric Adams, the Brooklyn borough president, who is a vegan evangelist and often brings his own food. He grabbed a green goddess smoothie and a quinoa tofu bowl one recent morning before visiting Yankee Stadium in the Bronx to hand out masks.“This will be in the car so I can have healthy options, and I don’t have to nibble on something unhealthy,” he said.Eric Adams, the Brooklyn borough president, is a vegan who published a book last year called “Healthy at Last,” about his plant-based diet.Credit…Chang W. Lee/The New York TimesFor Mr. Adams, his personal transformation from an overweight police officer in the 1990s to a lean vegan who loves yoga and meditation is a key part of his campaign narrative. Mr. Adams published a book last year called “Healthy at Last” about his plant-based diet, with recipes for tempeh stir-fry and jackfruit and okra gumbo.Mr. Adams is serious about his diet after dropping 30 pounds and reversing his diabetes. He has a mental map of the best vegan spots around the city, name-dropping Screamer’s Pizzeria in Williamsburg in Brooklyn, and boasts of his homemade creations like pizza with a cauliflower crust.When Michael R. Bloomberg was mayor, he famously cracked down on trans fats, sugary drinks and salt to try to force New Yorkers to get healthy. But his personal diet was filled with indulgences: He sprinkled salt on bagels and pizza, and enjoyed burned bacon and peanut butter sandwiches, Cheez-Its and Big Macs.Mr. Adams also wants to make public health a focus of his administration if elected, but would undoubtedly be a better model in his personal habits than Mr. Bloomberg.In his book, Mr. Adams describes waking up with vision problems in March 2016 and learning he had diabetes. After years of eating fast food like McDonald’s and KFC, Mr. Adams decided to change his lifestyle, along with his partner, Tracey Collins, a former school principal.The book has plenty of practical advice: “Don’t Brag (When You Start Looking Oh So Good)” and discusses health disparities in the Black community.Now when Mr. Adams eats with community leaders, he first scans the menu for appetizers and side dishes and orders something simple like broccoli or hummus. If he is offered something homemade, he tries to be polite.“I’m a master at moving food around on the plate,” he said with a laugh.Mr. Adams isn’t even the only candidate with a cookbook: Scott M. Stringer, the city comptroller, published one on healthy eating in East Harlem in 2008. But Mr. Stringer is no expert home chef. His contribution to the book was a list of ten tips for ordering takeout, including, “That’s dressing on the side, please.”Mr. Stringer said he learned some kitchen basics after marrying his wife, Elyse Buxbaum, in 2010.“Pre-Elyse, I was a connoisseur of West Side takeout,” he said. “Now I’m proud to say that I’m getting better at cooking. I can make pasta and throw tomato sauce on it.”Asked about his best meal on the campaign trail, Mr. Stringer sounded crestfallen that he remains mostly stuck inside his bedroom closet on video chats.“Takeout sushi in the midst of Zooming,” he said.The silver lining, perhaps, is avoiding the pitfalls awaiting candidates when they make public food choices.For instance, a recent stop for a dan tat, a Chinese egg tart, got Mr. Yang into trouble with his wife, Evelyn.“It was warm and delicious,” he said. “The only problem was that I didn’t bring one home for Evelyn. She saw it on my Twitter feed.”As for Mr. de Blasio, wisdom has not necessarily come with experience. Six years after the pizza fiasco, the mayor suggested that his favorite New York City bagel came toasted — prompting many bagel aficionados to recoil in horror. To make matters worse, Mr. de Blasio’s bagel purveyor of choice did not even have a toaster.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More