What the N.Y.C. Mayoral Candidates Hope to Achieve on the Debate Stage

This is The Sprint for City Hall, a limited-run series on the critical Democratic primary race for mayor.

Nine of the Democratic candidates for mayor will face off at 7 p.m. Wednesday in the race’s first debate, as a flood of campaign ads begins to hit the airwaves.

Hi, I’m Dean Chang, the editor running The New York Times’s coverage of the mayoral primary. This week’s note of jealousy involves Andrew Cuomo, who told us that he still has a Corvette from high school. My college-era Firebird barely outlived my graduation.

In this edition of the newsletter, we’ll preview what the candidates hope to accomplish at the debate, and ask Cynthia Nixon what it was like to debate Cuomo, as she did in 2018, when she ran for governor. We’ll also tell you how Ilana Glazer is ranking her ballot.

The News

Cuomo answers questions

He drove up, as he often does, in his black Dodge Charger, leaving most of his 392 Hemi V-8 engine untapped as he parked on West 41st Street. Andrew Cuomo then began, as he seldom does, a sit-down interview with The New York Times. We’re conducting similar interviews with all the leading Democratic candidates.

Our “10 Questions With” series begins today with Cuomo, and it’s an interesting read that covers a lot of ground, from his decision to resign as governor to less weighty issues, like which breakfast sandwich he likes the most and how much he pays in rent. He also says he rides the subway “fairly often.” Based on his follow-up answer, I do not think that means what he thinks it means.

We didn’t get to ask him nearly as many questions as we asked other candidates. His replies took longer, and they were peppered with brief history lessons and other asides.

One thing was clear. He believes he was wronged by the way his sexual harassment scandal played out, and regrets having resigned. More details here.

More news:

Zohran Mamdani was backed on Monday by State Senator John Liu, a former city comptroller and one of New York’s most prominent Asian American politicians. Liu said that “as a fellow immigrant,” Mamdani understood “the struggles that our communities go through.” The endorsement follows the Working Families Party’s selection of Mamdani as its top choice among its slate of five ranked-choice candidates.
In his first TV ad, Brad Lander rented out a salvage yard (whose owner has ties to the mob) to crush a sedan spray-painted with the word “corruption.” Now Lander is back with a new $2 million ad buy that has him riding Coney Island’s famed Cyclone roller coaster, while casually taking notes, making a phone call and eating a hot dog. It’s meant to portray him as the candidate best able to navigate the city through the “wild ride” of Mayor Eric Adams’s tenure. No drama or Dramamine required!
Two other ads debuted Tuesday. Cuomo used his spot to highlight his credentials. Whitney Tilson, a former hedge-fund executive trailing badly in the polls, used his to attack Mamdani, in a preview of his likely debate strategy. More on that below.

CHARTING THE RACE

We analyzed the candidates’ ad messaging

In his new ad, Lander characterizes President Trump as a threat to New York, and he is not alone. A New York Times analysis of the broadcast ads aired through Monday showed that facing off with Mr. Trump was a theme of five of them.

But the most popular subject was affordable housing, which came up in every broadcast ad reviewed in The Times’s analysis. Mamdani led the way with four such ads, with Fix the City, a pro-Cuomo super PAC, putting out three.

The volume of the ads can be seen as a demonstration of one’s commitment to an issue, but it also reveals each candidate’s reach and spending power. In Cuomo’s case, he hasn’t had to tap into his own campaign funds; Fix the City has already spent $4.3 million on ads that have aired on his behalf.

Some candidates, like Adrienne Adams, the City Council speaker, only qualified for the city’s generous matching-funds program last week. Her campaign is expected to use the money to begin an aggressive ad campaign in the coming days.

Cynthia Nixon’s advice on debating Cuomo

For the candidates racing to catch Cuomo, there are two imperatives on the debate stage Wednesday night: rattle the front-runner and find a way to stand out.

Cynthia Nixon, the actress and activist, engaged in a rather fractious primary debate with Cuomo when she ran against him for governor in 2018. She had some advice for his current challengers.

She urged the candidates to confront Cuomo with his record, including how he handled nursing homes during Covid and allegations of sexual harassment that ended his governorship (he denies them).

“He is not actually used to people calling him on stuff,” she said by phone from Paris, where she was promoting the new season of “And Just Like That,” a sequel to “Sex and the City.”

“He withers in the sunlight of facts,” she added.

Nixon said that she found Cuomo, who excelled as a backroom deal-maker as governor, was less effective at defending his policies or speaking to the experience of voters when they debated on live television.

“I am not a politician by profession. It was obviously a very intimidating thing for me,” Nixon said. “But once I got out there on the stage and we started to interact, I was really stunned by not only how terrible he is on his feet, but how wildly unprepared he was.”

Though Nixon was thought to have held her own against Cuomo, she did not meaningfully erode his lead. He went on to beat her in the primary by 30 percentage points. (In the mayor’s race, she plans to rank Mamdani and Lander, in that order, and is deciding which other candidates to include on her ballot.)

Rich Azzopardi, a campaign spokesman for Cuomo, called Nixon’s account of the debate “revisionist history.”

“He won that debate and he won that election — just like that,” he said.

— Nicholas Fandos

For a more detailed look at the candidates, go over to our Who’s Running tracker. If you want to brush up on where the nine debate participants stand on various issues, we’ve got you covered. Want to catch up on previous newsletters? Read here. And if you want to find stories you may have missed, our mayor’s race landing page is right here.

What can we expect to see onstage tomorrow?

We invited the candidates participating in Wednesday’s debate to tell us what they hope to accomplish onstage.

Adams: Present herself as a candidate “focused on solutions for all of us. A candidate who puts people first — not political redemption or ambition.”

Michael Blake: Detail his plans to increase access to affordable housing, implement a vacant apartment tax and improve public safety by hiring 1,000 mental health professionals.

Cuomo: Portray himself as an experienced manager with a history of accomplishments, and contrast that record against the qualifications of all the other candidates.

Lander: Stress his progressivism and his desire to make the city more affordable and safe. Highlight his experience as comptroller and suggest Cuomo would continue Mayor Adams’s “nightmare of chaos and corruption.”

Mamdani: Attack Cuomo and his “corrupt billionaire-backed politics,” and present himself as someone focused on the needs of working- and middle-class New Yorkers.”

Zellnor Myrie: Outline how he plans to address the city’s affordability crisis, centered on creating one million homes; establishing universal after-school programs; and extending the hours of pre-K and 3-K.

Jessica Ramos: Did not respond by deadline.

Scott Stringer: Be seen as “the adult in the room.” Hopes to present himself as a candidate with vision, plans and the right mix of “competence, leadership and experience.”

Tilson: Portray himself as a Democratic bulwark against the party’s left wing, and characterize Mamdani as a radical socialist “who endangers my Jewish family” and would make the city less safe.

What’s Your Ranked-Choice Ballot Look Like?

Ilana Glazer, funny woman

Ilana Glazer, a popular comedian who starred in the television show “Broad City,” shared her ranked-choice ballot plans with Emma Fitzsimmons.

Though Glazer has been busy performing on Broadway with George Clooney in the play “Good Night, and Good Luck,” which closes on Sunday, she has been paying close attention to the race.

She said that she had been going back and forth between Lander and Mamdani as her first choice and settled on Lander.

“Zohran definitely has the vision for the future and messages it in a way that resonates with me, but it’s Brad’s experience as comptroller and his plans to execute that I feel are most important,” she said.

She opposes Cuomo and said that he resembled a “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles villain.” She expressed concern over his record on ethics.

“He’s so unsavory and dangerous,” she said.

Glazer said she planned to rank Myrie third, and she decided to rank Adams and Ramos fourth and fifth after taking The City’s “Meet Your Mayor” quiz.

Photo of the week

All rise, except for Cuomo

Five of the leading Democratic candidates joined a packed audience of tenants, housing organizers and faith leaders at St. Paul Community Baptist Church in East New York on Sunday for an affordable housing forum.

A front-row pew was set aside for the candidates to listen to the community’s concerns and needs. Four of them — Adams, Lander, Mamdani and Stringer — sat side-by-side. One was missing.

Cuomo remained outside the church, waiting in a vehicle until it was his turn to address the gathering — a source of frustration for his opponents, who made not-so-subtle references to his brief appearance in their speeches.

Myrie, a state senator who was not invited to the event, sat in the audience apart from the rest of the candidates. He had hoped to be given a chance to speak. He was not.

— Maya King

DATES TO WATCH

Wednesday: The first Democratic primary debate. (7 p.m., WNBC-TV.)
June 12: The second debate, restricted to leading contenders. (7 p.m., NY1.)
June 14: The last day to register to vote in the primary election.
June 14-22: Early voting.
June 24: Primary Day. Polls are open 6 a.m. to 9 p.m.