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Last Tuesday, the eight top contenders in New York’s Democratic mayoral primary faced off in a debate. The City
A recent poll showed Eric Adams in first place with 19 percent, Andrew Yang with 16 percent, and other candidates with single digit support. 20 percent remain undecided. Change Research
The right supports Eric Adams, arguing that he will implement pro-police reforms to reduce crime.
“More than 400 people have been shot in the city since January, an 83.3% increase from 2020 and a 93.5% increase from 2019. Just a couple of weeks ago, the New York Police Department reported that shootings had tripled…
“Luckily, New York City’s mayoral candidates seem to understand that the NYPD isn’t the problem liberals have made it out to be. Former police captain Eric Adams has been a staunch defender of New York’s police officers. And former presidential candidate Andrew Yang, who is one of several candidates running to replace de Blasio, rightly came out against the ‘Defund the Police’ movement…
“But New York officers need more than just vocal support. They also need to be allowed to do their jobs efficiently if the city’s crime rates are to come back down. That might mean reintroducing some of the aggressive policing policies implemented under former Mayor Rudy Giuliani’s administration, during which crime dropped dramatically.”
Kaylee McGhee White, Washington Examiner
“New York’s reversal of fortune is no accident. Mayor Bill de Blasio cites the Covid-19 pandemic, lost jobs, and closed schools as excuses for the dramatic rise in violent crime during his last two years in office. He conveniently overlooks four culprits tied closely to his ideological priorities: catch-and-release bail reform; the abandoning of Broken Windows policing; the elimination of plainclothes anti-crime units that spent their nights hunting illegal gun carriers; and the movement to ‘defund’ the police…
“Proactive police officers have no incentive to respond to non-emergency crimes when the mayor has told them to stand down, when they know that the perp will be swiftly released anyway, and when they worry that their faces could be the next ones plastered on screens across the country if an arrest goes wrong.”
Craig Trainor, City Journal
“Asked about skyrocketing shootings… gun buybacks don’t work to get rid of the illegal guns we need to eliminate, [Adams] said. He rightly pointed out that 95 percent of the victims of gun violence are black and Hispanic. Prevention is fine, he said, ‘but we need intervention now.’ People are dying now. And Adams is the only Democrat talking about how to stop it. But if we’re heartened by our choice, we’re even more worried about the alternatives. There was a lot of talk about ‘inequities’ and not a lot of specifics on how to actually restore New York City’s economy…
“Apparently, there is nothing that can’t be solved with some more money. Kids should be better educated, but don’t test them. (Adams again stood apart, with Garcia, saying we should keep our selective high school exam.)… Yang was more reasonable, but still dodged almost every question thrown at him… we made the right decision in endorsing Eric Adams.”
Editorial Board, New York Post
“During a campaign stop in Times Square [last] Sunday, Yang opined that Gotham ‘can’t afford’ to defund the police… this is probably a smart move on Yang’s part, in addition to just being common sense. He’s running against some very hardcore liberals and socialists who seem to spend more time listening to the talking heads on MSNBC than they do the voters who actually have to live in the crime-ridden streets of New York…
“A recent Ipsos poll showed that ‘defund the police’ is only supported by 18% of Americans. Even among Black respondents, there was just 28% support and those numbers have been reflected in local, New York City polls as well…
“When the BLM movement was calling for defunding (if not abolishing) the police, Bill de Blasio quickly caved and worked with the City Council to steer nearly a billion dollars away from their budget. The results can be seen in the crime statistics which continue to head in the wrong direction. Even while Yang is being trashed on liberal talk shows for this, an undercurrent of support from alarmed residents may continue to push him upward as we approach the June 22nd primary.”
Jazz Shaw, Hot Air
The left supports progressive policies, and is critical of Andrew Yang and Eric Adams.
The left supports progressive policies, and is critical of Andrew Yang and Eric Adams.
“[Kathryn] Garcia’s many years of experience — she first joined the Sanitation Department as a 22-year-old intern — have helped her develop laudable plans for the city that are also achievable: Provide free child care up to age 3 for families earning less than $70,000 a year. Implement bilingual programs in every elementary school…
“Transform Rikers Island into a hub for renewable energy, with charging stations for the city’s electric vehicle fleet. Expand rapid bus lanes. Create more green space in low-income neighborhoods. Address the city’s centuries-old trash problem by getting refuse off the sidewalks and tucked away into nicer-looking, rat-resistant containers…
“She is also committed to reforming the New York Police Department. That begins with speeding up and strengthening the disciplinary process, reforming the promotion process, raising the age for recruits to 25 from 21 and requiring them to live in the five boroughs… Garcia can run a government that delivers for all New Yorkers.”
Editorial Board, New York Times
“[Yang is] just a little Trump-like… He has no relevant experience in government, either as a legislator or a civil servant, and has never really run a large organization. The New York Times’ reporting on his stint leading Venture for America was brutal—basically, he raised a ton of money for a project that he promised would produce 100,000 tech jobs, and only yielded 150—and suggests he’s a bit of a showman who exaggerates his accomplishments…
“He [also] seems to have that Trump-like habit of suddenly picking up ideas from whoever he’s talked to last and wants to impress. That’s not always bad—he recently came out in favor of a land tax on vacant lots, which is great!—but makes me doubt how hard he’d fight for any of the good ideas, and worry about which bad ones he’d adopt. Meanwhile, his campaign is basically being run by a lobbying firm staffed by ex-Bloombergites, which further makes me wonder whether you can really trust that he’ll push the more offbeat, progressive plans that make him stand out.”
Jordan Weissmann, Slate
“Less than a year since Derek Chauvin murdered George Floyd, in Minneapolis, sparking a summer of historic unrest and nationwide calls for police reform, polling shows that many New Yorkers still support transferring resources and responsibilities from the N.Y.P.D. to other social programs and agencies. But, with the spectre of crime suddenly top of mind for many voters, the language of ‘defund’ has been deemed a political liability…
“The most progressive candidates seem still to be searching for a way to talk about the fraught relationships with both the police and the public which de Blasio is leaving in his wake. On Thursday, the focus on the shootings obscured important policing and reform issues that have been playing out under de Blasio for years: the candidates barely mentioned, for instance, the future of Rikers Island, the city’s massive, dysfunctional jail complex.”
Eric Lach, New Yorker
“Can a ‘Stop-and-Frisk’ candidate win New York’s Democratic mayoral primary?…
“The ACLU has determined that during Michael Bloomberg’s 12-year, three-term tenure as New York’s mayor, the NYPD recorded a staggering 5,081,689 stops; even more staggering is that 4.4 million of those stops were of innocent civilians. The ACLU’s report goes on to note that 52 percent of the stops included frisks, and that half of the innocent 4.4 million were frisked—this despite the stop-and-frisk law’s stipulation that the act should ‘be conducted only in the unusual situation when an officer reasonably suspects the person has a weapon that might endanger officer safety.’…
“The report notes that ‘young black and Latino men were the targets of a hugely disproportionate number of stops.’… In August 2013, a federal judge declared Bloomberg’s stop-and-frisk policy unconstitutional, though she stopped short of ruling on stop-and-frisk in general… This is [the] policy that Adams aims to continue and potentially expand.”
Toby Jaffe, American Prospect
