Factual Dispatch #55: Hizzoner's Royal Rumble

If you live in NYC and haven’t already, polls are now open for you to cast your ranked-choice vote for the Party Primary candidates for: Mayor, City Council, Borough President (County Executive), and Comptroller (City Treasurer).

For an overview, TheCity has been a fantastic resource over the last few months. Their Quiz gathers info on your preferences, then spits back a choice & their respective positions. They also quietly reminded NYC to calm themselves, as it’s highly unlikely we’ll have a definitive winner for the Democratic Primary tonight.

On the minds of the people of Gotham? Jobs, crime, the homeless, climate change, and the cops. Front-runners & pearl clutchers have attached themselves to crime and gawdy homelessness like syphilitic barnacles on the Titanic. They point to a series of recent criminal justice reforms as the cause, but as you can imagine, that’s not the case. Not just in NYC, but for a better read on the national disingenuous fallacy blaming reforms for crime, I give you Harper’s. 

The race is coming down to renters vs owners, walkers vs drivers, suburban cops vs urban progressives. As Alex Yablon insightfully argues: 

Adams polls best with cops who own property, while Yang’s inertia slowed as his ignorance on…basically any policy subject was exposed. Morales had a moment before her campaign tried to unionize, with Garcia not differentiating and Stringer exploding on the launch pad. Wiley emerged as if “DeBlasio, but make it fashion” with surprise endorsements from AOC & the New York Times, but it might be too late. Without further delay, I give you the NYC Democratic Mayoral Primary candidates, with the best NOT REAL campaign posters for them I’ve ever seen.

(Editor’s Note: All faux endorsement/campaign images created by Seemoreevil.com, a fantastic website that really needs to migrate from HTTP to HTTPS if they want more organic traffic. 

Eric Adams

Given we’re still not sure if the guy lives in Brooklyn or Jersey, I can only shake my head at him being the presumptive winner of this race. Between going lockstep with cops, saying teacher student ratios don’t matter in the era of COVID-19, and putting out a video where he showed you how to search your kids’ room for drugs, he caters to a particular demographic that reads the Post, and didn’t tell people they voted for Trump.

Once he became the front-runner, his attacks on other candidates became decidedly Trumpy & worrying. When Yang & Garcia decided to cross campaign together, Adams called it “voter suppression” and invoked a “poll tax” while refusing to state he’d accept the results of the election in deep Trumpy fashion. So, I know why Black Giuliani” is presumed to win, it just makes me sad inside.

Andrew Yang

Andrew Yang figured out how to stick to a meme issue, put enough money into social media, and wear Dad jeans while standing next to things. He didn’t figure out two more important things. Firstly, NYC asks follow-up questions. On everything. Watching the NYC press pool educate Yang on the city, one follow-up at a time, was equal parts fun and deeply painful. “As long as there are absolutely no follow up questions, yes” is not a platform. 

Secondly, NYC is a graveyard for politicians. Can you think of a Senator, Governor, or NYC Mayor that elevated themselves to a higher office? Did you guess Teddy Roosevelt? Even Hildawg had to step down from the White House to Senate, and we saw how the rest of that went. If he wants to be president, he should not be seeking higher office in this part of the country. Anyone with a pulse has realized that Yang could take his candidacy and drop it into another city, but his name recognition and the waves of anti-Asian violence can’t be discounted. Given endorsements and Adams taking focus fire by calling it a poll tax, we could see not-UBI:

Maya Wiley

Maya is the only candidate willing to actually state that “defund the police” not only didn’t happen, but the issues that are causing spikes in crime, are not solved by increased funding. For this, she’ll be resigned to a 3rd or 4th place finish I’m sad to predict. I think she’d do good for the city, but I am terrified the cops would go full OCP/Robocop on the city if she was elected. If elected, she’d be NYC’s first woman mayor.

Scott Stringer

There was a wonderful article months ago about how Stringer was seen as trying to “dance at two weddings” from his community. While he came up in the arms of real estate and developers, he tried to burnish some progressive bonafides and an endorsement from the UFT (Editor’s Note: The UFT can pick winners about as well as our writer can pick stocks. Don’t bet on either.), while quietly pushing corpo-friendly policies. And then he was credibly accused of sexual harassment and worse by more than one woman. Unlike Trump & Cuomo he couldn’t swagger his way out of it, so I’m a bit puzzled as to why he’s still in the race. I expect a bleak finish.

Dianne Morales

Morales had wind in her sails before he blew up her campaign after they tried to unionize. If you’re appealing to progressives, you sanction the union and you work with recognized labor organizers to do it right. You don’t rip people’s heads off and fire organizing staff. Do that shit in Miami or Omaha, not NYC.

Kathryn Garcia

Garcia has acquitted herself as a competent administrator and been involved in zero scandals as the Commissioner of Sanitation. This means she’s probably in the top tier of candidates for the job, but has made no waves or stood out in the crowd in any meaningful way. The only real dirt on her is that she kept her husband’s name after the divorce, and isn’t ethnically Latine, but you have to be in contention for that to be weaponized against you. Honestly, this endorsement by SeeMoreEvil is the best thing I’ve seen related to her in months, and not just because of the One Punch Man reference.

 Shaun Donovan

While Kathryn’s pathway to middle-of-the-pack competence is through diligent service, Shaun Donovan’s appears to be “I have an important black friend?” The former HUD Secretary under Obama has appeal for policy wonks and did all the right things. But, standing in the wings of Barry doesn’t get you the big chair in NYC, especially after Trump. If his messaging team did their jobs, he could place in 3-5, which could give him inertia for the race in a cycle or two. Given what I’ve seen, I expects he jockeys for pole position in the basement.

Ray McGuire

The former VP of Citibank had the FIRE (Finance, Insurance, and Real Estate) sectors locked up, and could have been a much more visible contender if Yang and Adams didn’t blow him out of the water. The guy raised so much money in private/corporate donations that matching funds for other candidates had to be raised repeatedly. So, to be clear, we had a Romney tier villain who had commercials shot by Spike Lee in this race, and it wasn’t even a B-plot.

Curtis Silwa (R) 

The only Republican of note, largely because only a New York Italian can think that wearing the same damn hat since the 70s is an appropriate fashion choice. Why does this guy look familiar? Because it’s the same hat they wore in the “Guardian Angels” a group that tried to defend civilians in the late 70s/80s dystopia that was NYC.

That Guy! He thinks crack, gangs, and the Foot Clan are on their way back to the city, so he’s stepping up to save us all. He’ll be the candidate whoever wins the primary goes up against this fall. I really need to re-watch The Warriors.

Editor’s Addendum: Paperboy Prince!

 The man, the myth, the legend who has no chance at all. My hope is that he at least garners enough 2-5th slots to earn a podium showing. If he blows past even a single candidate that had a manager, matching funds, and some asshole consultants fumbling their race, LOL. We can all take a small nugget of hope away from today, if that does happen, even if the not-cop, the not-start-up guy, or the not-banker happen to win.

Ranked Choice Voting has never been tried on this large of a scale local municipality. If you live in NYC, Go vote! If you don’t, get some popcorn and enjoy the Royal Rumble we’re about to have.

Yours,