Three flawed choices for Mayor of New York: Cuomo, Adams and Sliwa?

NEW YORK – Coming away from the mayoral forum on the second day of the convention of the National Action Network here yesterday it was clear that if the host of progressive candidates seeking the Democratic nomination for mayor of New York doesn’t coalesce behind a single figure the chances are that voters will face choosing from among three flawed candidates. They are the scandal-ridden ex-governor Andrew Cuomo, the Trump convert and current mayor Eric Adams, or the right-wing opportunist Curtis Sliwa.

NYC Mayor Eric Adams announced yesterday morning that he would be bowing out of the Democratic primary scheduled for June and instead run as an independent in the fall. Cuomo is seeking that nomination, along with a host of other more progressive candidates.

Relaunched his campaign

In the afternoon yesterday, on the second day of the National Action Network convention, Adams relaunched his reelection campaign, and, even though he has withdrawn from the Democratic primaries, he went head-to-head against the entire Democratic candidate field.

Brokered by Rev. Al Sharpton, the venue was a safer debut than Eric Adams might have had otherwise. When it was announced that federal charges against Adams were officially dropped with prejudice, the crowd broke into a mixed reaction: some applause, some groans and boos.

His approval rating has currently cratered to 20%, and his stepping back from the Democratic primaries may offer former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo an advantage. Major newspapers are already predicting a three-way race between Cuomo (D), Adams (I), and gadfly reactionary and founder of the paramilitary gang Guardian Angels, Curtis Sliwa (R ).

The NAN Mayoral Forum was moderated by Rev. Al Sharpton, NYC Racial Justice Commission Chair Jennifer Jones Austin, and former Congressional Representative Max Rose. They spoke with all the candidates including the plethora of candidates that Adams has just stepped out of competing with for the Democratic nomination.

The format was drawn out at more than two hours in length, and non-threatening. Each candidate was asked out on stage and then asked a handful of questions from the panelists before the next candidate was announced.

It is noteworthy that the first candidate was disgraced former governor Andrew Cuomo, and not the current mayor, Eric Adams, himself. Cuomo entered onstage to cheers, applause, and a wall of camera flashes.

He fielded six questions, mainly softballs, insisting that he’s a good candidate because he knows a bully when he sees one and is therefore able to stand up to Trump. He claimed that he’d done it before as governor.

On more concrete issues, he went down the usual laundry list of New Yorker grievances: affordable housing, rebuilding public housing, childcare costs, free bus routes, and so on. He joked about refusing to commit to a four-year term – “What if I die?” he said to gasps. He sidestepped an opportunity to criticize the current Adams administration.

Notably absent from his comments was any accounting of his reason for being there: a scandal-ridden governorship that ended in his resignation in disgrace. The State Comptroller has determined that Cuomo has spent more than $60 million of taxpayer money to fend off legal challenges from former employees accusing him of sexual harassment, of grieving families who blame him for putting COVID-19 victims in nursing homes, and to the state itself who accused him of using public resources to write his $5 million book on the pandemic.

Yet, to some in the electoral field, he is surely less scandalous than the man who followed him to the stage: Eric Adams. He arrived to warm applause and cheers in a room he knows well.

After assuring the audience that a three-way race with Cuomo wouldn’t result in a Republican win – “If you had twenty people in the race, it wouldn’t be enough to make Curtis Sliwa be mayor” – the subject turned to a more challenging topic: his growing relationship with Donald Trump and the MAGA right.

Sharpton wanted assurances that Adams would stand up to Trump and Adams offered none, taking a defensive tone: “There isn’t a level of inconsistency in who I am.” He recounted his accomplishments in New York, both at the city as a cop and at the state level as a one-time State Senator.

Says he will “fight any White House”

“I’m going to fight any White House that isn’t going to benefit our city, including the previous one that cost us $7 billion,” he said, launching into a grievance about immigrants and asylum seekers in New York. His diversity bona fides seem to focus on how many African Americans he’s hired, but he dodges a question from Jennifer Jones Austin about releasing his diversity plan for the city.

At this point, his hands were shaking, though he tried to hide it by clasping them together. His face occasionally broke into a grimace. He was defensive on homelessness and was fervent that Rikers Island cannot close by 2027, as it is mandated to by law, mainly because there are too many people there – though he did not mention that the number of prisoners in the jail rose from 4,000 to more than 7,000 under his administration.

By the time the question was asked about the national Democratic Party, Adams was ready to cut. “I didn’t leave the party, the party left me,” he said, winding up his grievances again about the asylum crisis in New York and his federal charges.

When his segment with the panel closed, the crowd cheered but he exited the stage quickly, not stopping for photos as Cuomo did and as the candidates after him would.

There were seven more candidates to sit for mini-interviews from the National Action Network panel, and the majority of them echoed the same ambitions for New Yorkers: expanded childcare programs, more affordable housing, and fighting Trump.

City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams and Comptroller Brad Lander were followed by Democratic Socialists of America State Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, State Sen. Jessica Ramos, former Comptroller Scott Stringer, State Sen. Zellnor Myrie, and former State Assemblyman Michael Blake. And while it seemed as though they came on in descending order of how seriously the audience should consider them, some candidates overperformed, particularly Jessica Ramos, who was not listed as appearing in the program but exited the stage to a standing ovation.

What is notable is who on stage did more than speak to the issues. Who pushed hardest in an effort to win?

The only candidates to challenge Cuomo seemed to be City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams and Comptroller Brad Lander; and it is only Adrienne Adams, who followed Eric Adams on stage, who openly criticized the current mayor – she said the mass resignations triggered by his corruption charges were her inspiration to run, though she couched it to the audience by saying that she’s “very glad he’s okay.”

Progressives risked losing track of the narrative. Progressive groups and union locals have rolled out multiple endorsements for mayor – the Working Families Party, for example, has endorsed Brad Lander, Adrienne Adams, Zohran Mamdani, and Zellnor Myrie for mayor.

Yet it is Cuomo and Adams who are dominating the media narrative, and it is Cuomo who is polling double digits ahead of any other candidate. With both Eric Adams and Cuomo focused mainly on their own political careers and less on the issues as they stand, voters, misled by corporate media, risk falling into the trap of thinking they must choose one or the other for mayor.

This will be the second time that New York City Democrats can vote for mayor on a ranked choice ballot, but many still do not understand how it works, and only around 800,000 of New York City’s 3.3 million Democrats chose to participate at all during the last mayoral election.

While all of the progressives seem to be singing a similar tune, with minor differences in key between them, their inability to coalesce into a united anti-Cuomo, anti-Adams force threatens to force New Yorkers to choose between a governor who resigned in disgrace and a mayor who owes his freedom to Donald Trump.