A casual viewer could be forgiven for mistaking Democrats’ first New York City mayoral debate for the roast of Andrew Cuomo.
All eight of his primary opponents took turns throwing verbal daggers Wednesday evening at Cuomo, who arrived on the debate stage at 30 Rockefeller Plaza with multiple suitcases of baggage to go with his status as the polling frontrunner.
Cuomo, the former governor, has consistently led polls of the nine-candidate field, leveraging his name recognition as a longtime public official in New York and the scion of a storied political family. He resigned as governor in 2021 amid multiple sexual misconduct allegations and an investigation into the claims, but he is now attempting a comeback in New York City, where Democratic Mayor Eric Adams is running for re-election as an independent.
Cuomo’s front-runner status in the Democratic primary made him a constant target Wednesday night at the debate hosted by NBC New York, WNJU Telemundo and Politico. When Cuomo sidestepped a question about a 2021 report from the state attorney general accusing him of undercounting nursing home deaths during the Covid-19 pandemic, his opponents laughed in his face and jeered him.
When Cuomo cited “the state of the Democratic Party” when he was asked to name his biggest regret in his political career, Adrienne Adams, speaker of the New York City Council, pounced.
“No regrets when it comes to cutting child care?” Adams asked. “No regrets when it comes to slow-walking PPE and vaccinations in the season of Covid to Black and brown communities? Really, no regrets?”
And when Cuomo was asked about allegations of sexual harassment and responded by attacking his opponents for calling for the defunding of police, former state Assemblyman Michael Blake turned to the cameras to speak directly to the women of New York.
“Every woman watching tonight: He was just given a chance to actually address the clear claims that were stated and ignored it,” Blake said. Cuomo would later repeat his denial of the allegations, which mushroomed into an investigation led by state Attorney General Letitia James; it found that Cuomo had harassed 11 women and subjected some of them to unwanted touching and groping.
Each candidate took a different tack attacking Cuomo, 67. His most viable opponent, according to recent polls, is state Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, democratic socialist, who cast Cuomo as having been bought and paid for by billionaires.
“The difference between myself and Andrew Cuomo is that my campaign is not funded by the very billionaires who put Donald Trump in D.C.,” said Mamdani, 33.
After Cuomo dodged difficult questions about his controversies, Mamdani said he is “allergic to any accountability or acknowledgment of a mistake.”
Cuomo did not hang back, instead trying to give as good as he was getting when he was attacked. And Mamdani, the youngest candidate onstage, also received his own slew of barbs. After he confidently proclaimed, “I am Donald Trump’s worst nightmare,” Cuomo replied, “Donald Trump would go through Mr. Mamdani like a hot knife through butter.”
“He’s been in government 27 minutes. He passed three bills. That’s all he’s done,” Cuomo said, contrasting his own experience with that of his opponent, who is less than half of his age.
State Sen. Jessica Ramos got a jab in Mamdani when she was asked about her biggest regret. “I regret not running for mayor in 2021,” she said.
“I had been in the Senate for two years. I’d already passed over a dozen bills. I thought I needed more experience, but turns out, you just need to make good videos,” she said, poking fun at Mamdani’s social media strategy, which has propelled his candidacy.
Issues, including the city’s housing crisis and public safety, took a back seat to bickering, with debate moderators struggling to control the nine candidates’ speaking over one another and jousting for airtime ahead of the June 24 primary.
In addition to Cuomo and Mamdani, who has burst onto the New York City political scene on a progressive platform, candidates jockeyed for position in the city’s unpredictable ranked-choice voting system, which allows voters to choose multiple candidates and rank them on their ballots. The stage also included the current and former city comptrollers, Brad Lander and Scott Springer; state Sens. Ramos and Zellnor Myrie; and former hedge fund executive Whitney Tilson.
While candidates outlined their proposals on major issues facing the city, like housing and public safety, quarrels overshadowed the substance.
The city’s most recent Housing and Vacancy Survey, conducted last year, found that the vacancy rate for apartments in the city dropped to 1.4%, the lowest rate since 1968. When it comes to units that cost less than $2,400 per month, the vacancy rate is below 1%.
While Mamdani, Blake and Ramos have vowed to freeze the rent of rent-stabilized apartments, which are home to nearly 1 million New Yorkers, Tilson, the businessman on the stage, came at the issue from a different angle.
“I think we need to drop rents by 20% by unleashing the private sector to build a lot more housing,” he said.
Despite recent encouraging crime data from the city, which showed a record low 264 shootings citywide from January to May, the issue was a point of contention.
Candidates presented their plans to combat crime in the subway system, which has become a front-of-mind concern for New Yorkers after a series of high-profile and gruesome acts of violence, including a woman’s death after she was set on fire last year.
Myrie called for 150 police-clinician teams to patrol subway cars and platforms at all hours of the day.
Cuomo made a promise about his first month in office, should he become mayor. “In my first 30 days, I will take every homeless person off the trains and the subway stations and get them the help they need,” he said.
Blake called for 1,000 mental health professionals on the subways and streets, increasing bandwidth for police officers to handle other issues. “The police will indicate they were not trained on addressing mental health,” said Blake, who served in the Obama administration.
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