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Brian Lehrer: It's the Brian Lehrer show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. We begin today with our weekly Wednesday [unintelligible 00:00:16] about city politics and particularly the New York City mayoral race from WNYC and Gothamist political reporter Elizabeth Kim. Some of the headlines we'll discuss. Mamdani gets involved in the Jimmy Kimmel suspension with an ABC suspension of his own. Kamala Harris endorses Mamdani, though that endorsement is being described as tepid, but she endorsed him.

Chuck Schumer, not so much. Suozzi and Gillen, Congress members, Democrats from Long Island, and the New York State Democratic Party chief, not at all. The chief Republican guy named Donald Trump supporting Republican Curtis Sliwa. There's also Mayor Adams campaigning by targeting school bathrooms. How far is too far when it comes to advocating for charter schools? Was canceling classes to have kids out electioneering a lesson too far? Let's see how much we can get to. Listeners, your questions and comments are welcome on any of these things as usual, or anything else relevant. 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. You can call or you can text. Hello again, Liz. Happy Wednesday.

Elizabeth Kim: Happy Wednesday, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Let's start with Mamdani canceling a town hall that he had committed to on Channel 7, which, of course, the local ABC affiliate over the Jimmy Kimmel suspension. Now that Kimmel is back on the air, here anyway, if not at all affiliates owned by conservative companies. He's now planning to participate, is that correct?

Elizabeth Kim: Right. What happened was Mamdani held a press conference on Monday morning at Four Freedoms Park in Roosevelt Avenue. You get the--

Brian Lehrer: Roosevelt Island, right?

Elizabeth Kim: Roosevelt Island, sorry. Roosevelt Island. You get the symbolism there. He announced that he was going to withdraw from a town hall. This was a televised town hall that was supposed to air on WABC television on Thursday. It would have been a 90-minute town hall in front of a live audience where Mamdani would have taken questions from members of that audience. It was also something that his campaign later said to me was an idea that they had pitched to the network.

Brian Lehrer: It was just him, not the other candidates in the [unintelligible 00:02:47].

Elizabeth Kim: Correct.

Brian Lehrer: Let's play the clip of Mamdani canceling this town hall on Monday.

Zohran Mamdani: It's also a question of the many workers who find their livelihoods from that job, be they sound engineers, be they the writers, be they the musicians. This attack on the freedom of expression is also an attack on their ability to afford to live in the city that they call home. The message that it sends to each and every American across this country is a message that the First Amendment is no longer a right that can be counted on, but rather that it is government which will determine what should and should not be discussed, what can and cannot be spoken. We cannot normalize these kinds of acts or offenses.

Brian Lehrer: That was on Monday. After that, ABC announced that Jimmy Kimmel would go back on the air Tuesday night, last night. Is the town hall with Mamdani back on on Channel 7 tomorrow?

Elizabeth Kim: The campaign is trying to reschedule the town hall. I don't know that they have found a date yet, but presumably it's back on because presumably WABC, who had agreed to do it in the first place, would, of course, want to. They have already moved on and tried to do town halls with other candidates. I was told that Curtis Sliwa had a date scheduled for it already. What happened was Mamdani first told WABC that he wasn't doing the town hall on Friday, and then that, in effect, put in jeopardy the rest of the town halls because if they weren't going to be able to do it with the Democratic nominee and the front runner, it didn't make sense to try to do these town halls with others.

I was told by Sliwa's campaign that they had been told over the weekend that they weren't doing the town halls anymore. Mamdani's decision didn't just affect him and his own opportunity to be on television, but also that of another candidate. Now, Andrew Cuomo, I was told by his campaign that they were just in talks to do this. He had not committed yet, but they were in talks to do this town hall. It's important to note that something like this, it's 90 minutes. It's 90 minutes on television. It's an opportunity for voters to take a close look at a candidate.

Immediately after Mamdani made this announcement, his rivals, Andrew Cuomo, Curtis Sliwa, they pounced on him. They said that this was him trying to duck an opportunity to face tough questions. What's interesting is you look at how Mamdani argued why he was doing it. He was saying it's-- He was trying to tie how the decision to pull Kimmel from the air didn't just affect Kimmel, it affected the engineers and the other staff who work on it. This was a question of labor and affordability. At the same time, I think it's fair to ask. This was a town hall that was put together by WABC, the local network.

These are local journalists whose-- their job is to cover the elections and these candidates. Granted, it was Mamdani's idea, but they had already put a schedule out there. They were already talking to Andrew Cuomo about doing it as well. You can make the argument that did this, in effect, was this directed at the wrong people. I think Cuomo's campaign was trying to argue that. "Are you, in effect, punishing local journalists for something that their parent company did?" I think it's a fair question.

Hours later, after ABC announced that Kimmel was, in fact, going to reappear on the air, that they had reversed their decision, you could tell that the campaign, Mamdani's campaign, was scrambling because it took a while for them to finally announce that they would, in fact, seek to reschedule the town hall.

Brian Lehrer: Do you know if ABC, the company, it's really Disney, the parent company also owns Channel 7, WABC, do you happen to know? I'm not positive.

Elizabeth Kim: I assume that all of these networks, ABC is their parent. ABC and Disney are their parents. These are all the affiliates that fall under them.

Brian Lehrer: Some TV stations are what they called owned and operated by the parent company. I think at least in the past, WABC was owned by ABC. Stations change hands so much that sometimes, even if it has the same call letters as the parent company, it's not the same ownership. I would have to look it up. I guess--

Elizabeth Kim: That's a good point, Brian. I don't know that, although I would assume that Mamdani's decision implicitly implies that WABC is somehow implicated, because they are part of this. I think it's a fair question. Are they--?

Brian Lehrer: I'll try to get an answer, but I'm just trying to figure out what was in Mamdani's head, that if ABC as a company was caving to political pressure to cancel Jimmy Kimmel, as Mamdani saw it, then maybe some pressure on ABC, the company, was righteous in Mamdani's view. One could also ask the other candidates, why would you give them a pass and not impose some consequences if you thought that it was wrong to cancel Jimmy Kimmel. I'm just saying-- I'm not taking any side here.

Elizabeth Kim: Absolutely. Absolutely, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: I'm just saying it could go either way.

Elizabeth Kim: That is his argument, and you heard him there, is that we cannot normalize this behavior. That's why it was, to him and his campaign, it was important for him to take a stand on this. Something that someone in the Cuomo campaign raised, which is interesting. What about Rupert Murdoch and his relationship with Trump? he owns and controls the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post. Would that then affect the way that Mamdani works with those journalists? It's a fair question. I think you can think about it, that it could be a slippery slope. To what extent does it wind up hurting voters who want more information about candidates and the election?

Brian Lehrer: I guess you could go down this rabbit hole for a long time, and we won't, because we're going to move on to some other mayoral election issues, not global media issues. We know that the Trump administration doesn't want certain news organizations at certain events if they haven't been reporting in a way that he considers fair. Other politicians have done this, too. There have been examples of Democratic politicians. That's the rabbit hole you're talking about, right?

Elizabeth Kim: Yes. [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: How far down that do we go from any side in the name of whatever anybody considers righteousness or fairness?

Elizabeth Kim: Exactly. For Mamdani, he, leading up to the general, has really tried to focus or make one of his priorities in attacking Trump. In doing this act, I think he's speaking to a yearning that a lot of Democrats have, which is they want to see more kinds of resistance. This certainly, I think, lives up to that demand from some Democrats.

Brian Lehrer: We have confirmed that WABC Channel 7 here in New York is owned by the parent company Disney, for what that's worth. Let's take one call on this that's coming in before we move on to some of the other mayoral campaign issues. Lauren in the Bronx, you're on WNYC. Hi, Lauren.

Lauren: Hello. Thank you for taking my call. I think that canceling the town hall exemplifies why Mamdani cannot be the mayor of New York. He basically threw the baby out with the bathwater because he deprives the public of the chance to hear him answer their questions. I think there are many other ways you can express an opinion about ABC. Ironically, this is not ABC's first step like this. They paid the $12 million to Trump, so he knew who they were when he agreed in the first place.

I think this was more showmanship pandering to a section of his space than anything thought out. Also, I think that ABC, whether you agree with them or not, they have their right to free speech, too. It's their company. To say, "If you say something I don't like, I won't be on your show," is really-- that's attacking free speech as well. Plus, I don't know what you do if you're a politician. My idea always goes back to where is the elementary school education on civics? Maybe, he could say, "Well, I'm going to improve education to include civics." This was not the way to do it. It was an immature adolescent thing to do.

Brian Lehrer: Lauren, thank you for your call. I will say we're getting texts on the other side of that. Here's one. "I absolutely and unequivocally support this decision by the Mamdani campaign. If Trump plays out in the open on the airwaves, so should our mayor." Just say people are weighing in in different respects in this. We're going to talk more later in the show with another guest about free speech right now, and that whole thicket since the assassination of Charlie Kirk and the cancellation of Kimmel temporarily, et cetera.

We're going to go on to another issue. Mayor Adams surprised some people, I think, when he brought up the issue of school policies that lets kids, students, use whichever bathroom conforms to their gender identities. Here's 30 seconds of what he said about that a few days ago.

Mayor Eric Adams: I don't support girls and boys using the same restroom. I don't support that. We're going to always respect how one identifies themselves. My utmost importance is to ensure that when my children are in school, they're in there in a safe environment. I do not believe a safe environment is allowing boys and girls to use the same facility at the same time.

Brian Lehrer: That was the mayor on Saturday. No, I guess last Thursday. He talks about respecting identities. "We're always going to respect how one identifies themselves," in the clip. Yet he also says, "I do not believe a safe environment is allowing boys and girls to use the same facility at the same time." Why did he bring this up now?

Elizabeth Kim: When he first said it, it felt like it landed like, "Where is this coming from?" I think that's how political reporters were taking it. Behind the scenes, the Trump administration had handed the city an ultimatum, which was, you have to change your policies which accommodate trans students, or you lose funding. It's a considerable amount of funding. It would be a total of around $50 million. Now, under state law, the city does provide students not only access to facilities based on their gender identity, but that they-- The wording that the city uses, their asserted gender identity.

It's not just access to facilities, Brian, it's also the ability to participate in sports and athletic activities. That's the law. There is nothing that the mayor can do, really, to change that law. I mean, he would have to basically introduce a bill to change it. His remarks on it were interesting because he wasn't saying, "I am going to now introduce a bill and I want to change this law." He just put it out there without giving any context to it. The context was only found out later by reporters who looked into it and saw that there was pressure being put on the city to revise this accommodation.

Brian Lehrer: Is city policy in this respect under the arm of the state? Is it really a state law or state policy that would have to be reversed, and the mayor, even the city council, don't have the power to do it in terms of students being able to use the bathrooms that conform to their gender identities?

Elizabeth Kim: That's right, Brian. This is a protection that-- This equal access is protected under the state. The specific law that the city wrote was in keeping with the state protections granted to people and their gender identity. Like I said, it involves not just access to bathroom, but also access to activities. From the government's perspective, the federal government's perspective, all of this stems from an executive order that Trump made in February banning trans athletes from participating in Title IX sports.

Brian Lehrer: Does New York State policy, therefore, because some states are going in another way, some school districts are going in another way, and the Republicans in Washington want there to be a federal ban on trans athletes in girls' or women's sports. Is there a New York state policy that allows them to participate universally?

Elizabeth Kim: I know there have been lawsuits flying around this issue, particularly in Long Island, Brian, but I haven't dug deep into it. There are different municipalities and counties that are wrestling with this issue. In New York, until the mayor had said it, it hasn't been a fight in New York City, which was interesting, which was what made people- their ears perk up when they heard the mayor mention this.

Brian Lehrer: Does the mayor hope-- I don't know that we can even read into his mind, so far this far, but maybe. Could the mayor-- I realize the campaign is one big context here. Maybe he thinks it's going to be a popular position to say he doesn't support girls and boys using the same restroom, as he puts it, or people being able to use the restroom that conforms to their gender identity. If that's different than the sex identified at birth. Could he also be, as mayor, trying to stave off this cancellation of tens of millions of dollars of federal funds by just articulating his agreement with the president, even though it would be up to the state to change it, which they're not about to do?

Elizabeth Kim: I think that's fair to say, too, Brian. Originally, when he first brought up this issue, I think people's thoughts went to, "Well, he's trying to peel away some MAGA voters on this culture war issue." Then when the backstory around the funding and the pressure that the city's Department of Education is facing in losing this amount of money, you could think that perhaps the mayor is trying to deflect in this moment and ease some of this tension and try to get the Trump administration to back off and say--

The official statement that the city has given about this issue, about the proposed loss of funding, is that it's unfair because it's going to punish all students for a law that the city has no ability to change. That's their line on it. Perhaps, like you said, by the mayor trying to say, "I personally also don't agree with this as well." Maybe he's trying to find a bridge to Trump and get him to back off.

Brian Lehrer: Let's take a phone call on this issue in the mayoral race. Steve, in Midtown, you're on WNYC. Hi, Steve.

Steve: Hey, how are you doing? Hi.

Brian Lehrer: Hi. Doing good.

Steve: Can you hear me?

Brian Lehrer: Thank you for calling.

Steve: Thank you.

Brian Lehrer: You can hear me right? Yes, go ahead.

Steve: Yes, yes. Sorry, sorry. Listen, this is a non-issue, this thing with the bathrooms. If you have a kid who decides he wants to-- he or she or they want to dress opposite from maybe what people would expect, what difference does it make? If you go into a woman's restroom, it's all stalls, nobody's exposing themselves to anybody. Conversely, if you have a ostensibly female who wants to dress up butch and wear pants or whatever, can't use a urinal, so that person's going to be in a stall too. It's a complete non-issue. There's no danger. Adams is, well, craven.

Brian Lehrer: Steve, thank you very much. There's his point of view. Interesting about the stalls. I guess in theory, at least, the concern is pre-stall, if some predatory boy wanted to say, "I can just go into the girls' restroom," and then leer or do whatever he's going to do. He's not blocked at the door. It's an interesting point about the stalls.

Elizabeth Kim: Yes, the mayor did make another argument, which was about showers. He said that he thought it would be inappropriate for someone who was not biologically male or female to use the opposite gender's shower. That raised the question, which is that there are not that many schools in New York City where children are using showers. I think maybe in some suburban high schools where they have such facilities, maybe kids are showering after gym class. Brian, I went to public school in New York City, and there were showers, but no one ever used them.

I mean, there's just too much going on in the day to allot that time to let kids shower. Perhaps it's something that kids who are involved in sports do afterwards. That also invited a lot of skepticism about what was really behind the mayor's comments. I would say that argument about him trying to maybe deflect. I think there might be credence in that because that is something that he's done before, when he talks about-

Brian Lehrer: Immigration.

Elizabeth Kim: -immigration. Him saying, like, "I don't agree with all of the protections that the city has," and maybe this is along that vein. Right?

Brian Lehrer: Right. While he does defend the city's immigration policies in other ways to Trump and it becomes a complicated mix. We're just talking about the mayor so far on this issue because he's the one who raised it. What about the other candidates? Here's a text, for example, regarding Mamdani. Listener says, "His Muslim base is with Eric on this issue." I don't know if that's true. That's the assertion of a listener. Of course, there are conservatives on this in any religion or cultural group. Has Mamdani taken a position on gender identity in bathrooms? Has Andrew Cuomo? I'm assuming Curtis Sliwa is agreeing with the mayor on this, but what about Mamdani and Cuomo?

Elizabeth Kim: Mamdani came out and criticized the mayor's comments for being an attack on trans students. I think it's clear where he stands on this issue. I'm not sure what Cuomo and Sliwa have said, but then again, this has become an issue of the mayor's own making. There was really no candidate talking about this, or I'm not sure how much this was in the public discourse, either, until the mayor raised it. I'm not sure that it's really catching fire either.

Brian Lehrer: We have more New York City mayoral issues to discuss and developments in the race since last Wednesday, as our political reporter, Elizabeth Kim, does come on with us every Wednesday, and we'll continue to do so through the election to update us on issues and developments in the race. We're going to go on to some of those other issues, take more of your calls and texts as well as we continue after this.

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC with our political reporter Elizabeth Kim as we break down developments and issues in the New York City mayoral race. Endorsements. Will he or won't he? That's the big question for Senator Schumer, and not just Senator Schumer, but he's getting a lot of pressure right now. He has not endorsed the Democratic Party's nominee for mayor, and he got some crowd reaction on that, where this past weekend at the Metropolitan Opera, Liz?

Elizabeth Kim: Exactly, Brian. That's what made us so interested in this story. This is a very big night for opera fans, but also like culture at large, this is the opening night of the season for the Metropolitan Opera, and it's a black tie event. It draws not just opera goers, but also celebrities and prominent New Yorkers like Chuck Schumer. Prior to the performance, Senator Schumer was invited on stage to deliver some remarks. Then, as soon as he takes the stage, he starts getting booed. There's this one dramatic moment that several people pointed to, which was he starts talking about freedom of the press and also the Jimmy Kimmel controversy. Then someone yells, and a lot of people heard it, from my reporting, is, "Do something about it."

There were other things that people started saying, too. I was told by two people who were sitting in the orchestra section that they started hearing loud chants of, "Endorse, endorse." That being Mamdani. They also heard people shouting Mamdani's name, too. Depending on where you were sitting, you heard a lot of things. Because I interviewed several people, like some people who were sitting way up in the rafters, and they told me they definitely heard the woman who said, "Do something about it."

This was a very interesting night at reception for Chuck Schumer. To be fair, it wasn't just people who were booing and yelling at him. He did also get some applause. I was told by one person, they felt like the applause kicked in in response to try to drown out some of the jeering. Everyone who was there said to me it was wild. This is not the reaction that normally happens on opening night at the Met. In the words of one person I interviewed, this is a very prim crowd, but they were not this past Sunday.

Brian Lehrer: It also, I guess, suggests a question of how broad Mamdani's support is. Indicates maybe more broad than some other people think. Of course, he's leading in the polls by a lot consistently, but Andrew Cuomo was leading in the polls consistently until the last minute in the primary. We had that texter who I cited before on the school bathrooms issue, referring to "Mamdani's Muslim base." Mamdani's base is obviously much broader than that. We saw it in who turned out in the primary. We're seeing it in who the polls seem to identify.

I guess when you get this, whatever our stereotype is of a Metropolitan Opera attending crowd, it's probably not the same people who one might stereotype as being in Mamdani's base. It's probably instructive.

Elizabeth Kim: Yes. I started thinking about this, too, Brian. This is not just the city's wealthy. I think that tends to be the stereotype that people who go to opening night at the Met are wealthy people. These are people who are really interested in culture. I think it seems reasonable that these are also people who are interested in politics and possibly progressive politics, too. We should point out that even though Mamdani's platform is directed at helping working and middle-class New Yorkers, he did very well in some districts that are wealthier. Places like the financial district. Park Slope is a classic example.

I think it's just too flat and easy to say that Mamdani-- Poorer New Yorkers are supporting Mamdani, whereas richer New Yorkers are supporting Cuomo. It doesn't cut down those simple lines like that.

Brian Lehrer: Yes. By the way, do you happen to know, just for the fun of it, I don't. What opera were they staging?

Elizabeth Kim: Oh, you're going to-- It's Kavalier, and I'm going to butcher the name.

Brian Lehrer: The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay?

Elizabeth Kim: That's right. I know that it's based on a Michael Chabon novel.

Brian Lehrer: Why was Chuck Schumer on stage for that in the first place?

Elizabeth Kim: Brian, this is a huge cultural event. It's people from high society go, people who want to see and be seen. The New York Times had a whole spread of photographs of who was there. I don't know how often Chuck Schumer goes, I don't know how often he's invited on stage, but it's a big deal. I think, perhaps, he was there that night, and perhaps he's been a patron of the arts and trying to get funding for the arts. I think they thought it was appropriate to have him. He's the dean of the New York delegation to come up and give some remarks.

Brian Lehrer: In the context of why he's not endorsing, it's important to say, and I know you had a good spot on this that's been airing in our newscasts. He isn't just half the Senate delegation from New York. He and Kirsten Gillibrand, he's the minority leader, the majority leader in waiting, should the Democrats defy the odds and take back the Senate next year. His calculus is not just local, right?

Elizabeth Kim: That's right. He's thinking about other races around the country and whether him putting his political capital behind Mamdani would help or hurt those other Democrats in their own elections. He's also thinking about Jewish voters and also donors, like, well-heeled donors and real estate and business, and how they feel towards Mamdani because Mamdani has said he wants to raise personal income taxes on the top 1%. There's a host of reasons why he is wrestling with it. Ironically, The Times came out with a very well-timed article on Friday about Schumer and this decision he faces about Mamdani, and their reporting said that he still hasn't made up his mind yet.

Brian Lehrer: Senator Schumer, just for the record, did endorse another Democratic socialist who won a Democratic mayoral primary back in 2021. Some of our listeners know this story. We covered it on the show at the time. That was in Buffalo, India Walton, who won a Democratic primary, and she went on to lose in the general election to the incumbent Democrat she defeated in the primary, who then ran as an independent. Sound familiar?

Presumably, she held a lot of the same views, and I've gone down a whole list, but she was another Democratic socialist who won a mayoral primary in another big city in New York state, was opposed by the establishment incumbent, and in that case, Schumer did endorse her. Why or what's the difference?

Elizabeth Kim: It's fascinating. Right, Brian? At the time when he endorsed her, it was called a bold move because he was the first of six Democrats in statewide office to even weigh in on the race. This moment, though, I mean, you just have to say it. New York City is not Buffalo. New York City is the largest city in the country. It has a national profile that I think reverberates in quite a different way. I mean, at the time, I think Schumer does have the reputation of wanting to embrace young, up-and-coming Democrats.

I think that that "risk-taking" is what make a lot of people admire Schumer. That is, in part, I think, why his decision around Mamdani is even more interesting to longtime Chuck Schumer endorsers, because, again, it speaks to his own age and this issue of should the Democrats be making way for generational change, but also, how does he lead in this moment? I think historically people have felt that Schumer has been very good about promoting a younger line of up-and-coming Democrats in his party. What does he do in this moment when it's the Democratic mayoral nominee for the largest city in America, and it's also his own city?

Brian Lehrer: Do you think that he's going to have to take sides, one way or another, before the election? Right now, he's not endorsing Mamdani. That, in a way, is taking sides, but he's also not endorsing Cuomo or anybody else. We saw Governor Hochul, who sat on the fence for a long time, now endorsing Mamdani. She placed her bet that way with her reelection coming up next year, reelection campaign. We saw the New York State Democratic chair, Jay Jacobs, an ally of Hochul generally, I think, go the other way.

Of course, he himself is not running for anything, but he probably thinks there's a calculation to be made there, or it's a matter of true belief on his part. I don't know that Mamdani is dangerous, but maybe he's trying to protect the potential campaigns of other Democrats in a New York state election year next year. Hochul went one way, State Democratic Party Chair Jay Jacobs went another way, but they went. Is Schumer going to have to declare and not just try to stay out of it?

Elizabeth Kim: He didn't in 2021. He did not weigh in on the mayoral race the year that Eric Adams won. I mean, after Adams won, he was very supportive of Adams, but you could argue that--

Brian Lehrer: He didn't endorse Eric Adams against Curtis Sliwa in the general election?

Elizabeth Kim: No, he did not. He did not weigh in on the race. You could make the argument that the stakes are very different in this moment. The stakes are different. I mean, Mamdani has been leading in the polls by double digits over Cuomo, so it's looking less competitive than maybe we expected, but the stakes are certainly higher, I think, when you're talking about the party and the establishment and how do they use this moment? Do they use it as a springboard to try to address affordability and some of these other policies that seem very popular among New Yorkers?

I think the pressure is building on Schumer, and I think you saw it vocalize at the Met Opera. This place where you would never expect for him to get booed. This was not some outdoor music festival in Brooklyn, like where it's a free festival where everybody comes and you expect a lot of progressives to show up. This was the Met Opera. I think even though some of the complaints were not about Mamdani, obviously, the woman who yelled at him, "Do something about it," when he was talking about Jimmy Kimmel. All of it related to action. This sense of not taking any action, I think you heard it evidenced in that night, could hurt Schumer. That by just staying out of it, maybe isn't enough for New York Democrats anymore.

Brian Lehrer: Briefly, on the House side, the minority leader and maybe speaker in waiting, Brooklyn Congressman Hakeem Jeffries, seems to be teasing that an endorsement might come soon after he has also been reluctant to endorse the Democratic nominee. Here he is on Sunday on Al Sharpton's MSNBC show.

Hakeem Jeffries: What I will say is, as you pointed out, Governor Hochul endorsed last Sunday. Speaker Carl Heastie endorsed on Wednesday. He got a big endorsement today from a close friend of mine, leader of the Congressional Black Caucus, Congresswoman Clarke. I'll have more to say about the mayor's race sometime soon.

Brian Lehrer: He seems to be, as I say, teasing that an endorsement is coming, I guess, but he's got the same national politics calculation as Schumer. He and Democrats, generally, desperately want to take back the House next year.

Elizabeth Kim: That's right. I think you can read that-- You're right in saying that he's teasing his own endorsement there, and that puts pressure on Schumer as well. I mean, how would it look if then, like you said, Jeffries has the same complicated considerations that he does in trying to win seats in the House and becoming speaker? How would it look for then Schumer to hold out? It seems as if they're all in conversations with one another all the time. That being Hochul, Jacobs, Jeffries, Schumer.

You would think that they should be coming up with a plan where they do this in lockstep, where they have a idea that the governor is going to go first, and then you have these other electeds like you heard Jeffries reference Yvette Clarke. That's right. That's someone who's very, very close to him. When she announced her endorsement, a lot of people said, "Oh, that must mean that Jeffries is going to endorse because she wouldn't do it without having his tacit approval."

Brian Lehrer: I want to go back to the issue we were discussing before, for just a minute, of Mayor Adams coming out against students in the public schools being able to use bathrooms that conform to their gender identities. I think, as we probably reflected a lot of the concern about that by people who don't want people to be able to use the bathrooms that conform to their gender identities, is what might happen to victimize girls in the girls' room by trans girls who were born as boys. Karen in Pompton Plains is calling in with another perspective on that. Karen, you're on WNYC. Thank you for calling.

Karen: Good morning, Brian. I'm a big fan. Yes. My perspective as a person with a family member who's trans male, who's in more danger in the bathroom than a trans male person. Honestly, all he wants to do when he goes to the bathroom is relieve himself. I also wanted to add that recently I was at the Whitney Collection, and a family member was at the Lincoln Center Theater. They have gender neutral bathrooms. Men and women going in and out, and the stall doors are floor to ceiling, and you just go in there, do your business, wash your hands, and everything's fine. What's the problem?

Brian Lehrer: Why do you say, who's in more danger than a trans man or trans boy who obviously started life as a girl in a male bathroom?

Karen: If somebody was going to be assaulted, the ugly idea of rape comes to my mind because what is a person with female plumbing going to be doing in the bathroom, as opposed to a male?

Brian Lehrer: Karen, thank you for your call. We're going to wrap this up with one more schools-related issue. Liz, you wrote about another Mamdani foe, Eva Moskowitz, the founder of the Success Academy Charter School Network, the biggest charter school network in the city. Someone leaked to you a recording of a staff meeting. We'll hear a little of this tape. First, how does support for charter schools fit into the mayoral campaign?

Elizabeth Kim: It fits into the mayoral campaign because Zohran Mamdani has come out and said that he is not in favor of charter schools, he's not in favor of their expansion, and he would also like to see more oversight of charter schools. Similar to what the charter schools did in 2013 when Bill de Blasio was on the cusp of becoming mayor, they decided to hold a massive rally. It was a march across the Brooklyn Bridge. It's basically a show of force to potentially an incoming mayor who is not friendly to charter schools.

It's a fine line because under the law, these charter schools, which are technically non-profits, they can't get involved in electoral politics. Then what happens when you have a leader like Eva Moskowitz, she is the CEO of Success Academy, the city's largest leading charter network, talk about political threats? Even without mentioning Mamdani's name, we know there's only really one candidate in the race who's made it clear that he does not like charters.

Brian Lehrer: Set up this clip for us. This 30-second clip that you brought.

Elizabeth Kim: This is a pretty rare recording. There are not a lot of internal recordings of Moskowitz. This is a very, very-- the culture there is very, very hierarchical. This was when Moskowitz was delivering remarks at what was labeled an emergency meeting. She called an emergency meeting. These were hundreds of staffers. Most of them were administrative, but there were-- I think it was over a hundred new teachers in the room as well. She's basically telling them the expectations for this upcoming rally.

Eva Moskowitz: Second of all, I would just say that I want to reset, and then this goes for teachers as well. When you network are given a directive, I think we're getting a little democratic here. We are quite hierarchical. There is a chain of command, and when your boss asks you to do something, assuming it's not unethical or a question of conscience, you do the task. Are we clear?

Brian Lehrer: That was very clear. Just give us a little more on what individual teachers were doing that Eva Moskowitz considered too democratic. Small 'd' democratic, as she put it.

Elizabeth Kim: These were the expectations for the rally. The expectations were that all staff members had to attend the rally. They were going to cancel school instruction for that day. They wanted all staff members to attend, and they also wanted as many families as they could to attend. They really pressured families. All students were also expected to attend because even though school instruction was canceled, they would still be taking attendance. This went for Success Academy. On top of that, there was also an entire political lobbying effort that they were undertaking.

Moscowitz said that the goal was for the school to send 2 million emails to elected officials. Now, how were they going to accomplish that? By asking all of their staff members and families to send five emails apiece to elected officials. One of the reasons she called this meeting was she was unhappy with the low fulfillment rate among some of the-- she calls them network staffers. These are basically administrator staffers, that not all of them had done it. It was something like only-- she said only 20% of you had done it. This is a moment where she's giving them a talking to and saying that you guys have to do this.

Brian Lehrer: Ordering them to be political activists, sounds like.

Elizabeth Kim: Yes. Although I reached out to Success Academy, and I asked them about this. Like, "Isn't this coercing people to do political activity?" Their response is that, "No. At Success, we have a dual mission. It's to provide quality in classroom instruction, but it's also to do advocacy." Like I said, you can see how the advocacy-- It's a gray area. Right, Brian? Especially in that moment and in that speech, she talks a lot-- she never mentions Mamdani, but she says a lot of times that we are under political threat and political pressure. Everybody in that room, I think, can read in between lines about who she's talking about.

Subsequently, after the rally, state lawmakers called on the state to do an investigation into the rally, into whether or not it did cross a line. Some state lawmakers were not happy, by the way, that they canceled school for this. They're asking whether this is, in fact, a misuse of taxpayer dollars because, again, charter schools, they're privately run, but they're publicly funded.

Brian Lehrer: There we leave it for this week with Liz Kim, WNYC and Gothamist political reporter, who will continue to join us every Wednesday through the election to update us on the New York City mayoral race. Liz, talk to you next Wednesday, if not before.

Elizabeth Kim: Thanks, Brian.

 

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