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      Will A.O.C. Endorse? How She Could Shake Up the Mayor's Race

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }N.Y.C. Mayoral RaceWho’s Running?11 Candidates’ N.Y.C. MomentsA Look at the Race5 Takeaways From the DebateAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyWhat a Rebuke from Ocasio-Cortez Taught Andrew Yang About the Mayor’s RaceThe exchange was a vivid illustration of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s influence on New York’s political landscape. Whether she’ll use her platform to help shape the race for mayor is an open question.Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s endorsement is coveted by Democratic candidates in the New York City mayoral race.Credit…Anna Moneymaker for The New York TimesFeb. 11, 2021Updated 2:51 p.m. ETRepresentative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is one of the most powerful progressive leaders in the country, a politician most liberal Democrats want on their side — in person and on Twitter.But short of that, no Democratic candidate running for mayor of New York City wants to alienate her. Last week, Andrew Yang learned that the hard way.After the mayoral candidate laid out his plan to support a “Green New Deal for public housing,” he drew a near-instant rebuke from Ms. Ocasio-Cortez over the details.“I wrote the original Green New Deal for Public Housing,” she wrote on Twitter last Friday. “This isn’t that plan.”Mr. Yang quickly reached out to the congresswoman, speaking to her that same day, according to allies who heard about the conversation.The interaction was a vivid illustration of Ms. Ocasio-Cortez’s extraordinary influence on New York’s political landscape as another election unfolds.With less than five months before the Democratic primary election, the questions of how and whether Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, 31, will use her platform to shape the New York City mayor’s race are sources of great speculation — and angst — in pockets of her hometown.An endorsement from Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, who represents parts of the Bronx and Queens, could affirm the recipient as the liberal standard-bearer in the contest or elevate a lesser-known contender and signal a new measure of viability around their campaign.Certainly, endorsements alone rarely determine the outcome of campaigns, and Ms. Ocasio-Cortez’s are no different. Indeed, her endorsees have a mixed record of success both in New York and nationally. But because she commands attention and resonates with the city’s left wing in ways that no mayoral candidate can claim on their own, her blessing would almost certainly have outsize impact on the muddled field.“If you’re looking to sew up the left, I’m sure you’re looking for A.O.C.’s endorsement,” said Donovan Richards, the Queens borough president.With registered Democrats far outnumbering registered Republicans, the June 22 Democratic primary is likely to determine the city’s next mayor. Despite that compressed time frame, a number of strategists and other top potential endorsers appear to be holding their fire at least until there is more clarity around which candidates have staying power. Ms. Ocasio-Cortez could make a similar calculation.“My observation is, it seems that she would make an endorsement when a candidate really lines up with her values and she feels like she could make a big difference,” said Susan Kang, a political science professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice who is a steering committee member of the New York City Democratic Socialists. “The mayoral race is a little bit of a black box.”Interviews with more than a dozen elected officials, party leaders, activists and strategists across the city suggest that there is little expectation that Ms. Ocasio-Cortez will endorse in the mayor’s race anytime soon — if she does so at all.Ms. Ocasio-Cortez has been intensely focused on a range of federal priorities, from pressing for additional Covid relief to confronting the aftermath of the pro-Trump insurrection at the Capitol. But she suggested on Tuesday that the mayoral race, as well as other New York City contests including City Council races, was “absolutely of really important interest.”“It’s definitely something that I’m paying close attention to,” she said Tuesday night, after holding a virtual town hall meeting. “And of course, we want to make sure that we are also being very receptive to our community in this process.”Ms. Ocasio-Cortez was elected in 2018 after defeating Joseph Crowley, then the No. 4 House Democrat, in a shock primary upset. Since then, she has endorsed, sometimes late, in a number of high-profile New York races — though she does not jump into every contest.When she has weighed in, her choices have often been closely aligned with those of institutional allies like the Working Families Party and the Democratic Socialists of America, and neither group has endorsed in the mayor’s race.“I don’t see her getting involved,” said State Senator Jabari Brisport of Brooklyn, saying that he appreciated her work in Congress. “I haven’t heard anything from her being interested in doing that.”Mr. Brisport, who like Ms. Ocasio-Cortez has been embraced by the D.S.A., said he was primarily focused on City Council races at this point, which is also where a number of prominent liberal leaders and groups have put their emphasis.The speculation around Ms. Ocasio-Cortez’s intentions generally falls into three buckets: She could stay out of the race entirely, endorse Scott M. Stringer, the city comptroller, or support a woman of color.Other scenarios could also materialize.There is the possibility that Ms. Ocasio-Cortez won’t endorse at all, but will weigh in on the race periodically as a way to elevate her key policy priorities. Some of her allies, for instance, hope that she uses the race to draw attention to her own proposal for a Green New Deal for Public Housing, the measure she raised on Twitter with Mr. Yang.Andrew Yang quickly reached out to Ms. Ocasio-Cortez after the congresswoman chided him over his “Green New Deal” for public housing.Credit…James Estrin/The New York TimesAsked whether she planned to endorse in the mayoral race and how she intended to use her influence, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez said that she did not have “any concrete answers” at the moment, but emphasized her broader priorities around making the city more equitable.“Addressing inequality — and not just economic inequality — health inequality, criminal justice inequality, and so, you know, these are issues that are a major priority for me and for our community,” she said.Mr. Stringer, for his part, has pulled in endorsements from a number of prominent progressive lawmakers, several of whom are seen as aligned closely with Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. But he is also a white man who has worked in politics for decades, at a moment when some left-leaning voters would prefer to elevate a person of color.Maya Wiley, a former top counsel to Mayor Bill de Blasio, and Dianne Morales, a former nonprofit executive, are both progressive women of color who are active on the virtual campaign trail. But whether they can demonstrate real traction in the race remains unknown. Ms. Wiley, who in a recent poll came in at 8 percent, has qualified for matching funds from the city; Ms. Morales, who in that poll was at 2 percent, has said that she expects to hit the key fund-raising threshold for the next filing period.Carlos Menchaca, a Brooklyn city councilman, is deeply progressive, but has struggled to get off the ground.Then there is Mr. Yang, who has fashioned himself as the anti-poverty candidate. That message could appeal to progressives, but he also faces skepticism from the left over issues including policing and education. Ms. Wiley has sharply questioned Mr. Yang around reporting concerning a challenging culture for women working on his presidential campaign, and Ms. Ocasio-Cortez has been a vocal critic of sexism in the workplace.Assemblyman Ron T. Kim, who was endorsed by Ms. Ocasio-Cortez last year and is now a prominent supporter of Mr. Yang’s mayoral bid, said that he was encouraged when he heard that Mr. Yang had engaged directly with Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. He said he was hopeful that the congresswoman and Mr. Yang could connect on policy matters including the environment and housing and other anti-poverty measures.“If there is an alignment, I think it would be such a powerful combination of electeds,” said Mr. Kim, asked about the prospect of an Ocasio-Cortez endorsement for Mr. Yang.Representatives for Mr. Yang and Ms. Ocasio-Cortez declined to comment on their conversation.Jumaane D. Williams, the New York City public advocate and a coveted endorser himself, said that if Ms. Ocasio-Cortez decides to weigh in, “that would be an awesome indicator endorsement.” But no endorsement or potential endorsement alone, he stressed, is decisive.“The question is, do you have the infrastructure to have it translate to more on the ground, and then into votes,” he said.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Shaun Donovan's First TV Ad Campaign Features Obama

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }N.Y.C. Mayoral RaceWho’s Running?11 Candidates’ N.Y.C. MomentsA Look at the Race5 Takeaways From the DebateAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyFirst Ad Blitz in N.Y.C. Mayor’s Race Has an Unlikely Star: ObamaShaun Donovan, a former White House budget director, is rolling out his TV ad campaign and hoping his background in Washington will help him emerge from a crowded pack of candidates.Shaun Donovan, center, with then-President Barack Obama in 2014. Mr. Donovan also worked for former Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, running New York City’s housing department.Credit…Stephen Crowley/The New York TimesFeb. 8, 2021Updated 6:53 p.m. ETWith the pandemic transforming New York City’s mayoral race into a mostly virtual affair, the best way to connect directly with voters would seem to be through television ads. Yet so far, the airwaves have been silent.That will change on Tuesday, when Shaun Donovan, the former Obama and Bloomberg administration official, kicks off the first television ad campaign of any significance in the contest.By being first out of the gate, Mr. Donovan is trying to gain attention and seize a narrative advantage, an opportunity that will diminish over time as his better-funded rivals, with presumably bigger advertising budgets, join the television fray. Still, this is the race’s first television advertising purchase, according to AdImpact, an advertising analytics firm.As of Monday afternoon, the campaign had reserved $75,000 worth of cable advertising space for the week of Feb. 9, according to AdImpact. The ads will run on CNN, MSNBC and NY1.The airing of the first ad will cost six figures, according to the campaign, which hopes to spend more than $1 million on television advertising by the June 22 primary. The ad’s timing, more than four months before that primary, is not coincidental.“It doesn’t quite smack of desperation yet, but it’s clearly motivated by the fact that he’s in real danger of being marginalized as a second-tier candidate quickly,” said Neal Kwatra, a Democratic political consultant who is unaffiliated with any of the candidates. “And that matters a lot in a race that is so compressed and is such a sprint.”The race is certainly far different from the campaigns New York City is accustomed to. Meeting voters face-to-face is a risky endeavor; candidates now must jockey for attention in a seemingly endless series of livestreamed forums and fund-raisers. At least three of the race’s more than 30 candidates have already been sidelined by quarantine. One of those three candidates is recovering from the coronavirus.Still, for Mr. Donovan, being first out of the gate on television could carry some risk.By the January filing deadline, Mr. Donovan had yet to raise enough money to quality for the city’s generous matching funds system. Should he spend down his campaign funds too early, he risks running low on cash during the pivotal weeks before the primary, when New York voters will presumably pay the closest attention to the race.Nor is this tactic without historical precedent. Six months before the scheduled 2001 mayoral primary, Alan G. Hevesi, then the city comptroller, launched the race’s first television ads to try to gain early traction. The effort failed: Mr. Hevesi did not win enough votes to qualify for the Democratic runoff between Mark Green and Fernando Ferrer, which took place against the backdrop of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.Today, New York City also faces profound crises. Mr. Donovan, a Democrat who served in the Obama administration as budget director and housing secretary, has sought to focus voter attention on his experience in Washington and his ability to wrest meaningful aid from the Biden administration.His first ad campaign hits that theme, beginning with former President Barack Obama extolling Mr. Donovan’s virtues after he nominated him as the White House budget director in 2014.“Shaun’s just one of those people where he sees a problem, and he will work to solve it,” Mr. Obama said then.The 30-second ad then progresses through images of President Biden warmly embracing Mr. Donovan, and Mr. Donovan meeting with Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.Throughout his campaign, Mr. Donovan has seemed to distance himself from former Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, for whom he ran the city’s housing department. The commercial continues in the same vein, with Mr. Bloomberg making a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo.Part of Mr. Bloomberg’s face can be seen in an image of Mr. Donovan on Marine One with Mr. Obama and Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo as they respond to the destruction wrought by Hurricane Sandy.Mr. Donovan’s ad, produced by the Win Company, will run on cable television in all five boroughs.Katie Hill, a spokeswoman for Mr. Obama, heaped praise on Mr. Donovan in a statement, even as she said the former president was unlikely to endorse in the mayoral race.“Secretary Donovan helped lead our country out of the 2008 housing crisis, and later, as the director of O.M.B., he steered top policy priorities like health care access, climate change, inequality and public health, including pandemic preparedness and response,” Ms. Hill said. “President Obama is always heartened when alumni of his administration answer the call to run for office, but he does not typically weigh in on primaries and believes that the voters of N.Y.C. should make this decision for themselves.”Mr. Donovan has yet to break through to the front of the pack in this year’s race. He has about $900,000 in cash on hand, according to the New York City Campaign Finance Board. The Brooklyn borough president, Eric Adams, has $6.7 million on hand; the city comptroller, Scott M. Stringer, has $5.8 million on hand; and the former Citi executive Raymond J. McGuire has $3.8 million at his disposal.“I represent real change,” Mr. Donovan says, speaking to the camera from in front of a row of brownstones in the Brooklyn neighborhood of Prospect Lefferts Gardens, about three miles from his Boerum Hill home. “But the change candidate usually has the least experience. I actually have the most.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      No More Playing Nice: 5 Highlights From the Mayor’s Race

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }N.Y.C. Mayoral RaceWho’s Running?11 Candidates’ N.Y.C. MomentsA Look at the Race5 Takeaways From the DebateAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyNo More Playing Nice: 5 Highlights From the Mayor’s RaceThe candidates make stronger attacks against one another, as a Republican enters the race hoping to court Hispanic voters.Maya Wiley criticized Andrew Yang over his campaign’s use of nondisclosure agreements.Credit…Jose A. Alvarado Jr. for The New York TimesEmma G. Fitzsimmons, Luis Ferré-Sadurní, Katie Glueck, Jeffery C. Mays and Feb. 8, 2021, 3:00 a.m. ETWhen New Yorkers vote in the June mayoral primaries, they will get to pick up to five candidates, in ranked order of preference.No one knows exactly how the system, known as ranked-choice voting, might affect the outcome, but plenty of voters were still confused about how it worked when it was used in a special City Council election in Queens last week.The new approach to voting was expected to make candidates refrain from attacks, but the friendly sheen among them is starting to wear off. They are more directly criticizing one another at forums, seeking to highlight their differences.And a new Republican candidate joined the fray. Here are some key developments in the race:The candidates began to take the gloves offScott M. Stringer, the city comptroller, suggested that some of his rivals should exercise better judgment while campaigning during the pandemic.Credit…Chang W. Lee/The New York TimesThe conventional wisdom around ranked-choice voting is that candidates should avoid insulting their opponents for fear of alienating those opponents’ supporters. After all, voters’ second choices could be critical.But now, less than five months before Primary Day, several of the mayoral candidates appear to be making a more straightforward calculation: The time for sharper contrasts has arrived.Maya Wiley, a former counsel to Mayor Bill de Blasio, laced into Andrew Yang over his campaign’s use of nondisclosure agreements, which he said had been discontinued, and highlighted complaints about the culture on his presidential campaign. Shaun Donovan pointedly raised Raymond J. McGuire’s Wall Street background. Mr. McGuire shot back by calling Mr. Donovan “Shaun Obama,” a dig at the former federal housing secretary’s regular mentions that he worked under President Barack Obama. Scott M. Stringer issued barely veiled rebukes of Eric Adams and Mr. Yang over their in-person campaigning during the coronavirus pandemic.And at a candidate forum on homelessness, Dianne Morales contrasted her experience with Mr. Stringer’s, calling him out by name.“Unlike Scott, I’ve actually been talking to the people that are homeless for the last 15 years,” Ms. Morales said. “I’ve been doing the work.”In the scheme of American political discourse, these were, at most, mild exchanges. But they reflect a growing recognition that there is limited time to break out of the pack — and that candidates cannot count on anyone else to negatively define their chief rivals for them.On Sunday, though, advisers to two top candidates certainly tried: Aides to Mr. Yang and Mr. Stringer broke into a sharply personal Twitter exchange tied to the issue of support from the real estate industry.The first ranked-choice election confused votersIt was the debut that wasn’t.A little-known special election in Queens became the testing ground for New York City’s ranked-choice voting system last week, the first time the new system was used ahead of the mayoral primary.How would voters welcome the ability to rank up to five candidates instead of picking just one? Would the system, which could trigger multiple rounds of vote tabulations, be a stumbling block for the traditionally dysfunctional Board of Elections?In the end, however, one candidate, the former councilman James Gennaro, seemed poised to receive more than 50 percent of the vote, making him the likely winner in the City Council’s 24th District. Were he to receive less than 50 percent, the last-place candidate would be eliminated, and that candidate’s votes would be redistributed to the second choices listed on the ballots of voters who favored the eliminated candidate. The process would be repeated until one candidate reached a majority of the vote.Still, the election served as a dry run for a new voting method that will require significant public education.Some voters said they were unfamiliar with exactly how ranked-choice worked, despite being contacted by the campaigns or receiving mailers explaining it.“It didn’t really quite sink in, and I really liked one candidate, so I just voted for him,” said Kanan Roberts, 71, who voted for Mr. Gennaro. Other voters were more aware of its intricacies and appreciative of the ability to vote for several candidates.“If you want to take a risk on a candidate that you don’t know whether they have a realistic shot of winning, but they’re your candidate of choice, they don’t have to be a spoiler anymore under ranked-choice voting,” said Peter Sullivan, 39. “You can pick them first, then pick the safer, ‘electable’ candidates second and third.”Could the city’s first Hispanic mayor be a Republican?Fernando Mateo in December, before he shaved his head last week during his mayoral launch.Credit…Michael M. Santiago/Getty ImagesA key question in the mayor’s race is which Democratic candidate will win support from the city’s sizable Hispanic community. Ruben Diaz Jr., the Bronx borough president who is of Puerto Rican heritage, was viewed as a top contender before he dropped out of the race last year.But what if that candidate turned out to be a Republican?Fernando Mateo, who was born in the Dominican Republic, announced his mayoral campaign in an unusual video on Facebook last week where he shaved his head — a nod to new beginnings as New Yorkers look forward to the end of the pandemic.“I wanted to show my beauty,” he said in an interview. “I’m the cutest candidate in the race.”Mr. Mateo runs a restaurant, Zona de Cuba, in the Bronx and has led trade groups for livery drivers and bodega owners. He has been involved in politics for years but was also linked to a scandal over Mayor Bill de Blasio’s fund-raising.His campaign website boasts that he was once named “One of the Five Most Influential People in the Country” by The New York Times. That article, in 1994, reflected the results of a survey of senior executives shortly after Mr. Mateo had created a program to trade guns for toys.Mr. Mateo said he wants to to revisit bail reform, keep the jail on Rikers Island open and “re-fund the police” — instead of defunding the department. He distanced himself from former President Donald J. Trump and said he was embarrassed by the riot at the U.S. Capitol.“That’s not what the Republican Party is all about — that’s not what we’re about,” he said. “I’m an urban Republican. I believe in cities and immigration. I don’t believe in hatred.”There has been some debate over whether the city has already had a Hispanic mayor. John Purroy Mitchel, who was mayor from 1914 to 1917, was descended from Spanish nobility.A homeless expert on homelessness grills the candidatesShams DaBaron won praise for his aggressive questioning as a moderator at a mayoral forum on homelessness.Credit…Amr Alfiky/The New York TimesTen mayoral candidates took part in a Zoom forum on homelessness Thursday night, but the standout speaker was one of the moderators: a homeless man who goes by the name Shams DaBaron.Mr. DaBaron, 51, who emerged last fall as the self-appointed spokesman for homeless men battling to remain in the Lucerne Hotel on the Upper West Side over objections from neighbors, demonstrated a grasp of the issues that comes from having lived them.When the candidates were asked if they would disband the police unit that tries to move homeless people from street to shelter, one of them, Loree Sutton, said she would not, and that she would “team up police with peer-to-peer counselors.”Mr. DaBaron explained to her how “outreach” is practiced by the police. “Where they were telling me they were going to help me, and I submitted to the help, I ended up in handcuffs,” he said. “They brought me to a police station, made me take off my sneakers and threw me into a cell and then threatened to give me a ticket unless I entered the shelter system.”In response to a question about plans for the unsheltered people the city has placed in hotels during the pandemic, Shaun Donovan, a longtime government official, offered a mini-filibuster touting his college volunteering, his work with veterans under Mr. Obama and the importance of “reimagining the right to shelter as a right to housing.”Mr. DaBaron asked his co-moderator, Corinne Low of UWS Open Hearts, an organization that supports shelters on the Upper West Side, to pose the question to Mr. Donovan again, suggesting that the candidate had not really answered it.Mr. DaBaron, who tweets as Da Homeless Hero, garnered some raves on Twitter.One person praised him for “not letting any candidate talk about anything other than the content of the questions”; another suggested he might consider running for office.“@homeless_hero for mayor!” the user @SoBendito wrote.Maya Wiley chose Gracie Mansion over her own TV showTwo candidates had to abandon high-profile jobs as television pundits to run for mayor: Ms. Wiley, a legal analyst at MSNBC, and, Mr. Yang, a commentator at CNN.But for Ms. Wiley, the sacrifice might have been more substantial. Speaking to more than 170 women on a “Black Women for Maya” virtual event on Wednesday, Ms. Wiley said she had an opportunity to audition to replace Joy Reid’s weekend talk show “AM Joy” as Ms. Reid was being promoted to host her own prime-time show.Ms. Wiley, a civil rights lawyer, said that she “loved MSNBC” because “it felt like a family” and that she was proud of being a Black woman who was being paid to deliver legal analysis.After Ms. Reid “broke a Black glass ceiling” and received her own prime time show, “MSNBC knew one thing; They’d better put somebody Black in that seat, they knew it,” Ms. Wiley told the audience.She said that she decided not to take the network’s offer of an audition, because “as much joy and as big a paycheck as that MSNBC slot would have been, I knew we had so many treasures that could fill that seat.” She ultimately decided that “in this moment, to me, the greatest gift and privilege would be making people’s lives better.”Mr. Yang said he made a similar deliberation when deciding to leave his position at CNN.“I was very appreciative of my time at CNN. I made a lot of friends,” Mr. Yang said. “But I’m someone who is looking to help people at scale, and New York City is in a lot of pain right now. I’m more of a doer than an analyst.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      They Supported ‘Defund the Police.’ Then the Mayoral Campaign Began.

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }N.Y.C. Mayoral RaceA Look at the Race5 Takeaways From the DebateAndrew Yang’s CandidacyWho’s Running?AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyThey Supported ‘Defund the Police.’ Then the Mayoral Campaign Began.Most of the leading mayoral candidates have been wary of embracing the “defund the police” movement, which has lost some mainstream political momentum.Many in the Democratic field for mayor have backed away from the defund movement, reframing the issue as a broader need for changes to city policing.Credit…Byron Smith for The New York TimesJeffery C. Mays and Feb. 3, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ETNearly eight months ago, Scott M. Stringer stood in Brooklyn before an angry, unsettled gathering to memorialize the death of George Floyd. The best way to honor him, Mr. Stringer said, was to send a clear message to City Hall: “It’s time to defund the N.Y.P.D. now.”But with the New York City mayoral primary looming in June, Mr. Stringer has distanced himself from the defund movement.At a recent mayoral forum, Mr. Stringer was asked if he supported defunding the police, and whether he would commit to slashing the Police Department’s $6 billion budget in half. He responded with a less drastic proposal to cut $1 billion, spread over four years, and said he did not want the city to return to a period of high crime like in the 1970s.“I do remember when the A train was a rolling crime scene, and I don’t want my children or any child to go back to that time and place,” he said. “But I also know that overpolicing in communities of color has got to stop.”His remarks immediately drew fire.“This is not what a progressive would say,” said Lauren Ashcraft, a Democratic Socialist and former congressional candidate in Queens. Other progressives questioned whether several leading Democratic candidates had the courage and commitment to win their support.The escalating tensions over the issue highlight the challenges that Democratic candidates face as they try to cultivate the city’s growing progressive flank without embracing stances that may scare off moderate New Yorkers — especially at a time when shootings and murders have sharply risen.The issue cuts across racial and class lines: Two Black moderate Democratic candidates, Eric Adams and Raymond J. McGuire, have voiced concerns — echoed among other Black lawmakers in the city — that defunding the police would worsen crime in neighborhoods that suffer the most from violence.Maya Wiley, a former top counsel for Mr. de Blasio who gained a national following as an analyst for MSNBC, was often critical of the mayor’s handling of policing. Now she appears to be recalibrating her message to avoid using the defund slogan.“The word means different things to different people,” Ms. Wiley said. “We should focus on the clarity of the demands.”Others in the wide-open Democratic field for mayor have sought to distance themselves from the defund movement and instead speak more of the need to bring meaningful change to the Police Department.The debate over the defund movement has roiled the Democratic Party over concerns that the slogan scared away moderate voters during the election in November. Some Democratic leaders blamed candidates’ embrace of the movement for the party’s losses in the House.President Barack Obama discouraged candidates from using the slogan — arguing you have “lost a big audience the minute you say it” — while leaders on the progressive left like Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez defended it and blamed moderates for running weak campaigns.Even in Minneapolis, where Mr. Floyd was killed by the police, efforts to essentially dismantle the city’s police department collapsed. A far less ambitious move — cutting the police budget by 4.5 percent — was approved in December, disappointing defund supporters.In a survey of the nine leading Democratic mayoral hopefuls, only two said they supported the defund movement: Dianne Morales, a former nonprofit executive, and Carlos Menchaca, a councilman from Brooklyn.Some defund activists are expected to raise their demands and ask that the city cut as much as half of the police budget this summer.Credit…Todd Heisler/The New York TimesThe race for mayor this year may be the city’s most consequential in a generation, with New York facing a resurgence of the coronavirus that may prolong and worsen the city’s economic crisis. The pandemic’s effect on the city has overshadowed other issues on the campaign trail, including defunding the police.Many of the campaigns have commissioned polls to measure which issues voters want the next mayor to prioritize, and they have consulted with policing experts about how to tackle reforms. Keeping New Yorkers safe from the pandemic was the top concern in one poll; defunding the police was not among the Top 10 issues, with voters caring more about keeping crime down.“A lot of people, including in communities impacted by policing, bristle at the term,” Barry Friedman, a professor and director of the Policing Project at New York University School of Law, said of the defund slogan. “There are people who are frustrated at how police respond to situations, but don’t think they’re going to be safer without the police.”Still, many left-leaning leaders in New York are committed to trying to keep defund efforts alive. Two advocacy groups and one union — Make the Road Action, Community Voices Heard Power and 1199 Service Employees International Union — plan to unveil an independent expenditure committee to make the defund movement one of the top issues in the mayor’s race.The New York City Democratic Socialists of America, which helped Ms. Ocasio-Cortez win her primary in 2018, intends to make a concerted push to make defunding the police a key issue, according to the group’s co-chairwoman, Sumathy Kumar.Tiffany Cabán, a progressive-backed City Council candidate who nearly scored an upset win in the 2019 Democratic primary for Queens district attorney, wrote a 40-page public safety platform that is expected to be the philosophical basis that defund supporters running for mayor or City Council organize around.Protesters set up camp outside City Hall last year, hoping to pressure the City Council to cut at least $1 billion from the police budget.Credit…Amr Alfiky/The New York TimesMs. Cabán has spoken with Ms. Morales, Ms. Wiley and Mr. Stringer about what proponents of defunding the police want. She said she often had to tell candidates that their positions did not go far enough and believes that will change.“There will be a domino effect,” she said. “One of the big, more forward-facing mayoral candidates is going to release their comprehensive police plan, and everyone else is going to have an answer to it.”Mr. Stringer, who has won endorsement from several progressive leaders who support the defund movement, said that he was “the first elected official to put forth a detailed proposal to reduce the N.Y.P.D.’s budget by $1 billion,” and that his “position on these issues has not changed.”But when asked directly whether he supports defunding the police, Mr. Stringer gave a more indirect answer, saying that he wanted to “make concrete change when it comes to systemic racism and our criminal justice system.” Mr. Stringer will soon release a report that explains his policy ideas to transform policing that he says is more ambitious than his proposal in June. The report, a copy of which was reviewed by The New York Times, does not mention the word “defund” or cite a dollar figure for budget cuts, but it outlines how he would move certain responsibilities away from the Police Department and identifies specific areas for reinvestment in communities.Most of the other major candidates seemed even less likely to make major cuts to the police budget.Mr. McGuire, who served on the New York City Police Foundation, has called for “better policing with greater accountability, not fewer police officers,” even as he has said that as a Black man he could “easily be the next George Floyd” — a contrast that he does not view as a contradiction.Mr. Adams, a former police officer, said that he does not “support taking resources away from crime fighting — especially in communities of color where shootings and other predatory crimes are on the rise.”Ms. Wiley said at a recent mayoral forum that the Police Department budget was “bloated,” but declined to say how much she would seek to cut police spending.“I don’t have a number for you, but that’s because it has been such a black box,” Ms. Wiley said. “There really is so little transparency about what and how the budget is spent.”Kathryn Garcia, the city’s former sanitation commissioner, has called for “police reform through strict accountability and structural change,” including raising the minimum age of recruits to 25 and holding “police officers accountable for depraved acts with a zero-tolerance policy.”Shaun Donovan, the former federal housing secretary and budget director, called for a reduction in “overpolicing” and reinvestment in “wraparound social services.”Andrew Yang, a former presidential candidate, said the Police Department needs resources to address rising crime, but he supported shifting some of its funding to other city agencies that could better handle certain issues.“Not every problem requires an armed police officer,” Mr. Yang said.Last year was New York City’s bloodiest in nearly a decade with more than 460 homicides; the number of shooting victims doubled to more than 1,500. Mr. de Blasio and police leaders have blamed the economic losses and upheaval of the pandemic.Murders surged in Black and Latino neighborhoods including East Harlem, East New York in Brooklyn, Rockaway Peninsula in Queens, and areas near Yankee Stadium in the Bronx. In the 73rd Precinct in Brooklyn, which includes Brownsville and where about 70 percent of residents are Black, there were 25 murders last year, compared with 11 in 2019.The June 22 Democratic primary will take place just days before the City Council’s deadline to approve the budget for the next fiscal year, all but assuring that the push to defund will be in the public and political discourse.Last June, the defund effort led the city to pass a budget that called for the Police Department to suffer “$1 billion in cuts and cost shifts,” according to the mayor. But an analysis by the Independent Budget Office concluded that a smaller portion of the police budget was actually cut, and some of the losses were spread out over a number of years.Mr. Menchaca voted against that budget because it failed to cut $1 billion from the Police Department; he said he plans to raise the issue during upcoming Council budget negotiations.The defund movement, he said, “is going to be on the ballot.”Ms. Morales said she reached out to the Brooklyn Movement Center last summer to get a sense of what defund advocates expected from the next mayor. She now wants to cut $3 billion from the police budget — a position that has won her support among defund advocates.“We need to take that money and invest it in meeting people’s needs,” she said at a recent mayoral forum.Anthonine Pierre, deputy director of the Brooklyn Movement Center and a member of Communities United for Police Reform, one of the architects of the city’s defund movement, said that she was not surprised that more mainstream candidates have not reached out to her group because they think of “defund the police” as a communications strategy.“Scott Stringer has had over a two-decade career in New York City politics, and never has police accountability been a banner issue for him,” said Ms. Pierre, who worked for Mr. Stringer in 2008 when he was the Manhattan borough president.“There is really a lack of courage from these candidates,” she said, adding that she would welcome discussions with the mayoral field — or a direct message on Twitter.“My DMs are open,” she said.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Andrew Yang Says He Has Tested Positive for the Coronavirus

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }N.Y.C. Mayoral RaceA Look at the Race5 Takeaways From the DebateAndrew Yang’s CandidacyWho’s Running?AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyAndrew Yang Says He Has Tested Positive for the CoronavirusMr. Yang, a New York mayoral candidate who had suspended in-person events after a campaign staff member had tested positive, said he was experiencing mild symptoms.“After testing negative as recently as this weekend, today I took a Covid rapid test and received a positive result,” Andrew Yang said in a statement on Tuesday.Credit…Michael M. Santiago/Getty ImagesFeb. 2, 2021Updated 8:14 p.m. ETAndrew Yang, a leading New York mayoral candidate who has pursued extensive in-person campaigning amid the pandemic, announced on Tuesday that he had tested positive for the coronavirus.“After testing negative as recently as this weekend, today I took a Covid rapid test and received a positive result,” Mr. Yang said in a statement. “I am experiencing mild symptoms, but am otherwise feeling well and in good spirits. I will quarantine in accordance with public health guidelines and follow the advice of my doctor.”Perhaps more than any other candidate in this year’s race, Mr. Yang has sought to forge an in-person campaign trail, holding multiple events outdoors since declaring his candidacy last month.His approach has generated enthusiasm on the ground and attention in the news media, but even before Mr. Yang tested positive, the risks were clear: A staff member tested positive less than a week after he announced for mayor, forcing the candidate to quarantine.But Mr. Yang had since returned to a robust in-person schedule. He said his campaign had begun the contact-tracing process.“During this time, I will continue to attend as many virtual events as possible, in addition to working with our incredible campaign team to continue our mission of getting New York City back on its feet,” Mr. Yang, 46, said in the statement. “When the time is right, I look forward to once again hitting the campaign trail and advancing a positive vision for our city’s future.”In addition to the health considerations, the developments offer a vivid illustration of the campaigning challenges facing the mayoral candidates as they scramble to stand out before June’s Democratic primary. Many worry about their ability to connect over livestreams and wonder about how many voters they are truly reaching with virtual events. But the health risks — to the candidates, their staffs and their supporters — remain real.Scott M. Stringer, the city comptroller whose mother died of complications from Covid-19, and Maya Wiley, a former counsel to Mayor Bill de Blasio, have both had to quarantine recently, though they have generally been far more cautious about in-person campaigning.Pursuing a vigorous in-person schedule also may carry some political risk, especially in a Democratic primary.Throughout the presidential campaign, the Democrats drew sharp contrasts with their Republican rivals over the matter of taking the virus seriously. President Biden’s staff members argued that by pursuing a lighter in-person campaign schedule, they were respecting scientific and medical recommendations and offering a glimpse of how Mr. Biden would lead the country through the pandemic — contrasting with President Donald J. Trump’s large in-person rallies.None of the Democratic mayoral hopefuls are holding large rallies, though Eric Adams, the Brooklyn borough president, has faced criticism for fund-raising indoors. But they do face the challenge of breaking out of a crowded field while also signaling that they take seriously a pandemic that has devastated the city.In an interview, Mr. Stringer wished Mr. Yang a quick recovery, but he also cast the development as a “wake-up call” to the mayoral field — a sign that some of the candidates are increasingly willing to draw mild contrasts with one another, and in particular with Mr. Yang.“This is a dangerous business now, as long as this virus is raging, and we do have a special obligation to keep our people safe,” Mr. Stringer said.“Nobody wants to see, you know, a colleague get sick,” he added. “But you don’t want to be the one to expose people. So, you know, whether it’s indoor fund-raising or up-close campaigning, we have to write new rules to keep people safe while we inoculate as many people as possible.”A spokesman for Mr. Adams declined to comment on the reference to indoor fund-raising. In a statement, Mr. Yang’s co-campaign manager, Sasha Ahuja, said that the team’s strategy is informed by public health guidance.“We hope every other campaign does the same and does as much or as little as they are comfortable with,” the statement said.On Twitter, Mr. Yang used the moment to suggest a balm to speed his recovery.“In all seriousness if you want me to feel better donate to my campaign!” he wrote. “Then I can relax.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Tim Ryan Is Said to Plan Senate Bid

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyTim Ryan, a Top Democrat in Ohio, Is Said to Plan Senate BidMr. Ryan, who mounted a long-shot campaign for president in 2019, plans to compete for the state’s open Senate seat. His campaign will test Democrats’ strength in a state tilting to the right.Representative Tim Ryan of Ohio has argued that Democrats will build enduring majorities only if they reclaim support from a multiracial, working-class coalition of voters.Credit…Rachel Mummey for The New York TimesFeb. 1, 2021, 5:34 p.m. ETRepresentative Tim Ryan of Ohio plans to run for his state’s open Senate seat, Democrats who have spoken with him said, a bid that would test whether even a Democrat with roots in the blue-collar Youngstown region and close ties to organized labor can win in the increasingly Republican state.Mr. Ryan, an 18-year House veteran, has reached out to a host of Ohio and national Democrats in recent days about the seat now held by Senator Rob Portman, a Republican who stunned officials in both parties by announcing last week that he would retire.Former Gov. Ted Strickland of Ohio, a Democrat who has been encouraging Mr. Ryan to run, said of the congressman, “I think he is the person with the best chance, given this political climate we’re in and given the way Ohio has been performing.”“He has the ability to appeal to a lot of independents, and Democrats will be very excited about this candidacy,” Mr. Strickland said.Mr. Ryan has also discussed his candidacy with Representative Marcy Kaptur, the longest-serving member in Ohio’s congressional delegation, and national labor leaders, including Lee Saunders of Afscme, while also receiving a nudge from Hillary Clinton.Asked about these conversations, Mr. Ryan said on Monday that he was “encouraged by their support, enthusiasm and commitment,” adding, “The U.S. Senate needs another working-class voice, and I’m very serious about the opportunity to continue representing the people of Ohio.”He is expected to declare his candidacy by the beginning of March, according to Democrats briefed on his planning.Long one of the country’s quintessential political battlegrounds, Ohio has turned sharply right since former President Donald J. Trump’s ascent. Mr. Trump carried the state by eight percentage points in 2016 and won it again by the same margin last year, even as Joseph R. Biden Jr. emphasized his working-class appeal and made a late push in the state.Senator Sherrod Brown is the only Democrat remaining in statewide office in Ohio. And even with his fiercely populist approach, Mr. Brown has lost ground among once-reliable Democrats in eastern Ohio, including those in the industrial area south of Lake Erie and in the more rural enclaves that trace the Ohio River.Mr. Ryan hails from Niles, Ohio, just north of Youngstown, a region filled with voters who are effectively Trump Democrats, many of them union members or retirees. He outperformed Mr. Biden in his district, but Democrats there suffered a series of losses in other down-ballot races.The question, should Mr. Ryan become his party’s nominee, is if he can win back these mostly white voters.Mr. Ryan has long considered running statewide, but in the past decided on seeking re-election to the House seat he first won in 2002, when he succeeded the famously fiery, and corrupt, James Traficant.Mr. Ryan mounted a long-shot bid for the presidency in 2019 with the same message he’s expected to carry into the Senate contest — that Democrats will build enduring majorities only if they reclaim support from a multiracial, working-class coalition of voters.Beyond elevating that argument, Mr. Ryan, 47, has another compelling reason to run for the Senate: As Republicans grow stronger in eastern Ohio, his district has become increasingly competitive, and the Republican Party could redraw the state’s districts to make it even more forbidding for him in 2022.While he has risen on the Appropriations Committee, Mr. Ryan has mostly given up on his hopes to join the House leadership, having been turned back in his 2016 challenge against Nancy Pelosi, then the minority leader.In Congress, Mr. Ryan has been a close ally of unions and has generally toed the Democratic line, shifting toward a stance in support of abortion rights in recent years. Even before formally announcing his bid, Mr. Ryan drew support from the state chapter of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, which on Monday released a letter endorsing his undeclared candidacy.Mr. Ryan will enter the Senate race as an early front-runner. He is one of the few Democrats left in the state’s congressional delegation, and represents a region of the state the party is desperate to reclaim. He also has deep relationships with national leaders.On Saturday, Mrs. Clinton publicly encouraged Mr. Ryan to run for the Senate, repaying him for his support for her when she ran against Barack Obama in the 2008 presidential primary race.“You’re right, Kathy!” Mrs. Clinton wrote on Twitter, promoting a message from a Democratic activist in Ohio, Kathy DiCristofaro, who wrote that “Ohio needs leaders like @timryan to fight for working people.”Mr. Ryan also has an ally in the White House, having endorsed Mr. Biden in November 2019, a low ebb in the race for the candidate.It’s unlikely, though, that the congressman will run unopposed for the Senate nomination. One Democrat whose name has been floated for the seat, Mayor Nan Whaley of Dayton, said she was “thinking about it” when asked on the day Mr. Portman announced his retirement. Ms. Whaley is also considering a run for governor, though, and many Ohio Democrats believe she and Mr. Ryan would try to avoid clashing in a primary.Equally intriguing to some Democrats in the state is Dr. Amy Acton, who as the former director of Ohio’s Department of Health ran the coronavirus response effort last year for Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican. She is considering joining the race, The Plain Dealer of Cleveland reported last week, and received her own online boost when Connie Schultz, a longtime Ohio columnist and the wife of Mr. Brown, wrote on Twitter: “Imagine Dr. Amy Acton as Ohio’s next U.S. senator. I sure can.”The Republicans are likely to have an even more crowded primary field. The race appears to be wide open after the announcement last week by Representative Jim Jordan, the far-right Trump ally whom the former president awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, that he would remain in the House.A number of other House members may run, including Representative Steve Stivers, a Columbus-area lawmaker. A host of would-be self-funders are also eyeing the seat, including Jane Timken, the chair of the Ohio Republican Party.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      The First Post-Reagan Presidency

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      Credit…Timo LenzenSkip to contentSkip to site indexOpinionThe First Post-Reagan PresidencySo far, Joe Biden has been surprisingly progressive.Credit…Timo LenzenSupported byContinue reading the main storyOpinion ColumnistJan. 28, 2021, 8:50 p.m. ETDuring Donald Trump’s presidency, I sometimes took comfort in the Yale political scientist Stephen Skowronek’s concept of “political time.”In Skowronek’s formulation, presidential history moves in 40- to 60-year cycles, or “regimes.” Each is inaugurated by transformative, “reconstructive” leaders who define the boundaries of political possibility for their successors.Franklin Delano Roosevelt was such a figure. For decades following his presidency, Republicans and Democrats alike accepted many of the basic assumptions of the New Deal. Ronald Reagan was another. After him, even Democrats like Bill Clinton and Barack Obama feared deficit spending, inflation and anything that smacked of “big government.”I found Skowronek’s schema reassuring because of where Trump seemed to fit into it. Skowronek thought Trump was a “late regime affiliate” — a category that includes Jimmy Carter and Herbert Hoover. Such figures, he’s written, are outsiders from the party of a dominant but decrepit regime.They use the “internal disarray and festering weakness of the establishment” to “seize the initiative.” Promising to save a faltering political order, they end up imploding and bringing the old regime down with them. No such leader, he wrote, has ever been re-elected.During Trump’s reign, Skowronek’s ideas gained some popular currency, offering a way to make sense of a presidency that seemed anomalous and bizarre. “We are still in the middle of Trump’s rendition of the type,” he wrote in an updated edition of his book “Presidential Leadership in Political Time,” “but we have seen this movie before, and it has always ended the same way.”Skowronek doesn’t present his theory as a skeleton key to history. It’s a way of understanding historical dynamics, not predicting the future. Still, if Trump represented the last gasps of Reaganism instead of the birth of something new, then after him, Skowronek suggests, a fresh regime could begin.When Joe Biden became the Democratic nominee, it seemed that the coming of a new era had been delayed. Reconstructive leaders, in Skowronek’s formulation, repudiate the doctrines of an establishment that no longer has answers for the existential challenges the country faces. Biden, Skowronek told me, is “a guy who’s made his way up through establishment Democratic politics.” Nothing about him seemed trailblazing.Yet as Biden’s administration begins, there are signs that a new politics is coalescing. When, in his inauguration speech, Biden touted “unity,” he framed it as a national rejection of the dark forces unleashed by his discredited predecessor, not stale Gang of Eight bipartisanship. He takes power at a time when what was once conventional wisdom about deficits, inflation and the proper size of government has fallen apart. That means Biden, who has been in national office since before Reagan’s presidency, has the potential to be our first truly post-Reagan president.“Biden has a huge opportunity to finally get our nation past the Reagan narrative that has still lingered,” said Representative Ro Khanna, who was a national co-chair of Bernie Sanders’s presidential campaign. “And the opportunity is to show that government, by getting the shots in every person’s arm of the vaccines, and building infrastructure, and helping working families, is going to be a force for good.” More