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Brigid Bergin: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. I'm Brigid Bergin, senior reporter in the WNYC and Gothamist newsroom. Good morning, everyone. Coming up on today's show, we'll talk with Julie Rovner from KFF Health News on how the domestic policy bill just passed in the Senate will affect health care, including major cuts to Medicaid. Now, the House is taking up the bill, where there are reportedly some skeptical Republicans. We'll see if they're able to pass it before the July 4th deadline, which President Trump has made clear is his deadline.

Plus, we'll take a deeper dive into what my guest calls the "Mamdani Coalition." The writer and researcher, Michael Lang, has looked closely at the demographics of neighborhoods and voters. He'll explain how the assembly member was able to deliver his resounding win in the Democratic mayoral primary. We'll wrap today's show with some useful information about just how bad the tick season is this year. My guest will share some advice on how to avoid a bite and what to do if you find a tick in your skin.

To start things off, we take a deep dive into city politics. What a week it has been. There's a new city budget, new ranked-choice primary results, newly official Democratic nominees for mayor, city comptroller, and more, and a new general election campaign season launching into full swing. Joining me now to talk about all of these developments and more is my colleague, WNYC and Gothamist politics reporter Elizabeth Kim, who joins the show each week to talk about the latest out of City Hall and the campaign trail. Liz, great to have you here this morning as always.

Elizabeth Kim: Good morning, Brigid. Listeners probably don't know, but Brigid and I sit next to each other. I really feel like this conversation is bringing the conversation we have, where we're sitting next to each other, to the studio.

Brigid Bergin: I agree. I hope listeners enjoy it because I know you and I can talk for a while. Listeners, do you have a question about New York City politics? Are you wondering about this shift from a primary campaign to the general election and how it's shaping up? A big part of the primary was, of course, ranked-choice voting. We saw a huge uptick in voters engaging with the system. Were you one of them? Tell us about your experience, or do you have another question for me or my colleague, Liz Kim? Give us a call.

The number is 212-433-WNYC. That's 212-433-9692. You can call or text at that number. Okay, Liz, so let's start with those ranked-choice results we saw yesterday. I was talking with our friend, Steve Romalewski, from the CUNY Graduate Center right before the results were proposed yesterday. I was a little excited. I like my election data, but you were down at City Hall, so how did people respond to seeing Assemblymember Zohran Mamdani's lead grow to 12 points over Andrew Cuomo?

Elizabeth Kim: This is interesting because if you are really following this race, if you are really following ranked-choice, you felt a little bit of a letdown, because the real question on your mind is, where did the cross-endorsements go? How did that work? How were the votes transferred? Did this idea of a slate that the Working Families Party proposed, did that hold? How effective was it? How effective was the Don't Rank Cuomo campaign?

I think these were questions that were not answered yesterday. In the words of one person who spoke to me, he said, "The Board of Elections, they didn't show their work." I think that's the work people want to see. We want to see how many of Brad Lander's two votes went to Zohran Mamdani. That was the cross-endorsement I was referring to, right? There were some takeaways, which I thought we could talk about.

This was a very commanding and decisive victory. Compare it to four years ago, when Adams won by less than 8,000 votes, right? Now, this was a 12-point victory. The 8,000 margin that Adams won by was less than 1%, so that's less than one point, right? Clearly, Mamdani can, and he already has, make the argument that he has a mandate. The other thing that immediately people started texting me about was we exceeded one million votes, and that's history because we haven't seen that since 1989.

A lot of that is because we expanded the electorate, which is a story that you've been all over on due to younger voters under 30 and also first-time voters. Another takeaway. This really was a two-person race. We were saying that as we got closer to the primary, because that's what polls were indicating, but we saw that only 5% of people who voted didn't rank either Cuomo or Mamdani.

Brigid Bergin: That number of expired ballots, only 52,000, so 5% of the total, was really pretty surprising. Back in 2021, I think it was 15% of ballots didn't have Adams or Garcia on the final ballot. To me, it also means that people are engaging with ranked-choice voting in a new way. It could also be a signal that when a coalition of folks targets a single candidate and then instructs everyone to fill out their ballot in all five slots and leave that candidate off, it's a pretty effective tool to thwart at least that one candidate.

Elizabeth Kim: That's right.

Brigid Bergin: That's certainly something we saw with Cuomo. What do you think the results mean for the Cuomo campaign? They put out a statement yesterday that was both gracious in the sense that they thanked their supporters, acknowledged how Mamdani had grown the electorate, but then there was a barb in there talking about how this was extreme views that only reflected a part of the electorate and that they were still thinking about their future. What do you make of that?

Elizabeth Kim: Just when we came on, I saw a tweet that Al Sharpton was on MSNBC, saying that he had advised Cuomo not to run in November. Given that Cuomo's base was working-class people, were Black voters, that, I have to think, is a huge blow to Cuomo's campaign. Even before that, I think it's hard to see what is the case he makes given this commanding 12-point victory that Mamdani has secured.

Without Sharpton, without Black voters, the path becomes even more narrow. Even the bigger question before all of that, in which we've talked about, is, does he have the appetite? Does he have the energy to run a citywide campaign because he didn't for the primary, right? Heading into this general election, would we be seeing a new Cuomo? How would he retool his messaging, for example? These are all questions, I think, that the campaign needs to take a hard look at in the coming days and decide.

Brigid Bergin: Well, we're going to get into some of those other issues in more detail, but I want to talk for a moment about Mayor Adams, because now that we are past the primary, as we have talked about before, the mayor is running for reelection. He just opted not to run in the Democratic primary. He didn't want the Democratic line. He's going to run on his own independent party line. He formally kicked off his campaign at City Hall last week. What was the scene like there?

Elizabeth Kim: He had over 100 people on the steps of City Hall. The campaign was saying hundreds. It's just doing in a ballpark estimate. I think it's safe to say it was definitely over 100, which I think is impressive. If we remember, just a few months ago, the mayor was struggling under this corruption indictment, which ultimately did get dismissed, right? He's assembling over 100 people. It's a little chaotic, I have to say. There were hecklers, but I have to say it was a vintage Eric Adams rally.

Mayor Eric Adams: Listen, all my life, people have been having moments of trying to distract me. They tried to distract me when I couldn't read. They called me a dumb student. They tried to distract me when I went with clothing with holes in the shoes and cardboards in the soles. They called me poor. They tried to distract me when I got arrested as a little boy and beat by police officers.

They called me a criminal. They tried to distract me when I wanted to study and move up through the ranks in the police department and fight for reform. They said it was impossible. They tried to distract me when I became a state senator. They tried to distract me when I became the Black bar president. They tried to distract me when I became the mayor. No matter what distraction they threw at me, God has made the pathway.

Brigid Bergin: All right, Liz, you said this was a classic Eric Adams rally. Just break it down for those who might not be able to pick up on some of the elements there that are pure Eric Adams.

Elizabeth Kim: This is the mayor running on his identity. When I say "identity," it's his race. It's his working-class identity. These are stories that the mayor wove through his 2021 campaign and continue to tell as he was mayor, as he was struggling under historically low approval ratings. Time and time again, he goes back to the story of how he defied the odds. This is the story that he is going to continue to tell on the campaign. He punctuates it with God. We're going to hear that again and again because, time and time again, when he feels under pressure, he goes to the faith-based community.

Brigid Bergin: Liz, how has the mayor been responding to Mamdani's primary win? Have you noticed any changes in his schedule or priorities? Has he said much about it?

Elizabeth Kim: Well, he has attacked Mamdani. For a while, he was reserving most of his attacks on Cuomo. That was when Cuomo was perceived as the front-runner, but he's wasted very little time in pivoting towards Mamdani. Just yesterday, he held a press conference with Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch. This was to tout the decrease in crime that the city is experiencing or seeing.

My colleague, Charles Lane, captured this moment very well, in that he used those crime statistics to pivot to saying this is a moment of having experience and his experience as being a former police officer. This is not a moment where you're doing an experiment. You can see the mayor leaning into these. These are good statistics for him, right? This was a mayor who ran on reducing crime.

What he is going to do is he is going to try to persuade voters that having a mayor who has a more progressive vision for the police department is risky, right? He has gone on to deride Mamdani's policies as being unrealistic. At his rally, he framed the ideas of free buses, city-owned grocery stores as "handouts." He said to the crowd, "This is not a city of handouts." It'll be interesting to see how that lands with both the mayor's base and also more broadly with other voters.

Brigid Bergin: If you're just joining us, it's The Brian Lehrer Show in WNYC. I'm Brigid Bergin, senior reporter in the WNYC and Gothamist newsroom, filling in for Brian for a couple of days. My guest is WNYC and Gothamist reporter Elizabeth Kim, who covers city politics. We are talking about what a crazy week it's been here in New York City. I want to take one of our callers. Let's go to Carmen in Metuchen, New Jersey. Carmen, thanks for calling WNYC.

Carmen: Hello. Can you hear me?

Brigid Bergin: We can hear you. Oh, your line dropped. Sorry about that, Carmen. Hopefully, you can call us back. Liz, Mamdani is really becoming a national political figure. President Trump was asked about him during a press conference in Florida yesterday at a new migrant detention center. Here's a little of what he said.

President Donald Trump: Look, we don't need a communist in this country, but if we have one, I'm going to be watching over him very carefully. A lot of people are saying he's here illegally. We're going to look at everything.

Brigid Bergin: Now, before I play some of Mamdani's response, I want to correct some of the misinformation in those comments from the President. Obviously, Mamdani came to the US legally at the age of seven. He is a US citizen. He's also not a communist. He's a part of the Democratic Socialists of America. Here is how Mamdani responded to hearing that clip during an interview on NY1 last night.

Zohran Mamdani: Ultimately, what we're seeing in President Trump's rhetoric is an attempt to focus on who I am, where I'm from, what I look like, how I sound, as opposed to what I'm actually fighting for, because to do so would be to display the stark contrast in our sincerity, in actually delivering for the very working people who've been left behind by our politics compared with what President Trump has been able to do.

Over the same period of time that I've been running has been the moment where President Trump ran a presidential campaign premised on making life easier for working-class Americans, on making cost of living that much lower, on actually having cheaper groceries. He's been unable and uninterested to deliver on any of that, instead focusing on cruelty in the manner that we've just heard today. What I would tell him is that the last person who couldn't get my name right, we defeated them. That's what it's going to look like again.

Brigid Bergin: Okay, Liz, Mamdani is taking a lot of incoming from the top ranks of the Republican Party. Some of it racist, some of it Islamophobic. How much do you think that hurts him as we shift to the general election?

Elizabeth Kim: I think you can make the argument that the primary was, in some ways, a referendum on Trump. All of the candidates, for the most part, all of the leading candidates ran against Trump, but I think Mamdani really distinguished himself in the level of rage at the President. We've talked about this before. Trump did make gains in New York City in the last presidential election, but he is still a broadly unpopular figure in New York City. We are overwhelmingly Democratic city. I think his unpopularity stands to grow.

If you look at something like the policy bill that he is trying to pass that did pass the Senate yesterday, which would impose cuts to Medicaid, impose cuts to food assistance for poorer New Yorkers, these are all things that are going to make the President even more unpopular. I think you even see Mayor Adams trying to walk a very narrow line around the President, because he was asked about the President during his remarks yesterday, said something positive about Eric Adams, that he thinks he's a good guy. Adams was asked about that, but he didn't respond to it because he also knows that the President is potentially radioactive for him.

Brigid Bergin: Absolutely. I think he said he's a good guy and that he helped him out a little bit.

Elizabeth Kim: That's right, Brigid. [chuckles]

Brigid Bergin: Let's go. We've got Carmen in Metuchen, New Jersey, back. Carmen, can you hear me?

Carmen: Yes. Can you hear me?

Brigid Bergin: We can hear you. Go ahead. What's your question?

Carmen: Okay. Sorry about that. Well, you guys already started leading into the conversation by playing the Trump clip. I guess my question is, is that I've not made the decision either way, but it is an election race that is very much worth watching. I find that it seems that the younger people, who may be of different ethnicities, really get targeted with a lot of hatred, not just from outside of the party, but also internally. I think that Kirsten Gillibrand had to retract statements that she made.

I feel like the press really isn't covering this surreal moment we're living in, because what I'm seeing in terms of the candidates running is that they're really being attacked based on their ethnicity and their age and their perspective, and they're being insulted, incredibly told that they're stupid. Mamdani, for example, really, I read a lot of social media that basically says he is out to kill the Jewish community because of some of his maybe nuance in terms of how he is articulating his perspective. I was just curious about that. There seems to be no room for nuance.

Brigid Bergin: Carmen, thank you for your comment. I want to jump in because my colleague, Elizabeth Kim, has actually done reporting on this during the primary campaign related to some of those ads that almost came out from a super PAC that distorted Mamdani's image. We know this is very much an issue that's been alive during the primary, will persist during the general election. Liz, from your perspective, how much do you think Mamdani is being targeted because of his ethnicity, his race, his age?

Elizabeth Kim: It's definitely out there, and it's certainly going to intensify during the general. The thing that came to my mind, I really thought about this in listening to the Kristen Gillibrand interview. Now, that was an interview in which Brian was taking callers. A caller had a lot of inaccurate misinformation about Mamdani, and she seemed to go with it. It really reminded me, and some listeners might remember this, the 2008 race between John McCain and Barack Obama, in which there was a lot of misinformation, disinformation about Barack Obama. Do you remember, Brigid, there was this--

Brigid Bergin: Town hall.

Elizabeth Kim: It was a town hall moment, where John McCain got question after question that said things like, "He's not a US citizen. He's an Arab." That was a moment in which John McCain actually had to correct with each person that came up. He said, "No, ma'am, he is a decent American. We disagree on some issues, but he is a decent American." That is sort of, "I wonder now," as a lot of politicians, and this includes Democrats, get that incoming, "how do they stand up in this moment and talk about Mamdani, who is so polarizing and is going to be the target for conservative Republicans?" As we said, a lot of misinformation.

Brigid Bergin: I think just to clarify again from what happened last week, I think there was language that the caller used using the word "jihad" instead of "intifada." I think that was the language that then was echoed by the senator who, I will note, Politico is reporting this morning, did have a conversation with Assemblymember Mamdani and did apologize for that language. I will also note that Brian, I am the fill-in, he is the expert, was correcting it live on air and pushing back on some of that language. It's a challenge for everyone in the media to stay on top of some of these comments because they seem to be filtering from a lot of different directions.

Elizabeth Kim: Yes, Brigid, I would even say even this label of being an anti-Semite, which Mamdani vigorously denies, and even the mayor has now taken that accusation, too, what does that mean? That is something that has been debated during this primary campaign. Andrew Cuomo essentially equated anti-Semitism with someone who doesn't support Israel's right to exist. Is that anti-Semitism? See, these are the nuances that Carmen was getting at. Is it okay to recklessly use that label against Mamdani without maybe clarifying, "What do you mean by that?"

Brigid Bergin: We're going to take a short break. More with my guest, WNYC and Gothamist reporter Elizabeth Kim, in a minute. Stay with us.

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Brigid Bergin: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. I'm Brigid Bergin, filling in for Brian today. My guest is WNYC and Gothamist politics reporter Elizabeth Kim. We are talking about all things city politics, which is mostly the primary from last week. I want to read one of the texts that we got from a listener. "Will the Board of Elections eventually publish the round-by-round ranked results?" I'm going to take the liberty to answer that question for our listener. "That's the show your work part that Liz mentioned."

The answer to that question is yes. They will eventually release more data that we'll be able to analyze and see how those votes were transferred, but they won't do that until they certify the election results, which will be later this month. Then we will know how votes transferred from a candidate like Brad Lander to either Andrew Cuomo or Assemblymember Mamdani. More to come on that, but it will be released soon. I want to take one other caller, who's talking about ranked-choice voting as well. Let's go to Mark in Manhattan. Mark, thanks for calling WNYC.

Mark: Thank you very much. Okay, so I would say, the way this election was structured, certainly talking to friends about it, everybody was very confused. It's also very unfair. Number one, it's a closed primary, which is not all the case in all the other states. Only Democrats can vote. Secondly, the ranked-choice. Honestly, many of my friends did not understand what this was, how it worked, how it would work. Even the candidates' cross-endorsing was totally confusing. Now, the election itself, wow, this is one for the records. You get all these candidates on separate lines. I think that the whole system is unfair.

By the way, to say that somebody has 56% of the vote with a ranked-choice, is that really illuminating? My last point and to the point that you said before about Mamdani, I think, is very, very important. I don't think dwelling on whether he is or isn't, as I said, any of that, to me-- and that's not besides the point. The point is in a city like New York City, where I've lived my entire life, that there's a candidate, a person who gets up and says at some point, questioning, "Is there a Jewish state? Is Israel a Jewish state? Does it have a right to exist?" and all of this.

I have to say, to me, I'm not looking to the person's heart or sword or whatever it is. It just seems unseemly to me. In a city like this, which is so full of cultures and backgrounds and religions, why even have statements like that made by candidates? I think we should focus on the city, the economics, all of those issues, and the fact that we're having these discussions on national TV and asking questions to the candidate, "What do you think about intifada?" and all this stuff, it is very, I think, off-putting and, to me, a little disturbing and upsetting, if you see my point.

Brigid Bergin: Mark, I'm going to jump in on you for a second. I want to ask you a question, Mark, actually, because you said the closed primary system is unfair. I just wanted to ask you. Have you participated in primaries in New York City before this year?

Mark: Let me say this, okay? I am not a Democrat. A number of people I knew that was Republicans, what they did was they changed their registration before the election. I have participated in primaries for many years. Generally speaking, very few people vote in the primaries. That's a fact, but what they layered on this time was to put the ranked-choice thing in. I'm telling you, 100% of my friends who are very well-educated people did not understand, "How does it work? What does it mean when they rank?" Then you have Brad Land cross-endorsing and this one--

Brigid Bergin: Sure. Okay, Mark, I think we got you. I appreciate that point. I know that, having talked to voters, there are people who still are trying to understand ranked-choice voting. I will say, if you look at the data from this particular election, the people who participated, the number of people who opted out of ranked-choice voting seems to be much smaller than what we've seen in previous elections. Some recent exit poll data shows that most of the people who were polled really didn't find it to be particularly difficult to use. Some point-counterpoint on the question of ranked-choice voting.

Liz, I want to talk a little bit more about the general election campaign. We've already seen some of Cuomo's supporters in labor, even some elected officials, shift to Mamdani, but there are still some pretty significant holdouts among some top Democrats and people in the business community. What are you watching for in terms of those people making their choice and either shifting to Mamdani or potentially shifting to Adams?

Elizabeth Kim: I think with the top Democratic leaders, what I'm watching is I'm watching, what does someone like Senator Chuck Schumer say? He has commended Mamdani on running a campaign that successfully focused on an issue that New Yorkers cared about, which was affordability. That is also very much what Representative Hakeem Jeffries has said as well. Both of those two men, the two leaders of the Democratic Party, have stopped short of endorsing him.

I get it. I think they're very wrapped up in Washington right now with fighting the President's bill, but you have to think that after the release of yesterday's results that it's only a matter of time. Those two men are among several, a list of people who have said that they have upcoming meetings with Mamdani. I think his campaign is very confident that they will come around.

I think his campaign is very confident that business leaders-- we heard a lot of people immediately after primary night that somehow, there were these business leaders that their hair was on fire over this win, that somehow they were very worried about Mamdani's policies and calling for a redistribution of wealth in the form of higher taxes on the uber wealthy. I think a lot of that is calming down.

We do know that Kathryn Wylde, who heads the Partnership for New York City, which is this longstanding advocacy group for the business community in New York City, she has set up a meeting this month between Mamdani and her group. There are also a lot of side meetings going on between Mamdani and other big-name business leaders. One thing I think would be very interesting to watch, and I did reach out to his spokesperson, is Michael Bloomberg.

Michael Bloomberg is not just a billionaire. He's not just a business leader in New York. He's a former mayor. He is a former mayor. He is a philanthropist who has been extremely invested in the future of this city. My question to his spokesperson is, has he reached out yet? Is he going to have a conversation with the Democratic nominee? The answer I got was a decline to comment.

Brigid Bergin: Interesting.

Elizabeth Kim: I think that is someone that will be very interesting to watch. You have to think that, at some point, Bloomberg will want to sit down and talk to Mamdani.

Brigid Bergin: It's interesting. A listener text did something along these lines, "As a centrist Democrat who did not vote for Mamdani, I feel disappointed in centrist Democrats, including Cuomo, who refused to get behind him now that he won the primary fair and square. For the last several election cycles, progressives have been asked to fall in line behind centrists for the good of the party. Now that a progressive has won, why aren't centrists expected to do the same?" That fits into, where does this coalition move? We also got a text, Liz, and I just want to give you a chance to clarify this. A listener thought they heard you say that Mamdani said Israel does not have the right to exist. That's not how he said it exactly. I think he talked about it in the context of exist as a Jewish state.

Elizabeth Kim: The last caller, Mark from Manhattan, he touched on this. There's a lot to unpack there. What Mamdani has said is, "I was saying that Cuomo has equated anti-Semitism with the idea that Israel does not have the right to exist." Mamdani's criticism is he does not believe that Israel has the right to exist without equal rights for Palestinians, for example, and other minority groups. That is his criticism, which is not an unusual criticism.

It is a criticism that many members of the left have had. It's a criticism that has gained steam in the wake of the war in Gaza. That is something that is debated in the Jewish community is that there is-- and I should say in the Jewish community, outside the Jewish community, is how do you define anti-Semitism in this very polarizing moment? What does criticism of Israel mean in this moment? That became one of the issues of the campaign.

It's interesting because Mark made the point that why is this-- At the same time, he was saying, "Why is this an issue?" I think that Mamdani would agree. He doesn't want to spend a lot of time talking about what is essentially a foreign policy issue, right? We also know that this is New York City. There is a huge constituency of Jewish voters. I think we frequently say it's the largest population of Jews outside of Israel. This has traditionally been a question that has been put to candidates and politicians in New York City is, how do they feel about Israel?

I think that there are signs that it could change because Mamdani has been a candidate who has come out and said that he does not plan to visit Israel should he become mayor. That would be a huge break. That is traditionally a pilgrimage that New York City mayors make. If that does happen, the political world will try to understand, "What does that mean?" Is this a break now in that we no longer focus on this issue as hugely important to New Yorkers?

Brigid Bergin: Even though Mamdani is the Democratic nominee, it's clear his campaign is focused on reaching out to voters with whom he didn't perform particularly well with in the primary. In particular, results show Cuomo did much better with Black voters across the city, particularly in Central Brooklyn, Southeast Queens. You were with Mamdani on Saturday at Reverend Al Sharpton's National Action Network. What were the dynamics there?

Elizabeth Kim: This was interesting because this was marked a return to the National Action Network. He was actually there with several other candidates, including Brad Lander and Adrienne Adams, right before the Tuesday primary. Again, this is another political rite of passage. We were talking about how going to Na'an is a political rite of passage for candidates and elected.

It was very interesting that in his first public appearance on the campaign trail for the general election, he elects to go to Na'an, which is essentially talking to Black voters, because this is an event that is broadcast on radio. Al Sharpton talks about all the people who watch it on YouTube as well. This was an opportunity for Mamdani to talk to a slice of the electorate, which he might not have won commandingly.

I think this idea that Cuomo won Black voters, not to say that that's not true, but, again, I think we want to see more of what the ranked-choice tabulations reveal in terms of who were their second and third choice, for example. I think we'll see that when those results lay up. For now, at first blush, looking at the first-ranked votes, it does appear that in a neighborhood like Southeast Queens, for example, Mamdani did not win those first-choice votes. Here he is. He comes back to Na'an, and he decides that this will be his first campaign stop on the general election.

Brigid Bergin: Here's how Reverend Sharpton introduced him.

Reverend Al Sharpton: There was a story in The New York Times two days after the primary about Black votes. It said that Zohran was the first one to win the nomination because that's what it's going to be without the majority of the Black vote. Any other kind of politician would have played against the Black community. He decided to come to the Black community this morning.

[applause]

Reverend Al Sharpton: He could have went the other way and say, "It's me against them," but he came this morning and he proclaimed something. I give him a lot of credit for that. This does not meet the political calculus, but it's what this city needs is courage.

Brigid Bergin: That statement from Reverend Sharpton there, Liz. As you were saying earlier in the segment, it sounds like Reverend Sharpton is now leaning on Cuomo to bow out of the race and is trying to throw some support behind Mamdani.

Elizabeth Kim: Right. He actually made those remarks, Brigid, after Mamdani spoke. He referenced that New York Times article, which suggests that if you just look at the first-choice votes, this has been a truism in New York City politics, is that you need Black voters to be part of your coalition to win a citywide race. If you look at it, and, again, this is before we have all of the tabulations, I think for a lot of Black leaders, this is a worrying sign that somehow they have lost some kind of political capital in this moment.

That was a very nice praise that Sharpton gave Mamdani, but I would disagree with him when he says, "This is not the political calculus," that he comes back, that his first stop is Na'an and speaking to Black voters. I think this is the political calculus because we've heard these speeches before. When someone wraps up the primary, what do they say? "I want to be a mayor for every New Yorker." That was exactly what Mamdani says. The idea is you want to unify people in this moment. You want to grab those voters who didn't vote for you. This is the right political calculus that Mamdani is making, which is reaching out to Black voters, which is taking meetings with business leaders, for example.

Brigid Bergin: I'm going to take one more caller. Let's go to Al in Manhattan, who I think wants to respond to the text I read about centrist Democrats who have not fallen in line behind Mamdani. Al, thanks for calling WNYC.

Al: Hi. Happy to be on the air. I'm a centrist. I will not support Mamdani. The reason is I don't believe a progressive socialist mayor of New York City and the empowerment that might follow nationally within the Democratic Party to nominate similar candidates is good for the Democratic Party. I want to beat Trump. I want to win back the House. I want to win back the Senate. The Progressive Party is not going to cut it nationally. Locally, the things that Mamdani can do, frankly, are minimal insofar as his socialist agenda. He's going to need Albany. The concern that I have is that he's symbolically going to be there. I'm also concerned about how he'll handle the police. That's why I will not support Mamdani. I don't know who I'll vote for, but it won't be him.

Brigid Bergin: Al, thanks so much for your call. Liz, I should note that we've gotten a few texts of people also pushing back on the Mamdani mandate and kicking the tires on some of his policies and his ability to accomplish some of what he has campaigned on. Are you starting to see any of that in your reporting from voters? People saying, "Okay. Now, he's the nominee. I'm still not so sure about this"?

Elizabeth Kim: Well, our colleague, Jon Campbell, has reported on how realistic a tax increase on the wealthy is with Governor Kathy Hochul. She controls that. She controls a lot of his policy agenda. She is running for reelection next year. I did have a conversation with James Parrott yesterday. He is a progressive economist. He was a former chief economist for this city, I believe, under Dinkins. He made this argument to me, and I think we can debate this.

If Trump is able to get his policy bill through, which is also, it's not just cutting the social welfare net, but it's also giving the wealthy tax breaks, could, in fact, a mayor make the argument that if the wealthy in this moment are getting tax breaks that they did not anticipate necessarily, could the state somehow capture some of that and make the argument that, "Let's use that money to fund something like free buses, universal daycare"?

We should point out that even though Hochul and Mamdani may be opposed on this issue of tax increases for the wealthy, they do share a priority of affordability. She has made affordable childcare part of her policy plank. There's a question. Is there room to negotiate on this? I'm not sure, but I certainly think that the stakes are high for his mayoralty. Let's not jump ahead of ourselves. If he does win, the stakes would be extremely high because of what Al said. What message does this send to the rest of the country and the success of progressives elsewhere?

Brigid Bergin: It circles back to the earlier part of our conversation where he is absolutely becoming a national figure. In that interview last night with Errol Louis, he talked about one of the calls that he got on primary night that surprised and, I think, delighted him was from Boston Mayor Michelle Wu. There are a lot of people paying attention to the progress of this campaign and what it means, not just here in New York City, but what it means for the country. Lots more work for us to do, Liz. We're going to leave it here for today. For this conversation, my guest has been WNYC and Gothamist politics reporter Elizabeth Kim. Liz, see you back at our desk.

Elizabeth Kim: Thank you, Brigid.

 

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