Former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) continued his attacks on the inexperience of his leftist opponent, Zohran Mamdani, in the second and final New York City mayoral debate.
The far-left candidate was blaming Cuomo for the housing crisis under his watch as governor and received loud applause from the audience. Then Cuomo fired back and leveled Mamdani over his record as a New York state assemblyman.
‘You had the worst attendance record in the Assembly, and you gave yourselves the highest raise in the United States of America … and then you never showed up for work!’
“He says that taking five years to build affordable housing is the sign of an incompetent government — by his own words, that means he must have led an incompetent government. That is what we are seeing because that is the record that is actually on offer!” said Mamdani.
“I understand my friend doesn’t really understand government,” Cuomo responded.
“The governor doesn’t build housing in New York City,” said Cuomo.
“Not if it’s you!” Mamdani interrupted.
“No!” Cuomo yelled back. “Legally there are jurisdictions. The governor doesn’t pick up trash. He doesn’t run the fire department. That’s what the mayor does. The mayor builds housing. The state allocates funding for localities, and I allocated more funding for housing than any governor in the history of the state of New York!”
Cuomo also got loud applause from his supporters in the audience.
“All right? I did things! You have never had a job. You’ve never accomplished anything,” he continued.
“There is no reason to believe you have any merit or qualification for eight and a half million lives! You don’t know how to run a government, you don’t know how to handle an emergency, and you’ve literally never proposed a bill on anything that you’re now talking about in your campaign!” Cuomo said.
“You had the worst attendance record in the Assembly, and you gave yourselves the highest raise in the United States of America. You went from $110,000 to $140,000, and then you never showed up for work, and you missed 80% of the votes!” he said empathically. “Shame on you! Shame on you!”
“It is always a pleasure to hear Andrew Cuomo create his own facts at every debate stage,” Mamdani replied.
He did not dispute Cuomo’s characterization of his time in the Assembly and instead counterattacked on Cuomo’s housing record. Mamdani and Cuomo argued and talked over each other before they were quieted by a moderator to let Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa respond to both.
RELATED: Cuomo strikes at Mamdani while Sliwa goes on the attack in fiery NYC mayoral debate
Photo by Hiroko Masuike-Pool/Getty Images
“I heard the both of them, again fighting like kids in the schoolyard,” said Sliwa. “Zohran, your resume could fit on a cocktail napkin, and Andrew, your failures could fill a public school library in New York City!”
One of Mamdani’s most popular policies among New York City voters is his promise to freeze rents in an attempt to ease the high cost of living in the city. Housing experts say that rent freezes almost always backfire by leading to fewer housing units by making them unprofitable.
Most polling has Mamdani ahead of Cuomo, which has caused some to call on Sliwa to drop out of the race in hopes of swinging the advantage to Cuomo.
The mayoral election is less than two weeks away.
The entire debate can be viewed on the YouTube channel for Spectrum News.
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