Among the cluster of candidates vying for the New York mayoralty are several (at least currently) longshots for landing in Gracie Mansion, like City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, former Comptroller Scott Stringer, and content creator/community activist/music artist Paperboy Prince.
More viable viers for the office at present include the incumbent mayor, Eric Adams, who is running as an independent; presumed Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa; and would-be Democratic nominees former Governor Andrew Cuomo and State Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani.
Primary elections, which will be ranked-choice (allowing as many as five candidates to be chosen by voters in order of preference), are scheduled to be held on June 24, 2025, with early voting beginning on June 14.
Mayor Adams is a longtime friend of the Jewish community, and in particular its Orthodox segment, which fact played a pivotal role in his election in 2021. He is even seeking to secure a ballot line under the name “EndAntiSemitism.”
The former governor has been reaching out to Orthodox voters, who remember his redlining of some of their communities during the Covid months in 2020, an approach that earned him a First Amendment court challenge by Agudath Israel and eventually a defeat.
In private meetings with chasidishe groups and Agudah representatives, Mr. Cuomo suggested that, in retrospect, he would have handled some pandemic decisions differently.
So Mayor Adams and former Governor Cuomo are both trying to woo the community.
Not so, to understate things, Mr. Mamdani, who has done surprisingly—and disturbingly—well on the Democratic race track. Unlike Messrs. Adams, Cuomo and Sliwa, all of whom are outspoken in support for Israel and condemnation of Hamas and anti-Semitism dressed up as anti-Netanyahu-ism, Mr. Mamdani, a “progressive” and Democratic Socialists of America member, has been mostly outspoken about his support for Palestinians and condemnation of Israel.
And the 33-year-old has attracted strikingly broad support from young voters, proving the Gemara’s adage that binyan ne’arim stirah, which means, loosely translated: “What might seem progressive to the young is in fact the opposite.”
A recent Marist Institute College Institute for Public Opinion poll showed Mr. Cuomo with support from 37% of Democrats and 18% for Mr. Mamdani, who actually led among voters under the age of 45. Moreover, he has raised more than $640,000 from thousands of small-dollar donors, which unlocked millions more in public matching funds.
Mr. Mamdani has pledged that, as mayor, he would “protect Jewish New Yorkers,” but he has defended his use of the term “genocide” to describe Israel’s war against Hamas, which is the true genocidal entity. The increased slandering of Israel with that term, of course, is a prime reason for why Jewish New Yorkers need protection.
Early in 2023, Mr. Mamdani introduced a bill in the State Assembly called the “Not on Our Dime!: Ending New York Funding of Israeli Settler Violence Act,” which would prohibit registered charities from donating to organizations that support communities in Yehudah and Shomron.
And after Hamas’ barbaric murder frenzy on October 7 of that year, he tweeted what can best be described as a “well, what did you expect?” reaction, complete with references to “occupation” and “apartheid.”
This year, Mr. Mamdani declined to sign onto the annual State Assembly resolution celebrating the anniversary of Israel’s founding, citing concerns over language praising Israel’s pursuit of peace, which he calls contradictory to its actions in Gaza.
The candidate has received, and celebrated, an endorsement from false fire alarm-puller and fellow Israel-slanderer former Congressman Jamaal Bowman, as well as from BDS and “one-state solution” advocate Linda Sarsour. Not surprising, since all three oppose Israel’s quest to destroy an enemy pledged to its eradication. “Birds of a feather…” includes buzzards.
If I had the ears of Mr. Mamdani’s young supporters who want to signal their progressive idealism, I’d encourage them to go the extra mile and really demonstrate their independence from the establishment. Rather than casting their ballots for Mr. Mamdani,
I’d tell them, they should pull the lever for Paperboy Prince.
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