Title: City Politics: Mamdani Meets With Business Leaders; Cuomo's Officially in the Race

Brian Lehrer: It's the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. Later this hour, we'll look at the new politics of the alleged Jeffrey Epstein client list. If the old politics were President Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi suggesting there was such a list to imply the Democrats were on it, the new politics are why Trump and Bondi are suddenly saying it doesn't exist. Who's covering what up now?

Also today, the human rights activist and former world chess champion, Garry Kasparov. He is now host of the podcast Autocracy in America. With this year's Emmy nominations released yesterday, we'll have a call in for you to share TV show tips from the last year. What have you been watching that you'd like to turn our other listeners on to? TV is so diffused now with so many streaming services in addition to the old networks. A community share on quality television, according to you, is definitely in order.

All that is coming up, but we begin by continuing our coverage of the New York City mayoral race. Our ace political reporters, Brigid Bergin and Elizabeth Kim, are both here to discuss developments such as Zohran Mamdani now says he will discourage use of the term "globalize the intifada." Andrew Cuomo gets back into the race as an independent and starts campaigning differently from how he did in the primary that he lost, and Eric Adams is denied public matching funds again by the city's campaign finance board for failing to provide documents to show he's not corrupt.

With those headlines as a starting point, here are Liz Kim, who joins us on Mayoral Politics every Wednesday, and Brigid Bergin this week as well. Happy Wednesday, Liz and Brigid. So glad you are crashing the party.

Brigid Bergin: I love to crash a party.

Elizabeth Kim: Good morning, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Liz, you have brand new reporting on Mamdani and globalize the intifada, I see. What can you tell us?

Elizabeth Kim: This was news that came out of a meeting that Mamdani had with the city's business community. This was a meeting that was put together by Kathryn Wylde, who heads the Partnership for New York City, a business advocacy group. It was at the behest of Mamdani, who is looking to consolidate support from various stakeholders in New York City business, and also other Democrats. He has this meeting. It's the first of actually two meetings. He's expected to have another meeting today, but there was a lot of attention paid to this meeting. How would a democratic socialist be received by the titans of industry in New York City?

There were about 130 CEOs and senior executives in the room, and the main headline, which was a story that the New York Times broke late last night, was that Mamdani spoke about his relationship to the Jewish community, and he said that he would discourage the use of that slogan, globalize the intifada. Now, just to give listeners some more context on this, this controversy erupted days late into the primary, just like days before the actual election. This was around an interview that he gave to the Bulwark podcast in which he was asked about phrases like this, phrases that are used in the pro-Palestinian movement, and how he felt about them.

He did not condemn the use of the phrase, and that was really what the controversy centered on. He said that he himself does not use the phrase and that he hears it differently from people who are offended by it. He says he hears it as a call for equality, not violence. Like I said, it really create a firestorm of controversy because Jewish leaders came out and criticized him for it. His main rival, Andrew Cuomo, came out and criticized him for it, and this controversy has just never left. Even after his stunning victory in the primary, it has lingered.

I think some people would argue it has actually grown. He's expected to meet with Representative Hakeem Jeffries on Friday, and there was a report on Monday that Jeffries said that one of the issues he wanted to discuss with him was his concern over what he has said about phrases like this, globalizing the antifada. I asked him about it on Monday. He kind of sidestepped the question, but here again, we see that it came up, and now that he is, in fact, I guess you can say, moderating his stance on this, I think the question, though, is and I spoke to Kathy Wylde about this this morning is what in practice does this mean that he says he's going to discourage the use? Is he going to come out with a statement? Is he going to have a speech?

I reached out to the campaign last night and this morning, and they didn't respond, but I think that is sort of the next step that we're waiting to hear from the candidate himself. He gave these remarks behind closed doors in a meeting, but I think now the broader public wants to know exactly what does this mean? What will he say to the broader public?

Brian Lehrer: Right. On the context you were giving about how he said this first, when he was asked to condemn the phrase on the Bulwark podcast, he was on this show just a few days after that. I brought it up and he gave basically the same answer. This was just the day before primary day. Let me replay what he said on this show about his answer on that show that apparently didn't satisfy a lot of people.

Zohran Mamdani: I was speaking about the word itself and the ways in which that word, as you're speaking to, has a variety of meanings to a variety of people. That is not language that I use. The language that I use is that of clarity, and I do not believe it is the mayor's position to be policing language in a manner that we are seeing in this moment, where Donald Trump does so much of the same with so much of the language across this country. Ultimately, however, I know that this is a moment when many Jewish New Yorkers are fearful and are concerned, and I've had many of those conversations. I know that what we need, especially in a leader, is a language of clarity. That is what I've always sought to do.

Brian Lehrer: Zohran Mamdani here last month. Liz, he's expressing a vibe of solidarity with all New Yorkers, but twice in that answer, he said the language he uses is the language of clarity. The problem turned out to be precisely that his explanation wasn't clear enough for many people. For example, Comptroller Brad Lander, who most of you know, is one of Mamdani's most prominent supporters. Lander said on the Pod Save America podcast just this week, "Maybe you don't mean to say it's open season on Jews everywhere in the world, but that's what I hear." Even for Brad Lander, Mamdani had not been speaking the language of clarity, as he called it on the show. Is there any response to his new remarks yet?

Elizabeth Kim: That's exactly right, Brian, and that is why when Mamdani-- he was holding one of several rallies that he held this week on Monday, and I put the question to him. I said, looking back, because this story has not died. I said, "Is there something you regret about the answer you gave to the Bulwark podcasters?" because, not only has the issue not died, but there is now this continuing misperception and misreporting that he himself uses the phrase and embraces that slogan.

In fact, he said to you, "That is not what I use. My language always is clear." He's also gone on to say something else that I think is interesting, but also I think problematic, which is he says that, "I don't want to police language." Now, having covered Mayor Adams, this has been an issue that has been put in front of mayors in general, right? There's always a question, "So and so on the city council said XYZ," or "So and so in your administration said this," right? Something controversial. "Do you condemn it?"

It's actually interesting to me because when Mamdani said, "I don't want to police language," it really echoed the way Adams often handles questions like that, in which he says, "I don't want to be the language police," which was something he said really early on when people were were asking him about ex-controversial thing, either he said or someone in his circle said.

I think this will be a recurring theme for any mayor is how do they respond to language that is used by their supporters, people in their base. They're going to be asked, "How do you feel about this?" I don't know that people will be satisfied by saying that, "I use the language of clarity, but I don't want to police other people's language." I don't know that because it was not satisfactory when Adam said it.

Brian Lehrer: Well, we'll find out over time what people's reaction is. Let me cite one person who has now come into the Mamdani camp who wasn't originally over issues like this. It's Congressman Jerrold Nadler. Nadler had endorsed Andrew Cuomo in the primary and is now a Mamdani supporter. I'm going to play a clip of Nadler on this show at the time, this is before primary day. He cited Mamdani's position on Israel as a primary reason. Here it is.

Congressman Jerrold Nadler: I couldn't support Zohran Mamdani for a number of reasons. Number one, his criticism of Israel for committing genocide, which I think is wrong. His support, well before this war, for the boycott, divestment, and sanctions campaign against Israel, which is really a campaign against Israel's existence.

Brian Lehrer: That was Jerrold Nadler here in early June. Brigid, I'll bring you in on this one. Now he is supporting Mamdani against Cuomo and the others in the race. That clip was fairly definitive-sounding, right? "I couldn't support Mamdani for a number of reasons." What changed?

Brigid Bergin: I think there's a recognition that the voters in the city of New York have spoken. It's a similar explanation as what we heard from Congressman Adriano Espaillat when he offered his endorsement of Mamdani just last week. He sort of alluded to similar issues. He said the Democratic Party is a big tent. We may not agree on all issues, but the Democratic voters have spoken in this race, and they overwhelmingly have supported Mamdani as the Democratic candidate for mayor. Therefore, these are officials who are coming along and showing their support as well.

I know that Congressman Nadler, who was a big supporter of Scott Stringer also in that primary race, convened a meeting with Mamdani and some Jewish leaders. I think that those kinds of conversations are going to be very important as we move towards the general election. More to the point to what you and Liz were talking about, I think that there is a real effort on the part of the Mamdani campaign that we are starting to see through that meeting yesterday with the partnership to try and reframe the message around this phrase, and I think ideally, in their view, turn the page and move on to other parts of this conversation.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, one question for you is, if you backed Andrew Cuomo in the primary over Zohran Mamdani, do you think you'll vote for Cuomo again in November, or have you switched to Mamdani for the general as the Democratic nominee? As we will discuss, many unions and elected Democrats have. We've been discussing that already, Jerrold Nadler as an example. 212-433-WNYC. I know this is brand new, but with this new word, discourage use of the term globalize the Intifada, understanding how it's taken, even if it doesn't necessarily mean commit violence against Jews. Does that satisfy you if this has been a concern for you? 212-433-WNYC. 212-433-9692.

Of course, that's not the only issue. Maybe if you own a business, after the meeting with business leaders yesterday, are you convinced enough that Mamdani's form of democratic socialism just means more fairness in our tax and economic system, as he would argue, not that he wants to destroy your business or run you out or anything like that, or any reaction to any candidate in the race, or questions for our reporters Liz Kim and Brigid Bergin. 212-433-WNYC. 212-433-9692.

Well, we'll get to Cuomo in a couple of minutes, which was actually going to be the centerpiece of this segment in the first place, but now there's all this breaking Mamdani news from last night and this morning. The other piece of it is that he met with business leaders yesterday to try to calm some of their fears about his democratic socialism being a threat. Liz, you told us that meeting was brokered by Kathy Wylde, who represents New York's big business community as leader of the group Partnership for New York City.

You brought us another new clip of Mamdani. What you got?

Elizabeth Kim: This was an event. It was an event in which DC 37, the city's largest municipal union, announced that they were endorsing Mamdani yesterday. No surprise. What was interesting is this event was literally just hours ahead of his meeting with these business executives. He was asked a lot about what he expected to happen, what he expected to say. One of the questions, and one of the more controversial parts of his policy planks is his proposal to raise taxes on the rich and corporations.

Now, this is not something that a mayor has the power to do, but he can try to move the conversation around it and build support for it in Albany. This is a very, very critical part of his campaign because in order to fund all these popular initiatives that he ran on, things like free buses, universal pre-K, government-owned grocery stores, his plan, it's really contingent on generating revenue, and that revenue, he says, should be generated by taxing the rich and corporations.

What I heard in his press conference yesterday was something different. He's now trying to reframe it. I thought that was very interesting because he's trying to reframe it like a relative tax increase. I brought you some of what he said exactly about it.

Zohran Mamdani: The financial plan that I've put forward is one that would still have the top 1% of New Yorkers, the top category of corporations who are making millions of dollars in profit, paying less in taxes than they did before Donald Trump's first administration.

Brian Lehrer: That's interesting.

Elizabeth Kim: It's interesting because-- and I want to credit James Parrott. He was a chief economist. He worked for Mayor Dinkins. I had had a conversation with him about this plan to tax the rich, and he brought up a very good point, which is-- so under Donald Trump, and this is going back to the first Trump administration, rich people and corporations got tax breaks. Those tax breaks were set to expire. What has now happened under Trump's domestic policy law, which was passed, signed into law this month, is that those tax breaks now become permanent.

It is possible to then make the argument that this is an unexpected windfall for very, very rich New Yorkers, and I'm talking about the top 1% and corporations, of course. Would it not be possible for a candidate like Mamdani to start making the argument, "Hey, this is an unexpected windfall. I'm asking you to sacrifice perhaps a portion of that windfall. You will still be better off than before Trump first took office."

I think it's a question, though, how people in those income brackets would receive it. Would they say, "Sure, I think you can also argue that people who have been receiving those tax breaks want to keep them, which is exactly why Donald Trump is giving it to them, but it's an argument-- it creates room for Mamdani, not so much to negotiate with business leaders, but with the lawmakers that he'll be talking to about this policy, "Can we not look at this windfall?" especially if it's coming on the backs of people who receive food stamps or Medicaid, for example, because that is also part and parcel of how these tax breaks are being funded, is through cuts to the social safety net.

Brian Lehrer: Here is Kathy Wylde from that business group who brokered this meeting with Mamdani, speaking after the meeting.

Kathryn Wylde: The prospects of him being a mayor, I think, are much less scary to them than before they met him because he is a good communicator, a thoughtful person, and genuinely seems to want to understand and know them and their issues.

Brian Lehrer: That's a pretty supportive response. Does that surprise you coming from Kathy Wylde? How do you interpret that?

Elizabeth Kim: She said that shortly after she came out of that meeting. I spoke to her again this morning, and I think you should keep in mind that she's really a facilitator here, and she's trying to do something for not just Mamdani, but also her members. There were around 130 people in that room, and she told me this morning that she's still hearing from them. She reiterated that, yes, overall, the reaction was that they found him smarter and more personable than maybe they expected. At the same time, she did say to me it did not make them more comfortable with his policies. I think one of the policies in which they have a sharp disagreement on is this plan to raise taxes on the rich.

Brian Lehrer: We're going to take a break and then continue. We're going to talk to some of our callers who have various points of view on what we've been discussing so far, as you might imagine, and we're going to shift the emphasis to Cuomo and what's been happening with him the last few days. There, we will shift the emphasis from Liz, who's been reporting mostly on Mamdani, to Brigid, who's been reporting mostly on Cuomo this week.

I do want to issue one correction. Talking about Jerrold Nadler, I said that he had supported Cuomo in the primary. Actually, he had supported Scott Stringer. That clip that we played of him saying he couldn't support Zohran Mamdani, of course, stands as his position at that time. He was supporting Scott Stringer in the primary, not supporting Andrew Cuomo. Now he's supporting Mamdani. All right, we'll continue with all this as we cover the mayoral race in just a minute. Brian Lehrer with Brigid Bergin and Liz Kim on WNYC.

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Brian Lehrer on WNYC. As we continue to talk about developments in the mayoral race, moving on to Andrew Cuomo, and then we'll take some phone calls and some texts, Brigid, you covered Cuomo's reentry video and then he went on New York 1 last night, which is something that he did not do, I believe, during the entire primary. He did come on this show on the day before the primary, and now he's apparently going to campaign differently.

We have a good example of how he's going to campaign differently. Why is it good? Because he says it in his own words. It's a good indication that he's going to campaign differently. You reported on the first part of his video released on Monday where he apologized to supporters for letting him down by losing the primary. Here's the last 15 seconds of the video where he seems to announce that he will be campaigning in exactly the opposite way of how he did before.

Zohran Mamdani: Every day I'm going to be hitting the streets, meeting you where you are to hear the good and the bad, problems and solutions, because for the next few months, it's my responsibility to earn your vote. Let's do this. I'll see you out there.

Brian Lehrer: Brigid, give us your analysis of that clip and his announcement.

Brigid Bergin: Well, I think, definitely, as you noted, it's an extreme departure, a 180 from how the campaign ran during the primary. I will note that since that video on Monday, Cuomo's done a series of one-on-one interviews with some various television stations, New York Magazine. The campaign hasn't actually held a public event yet. He hasn't spoken to an unfiltered gaggle of reporters to just take questions of any type on anything related to the news of [unintelligible 00:23:55] how he plans to conduct his new campaign.

He's had some structured, very interesting conversations with some insight and some self-reflection about mistakes that they made during the primary campaign, acknowledging just very bluntly that they didn't run a good campaign, that they had advisors who showed them data that they were well ahead in the polls, and then that kind of drove their strategy more than, as he said, particularly in that New York 1 interview, debunking some of the policy proposals that Assemblyman Mamdani was proposing, which she is extremely, extremely critical of.

I think it is a little too soon to tell if this is a fully rebooted Andrew Cuomo, and I think it's also very difficult to reboot your campaign when you've already been running since March a certain way, and a large portion of the electorate has assessed your campaign. We know, based on the primary results, didn't like what they saw. Does he offer some new proposals? Is he really going to be out there shaking hands, being a candidate who is kind of in the thick of it?

I draw the contrast in my own mind between that last Friday before primary day, Assemblymember Mamdani had gone through a very difficult news cycle. It was the beginning of what has continued to be the cycle around the globalize the intifada phrase. Instead of kind of going indoors and cooling off and letting the last weekend of early voting kind of come and go, he decided to walk the length of Manhattan with voters and reporters, and just kind of a sense of open access.

I don't know if it's reasonable to expect really any other candidate to do something like that. I'm not sure that it's absolutely necessary, but that kind of openness is something that really we haven't seen from Cuomo in any campaign I can remember. If he starts to do more things like that, I think that will be a significant departure from what we saw during the primary.

Brian Lehrer: Any reaction yet from some of the groups, like some of the unions or elected officials who had endorsed Cuomo before but have now flipped to Mamdani, Congressman Espaillat, the Brooklyn Democratic Party chair, Rodneyse Bichotte Hermelyn, unions like 32BJ?

Brigid Bergin: I think what we've seen the day after Cuomo reentered the race on Monday, the Mamdani campaign launched another video with Assemblymember Bichotte Hermelyn walking with Mamdani through Little Haiti in Brooklyn, and very much in the style of their videos, a lot of interacting with voters, sampling different foods, a little kind of playful back and forth forth about the pronunciation of his name.

They have cultivated a certain style and a certain way of presenting their candidate, and they've remained consistent with that. The day after, again, Cuomo got into the race, Mamdani held that rally with DC 37, the city's largest municipal workers' union. It's a union that had supported him as a ranked-choice candidate in the primary. He was not their number one, and now they are all in for Mamdani. Certainly, other unions that have come out to support him since, we saw the musicians' union come out in support of him on Monday, the Hotel, Game, and Trade Council. I get their new name wrong sometimes, Brian, so I have to slow my brain down, and 32BJ.

These unions came out immediately in support of Mamdani after his primary win, and nothing seems to have changed there. Now, one of the segments of unionized workforce that Cuomo had a lot of support from during the primary were the building trades, and it's been very quiet on that front. It would not surprise me if the Cuomo relaunch campaign decided to have an event at the Carpenter Unions Hall, which is just around the corner from our station here on Varick Street. Some of those building trade unions folks were out there supporting him again. In terms of unions that had supported him, that have already shown their support from Mamdani, nothing has changed now that Cuomo's back in the race.

Brian Lehrer: Listener texts, "Has Cuomo been to a mosque yet?" Of course, Brigid, that refers to the question that our New York 1 colleague, Errol Louis, in the debate that he and I helped to moderate, asked Cuomo-- Errol Louis asked Cuomo about reports that he had never been to a mosque in his 10 years as governor, and he could not recall any time that he had been. Now it's over a month after that debate, and he's still campaigning. Do you know? Has he been to a mosque yet?

Brigid Bergin: It's an excellent question and one I know we will ask him. As I said, the campaign's not putting out a public schedule. They are doing some curated media appearances. It's more than we saw during the primary. They are interesting conversations worthy of people's attention, but we have not seen the candidate emerge in some new on-the-ground way where you might bump into a metro subway stop. I think, if and when, and I stress the when because I think it's highly unlikely that he won't visit a mosque before the general election, but I think the day he does, we will all be very aware of it, particularly given that question.

At this point, they would say they've only been back at this for about two days. I think I would temper that by noting that this is something that we did expect, particularly over the last 10 days or so. Your conversation with Jim Walden on Monday where the independent mayoral candidate talked about this poll proposal that he had floated about 10 days ago where all of the independent "free market" candidates should consider who is doing the best in September and then whoever's in the lead, everyone else should drop out and support that candidate, that is something that he really floated out there.

Then we saw that press conference a week ago Monday with Republican John Catsimatidis, former Democratic Governor David Paterson, kind of trying to give some boost to that idea. At that time, Cuomo's spokesperson, Rich Azzopardi, put out a statement kind of validating that idea, saying that they thought it was a good idea. Cuomo again reiterated his support for that idea during that conversation with Errol Louis on New York 1 last night. He went so far as to say if come September, Mayor Eric Adams is the one who's in the lead, then God bless him, go forth, and suggested that he would drop out.

I thought in the answer he also implied that Adams was also supporting that idea, which thus far, I don't think we've had any indication that Mayor Adams is in any way supportive of this idea. It will be very interesting to watch if that's something that comes to pass come September, if there's some actual poll that looks at these independent candidates and determines who should be the person to go one-on-one against Mamdani in November.

Brian Lehrer: Let's get to a couple of the calls reacting to Mamdani now saying he will discourage use of the term globalize the intifada. I'll just say, because I don't want to get bogged down in this as the only thing that we take calls on or talk about for the rest of the segment. We've already moved on to some of the other issues facing Cuomo, and I still want to get to issues facing Eric Adams that are new in the last day as well.

As you could imagine, this is a hot button in our call. I'll just say our callers are all over the map on this with strong feelings that range from we shouldn't even be talking about it to they are not satisfied with this new position as being enough of withdrawal of support of language that, no matter how he means it, winds up making Jews less safe. Let's just get a couple of callers on representing that range. Mary in Somerset, you're on WNYC. Hello, Mary.

Mary: Hi, Brian, how are you? I just wanted to say I have very active and influential Jewish friends on both sides who are very concerned about what's going and against what's going on in Gaza, and then those that really feel the antisemitism that's been on the rise, professor at Columbia, so forth. I was talking to my partner who's a journalist. He mentioned it's about the weaponization of the word. This is my understanding. I'm not overly educated about this, but the word has been co-opted by groups that have been very violent, but that the greater context of that word, intifada, is the struggle of the Palestinian people in their land, historically.

It's not unlike how the word crusades represented the real struggle of Christians, but at times was associated with real violence. Now it's used casually for sports teams. He had also sent me an article that said at the title, social scientists should resist the distortions of language that are misshaping perceptions of the war in Gaza. I just wanted to offer that.

Brian Lehrer: Right. To you, it's a weaponization of the word by opponents of Mamdani to emphasize the worst meaning of the word, which he never said that he means. Is that what you mean by weaponization?

Mary: Yes, and not just by his opponents. I think it's a misunderstanding in our society at large because, unfortunately, there are real legitimate struggles going on on all sides, and to ignore the history and the context of it, then you're weaponizing it. It really ignores the original meaning of these words. As Maya Angelou said, words have power, and so this word unfortunately has been weaponized, not just by his opponents. I think there's a greater lack of awareness of that word.

Brian Lehrer: Mary, thank you very much. Sandra in Riverdale with I think a different point of view. Sandra, you're on WNYC. Hello.

Sandra: Thank you, and hello, Brian. I'm a very strong supporter of you and the program, but I am disturbed about Mr. Mamdani and his take on things, especially with the Jewish community. I don't think there's much argument that antisemitism is definitely on the rise, not just in the United States, but everywhere, and I believe that Mamdani uses the word clarity and he wants to explain things well.

To me, the use of his to quote him, he's going to discourage the use of globalize the intifada and discourage, that is a wishy washy way of not coming out and saying what I think some people like me are hoping that he would be much stronger and much more understanding of the real fear of the Jewish population. We have seen these things happen before as antisemitism rises.

By the way, you criticized Cuomo, and I think it was-- not you, but the speaker criticized or mentioned that Cuomo has not visited a mosque, which I think is absolutely wrong, and he should. Mamdani, even before he is possibly the mayor of this city, has said he doesn't plan to visit Israel. That's okay, but that's a very interesting comment when there are so many Jewish people in New York and around the world who believe that it's an important country to visit.

Brian Lehrer: Got it.

Sandra: I'm very [inaudible 00:37:58]

Brian Lehrer: Thank you very much. Two different points of view on that. We're going to leave that there for now and see how this story develops, except to say-- well, here's another text, Liz. Listener writes, "Seriously, the astronomical cost of living in New York City is literally driving particularly non-white people out of the city. The news out of the meeting between the leading mayoral candidate Mamdani and the wealthiest business owners in the city is not anything related to affordability, but Mamdani saying he wouldn't use a certain phrase."

How much was that the centerpiece last night, and how much-- I know you weren't in the meeting. It was a closed-door meeting, but how much does your reporting indicate that the business leaders had any better solution to the cost of living in New York City than Mamdani is offering that they feel threatened by?

Elizabeth Kim: This was not the only issue that was discussed, but it was something that Kathy Wylde, and she said it on our air, that was discussed in depth. I think we can read into that, that she means that they had a long discussion about it. Of course, they discussed affordability. Of course, they discussed his tax proposal. Of course, they discussed affordable housing. There were real estate developers in the room who wanted to give their ideas.

Like I said, this has been a story. This has been a controversy. For Mamdani, he sees it as a distraction. Absolutely. This is not what his campaign is about. We've talked about this. How much should foreign policy dominate the conversation for a mayoral race, right? I think it's undeniable that this is an issue of importance, not just to the Jewish community, but to the Democrats.

Like I said, heading into this meeting that he is going to have with Congressman Jeffries, Jeffries came out and said this is something he wants to talk to Mamdani about. He has concerns, so it's not going away. I asked Kathy whether his choice of the words discourage, discouraging the use of the word, whether that felt sufficient to her audience, and she said people were divided about that. She said there were many people who felt it wasn't enough.

Brian Lehrer: What could he do? He can't outlaw the use of a word as mayor. I don't think any mayor would want to outlaw the use of any word, but what more could he do, according to those critics?

Elizabeth Kim: I think that what some people would like to see him say is that he would condemn that kind of language, and to use exactly that phrase, "I condemn the use of that language," which is stronger than discourage, but this is a dilemma for him. He is part of a movement. We need to understand, he is part of the pro-Palestinian movement. He has been a very vocal critic of Israel and its treatment of Palestinians. This is not something that he can just easily back away from.

I think back to the rally he had with AOC, and during that rally, there was a speaker whose-- and it was one of many speakers, and they touched on a lot of issues, right? Affordability, that got applause. One of the moments that got the greatest applause was when someone said, "We will free Palestine." Again, I think, his campaign says, "Our campaign is focused on affordability," but I think it's a little disingenuous, too, because he is part of this movement, and there's no denying it.

How does he thread the needle here without offending his base? I think one of the callers made some really legitimate points that I think Mamdani would agree with. It's not just this one phrase, globalizing the intifada. It's other phrases like free Palestine, from the river to the sea. At what point does--

Brian Lehrer: He hasn't been out there saying those either, right, with other people?

Elizabeth Kim: He hasn't been out there saying it either, but you can see how this could become a slippery slope for him, right? Then it becomes a never-ending cascade of questions about, "Well, what about this slogan and that slogan?" Perhaps what he's saying is he doesn't want to get into it, and that's what he means by, "I don't want to police this language." He's also intimated what the caller Mary said, which is that he feels that opponents of the pro-Palestinian movement are seizing on these types of slogans to try to muzzle protest.

Brian Lehrer: One follow-up, and I don't know if you have reporting on this yet or if anybody does, but where it potentially becomes relevant to him being mayor at a policy level, and the independent candidate, Jim Walden, brought this up on the show on Monday, and I don't honestly know the answer to it. When Mamdani was in the assembly or he is in the assembly, one of the things that he did in the state assembly was introduce a bill that would punish certain groups that donated to causes that help Israeli settlers in the West Bank do things that are considered illegal under international law.

Jim Walden said, if he did that in the assembly, that's an indication that he is going to use the mayoralty in part to pursue pro-Palestinian policies, not just to have sympathy with his words or his feelings, but that there would be policies that he would enact as mayor of New York that are relevant and that might be controversial in that way. Do you know if he said anything about what he would do? Would he do something similar as mayor? Is he introduced in the assembly or anything like that?

Elizabeth Kim: No, I have not heard that, but I think that that is an excellent question to put to him, which is, I think it translates, as mayor, how would you handle contracts, for example, with Israeli companies? It was something I talked to Kathy Wylde about, and this was prior to the meeting. I don't know if it came up during the meeting, but I think it was definitely something on Kathy Wylde's mind.

Brian Lehrer: All right. To be continued, I guess on that, and on the economy, with more unions who back Cuomo in the primary now lining up behind Mamdani, one example is the powerful building services union, 32BJ, which had supported Cuomo, now with Mamdani. Here's Mamdani at a rally with them after the announcement of their support on July 2nd.

Zohran Mamdani: To stand here alongside these unions, it's especially meaningful for me because this entire campaign has been about ensuring that this city, the most expensive city in the United States of America, finally become affordable for the working New Yorkers who make it so special. To take on inequality, we know the most effective tool is union density.

Brian Lehrer: Most effective tool is union density. Brigid, why did so many unions in the first place back Cuomo rather than the more socialist, which by definition is more union-friendly candidate in the first place, and why have some big ones like 32BJ switched? For that matter, I realize I'm giving you three questions at once here, but does Cuomo have a competitive set of platform planks to enhance affordability in New York that he would match and say, "These are better than Mamdani's"?

Brigid Bergin: To your first question, I think a lot of these unions supported Cuomo initially because he was Andrew Cuomo. He was governor of the state of New York, attorney general. They knew how powerful he has been. When he entered the race, even before he launched his campaign, some of the polls that were being conducted about him kind of considering showed him in the lead. These are organizations that I think wanted to serve their members and saw him as the likely winner, as many people did, as I think Cuomo's own campaign did.

I think the reason many of them have since switched, it's kind of straightforward, Mamdani was the winner, and he didn't just eke it out. He won by more than 12 points. There was a ranked choice tabulation that was released just yesterday that shows that the result is now up to 12.8 points was his victory over Cuomo. I think they understand that Mamdani really does have the wind at his back going into the general election.

Now, a lot can happen between now and November. However, this is still a city where Democrats outnumber Republicans by about six to one. Certainly, there's a large number, more than a million unaffiliated voters who couldn't participate in either of the primaries, in a Republican or Democratic primary, but it's going to take a lot of peeling off support from people who might have supported other candidates in the primary as well as building support among some of these independents and Republicans for Cuomo to be successful.

Now, to your point, he does still have some support. He has not lost necessarily the support of some of the building trades. We haven't heard them come out yet for Mamdani or Curtis Sliwa, or Jim Walden, or Eric Adams. Part of that is because one of the things that Cuomo will say is his solution to affordability is that there needs to be rapid development. He will point to the capital projects he was able to complete as governor, building LaGuardia Airport in four years.

When you dig a little bit into the details about how he wants to do some of the development, in terms of housing development to address some of these housing affordability issues, it starts to get a little bit sticky in terms of what can the mayor do, what are some of the limitations of the office, perhaps limitations that he's not as used to, didn't experience in the same way when he was in the governor's office, including some of the restraints imposed by the state itself, laws that limit what the city can do without state approval. I think we're going to get into some of those conversations more in-depth.

One of the things I do think we will hear consistently from Cuomo throughout this campaign is a pulling apart of some of the proposals that Mamdani is running on and trying to say that these things are just not possible. When he says freeze the rent, that voters hear that and they think he means every voter in New York City, when in fact, he's speaking specifically about tenants in rent-stabilized apartments, of which there are about two million, and that is a subset of the rental market here in New York City. I think we'll hear a lot more of that between now and November.

Brian Lehrer: Certainly here as well as other places. That's our conversation about the mayoral race for today. We're not going to talk about it again until tomorrow when Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa is going to make his first appearance on the show for this election cycle. That'll be on tomorrow's Brian Lehrer show. For today, we thank Brigid Bergin and Liz Kim, our political reporters. Thank you both.

Elizabeth Kim: Thanks, Brian.

Brigid Bergin: Thanks.

 

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