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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Happy April 1st everybody. Beware of people trying to fool you today pretending to change the name of their car company or anything else, and happy opening day of the baseball season. A national holiday if there ever was one for some people I know. I know people who say there aren't four seasons in a year, there are only two; baseball season and the offseason. So, happy opening day. Nice day if it don't rain at Yankee Stadium this afternoon.

April on the Brian Lehrer Show is Ask The Mayor tryouts month. You know how we do Ask The Mayor with my calls and yours with Mayor Bill de Blasio every Friday? Well, we've invited all eight of the leading candidates in the Democratic mayoral primary to come on the show this month for Ask The Mayor tryouts, and one by one they're accepting. We'll start next week with Maya Wiley on Monday and Kathryn Garcia on Wednesday. It's Ask The Mayor tryouts this month on the Brian Lehrer Show. Happy April.

In advance of those auditions, we thought we would take some time this morning to assess the state of the race, and some of the big ideas the candidates are running on. Joining me now is WNYC and Gothamist Elizabeth Kim who is covering the campaign and writing a series called The Big Idea, which profiles one big idea that each of the candidates is trying to run on. Hi, Liz. Thanks for coming on.

Elizabeth Kim: Hi, Brian. Thanks for having me.

Brian: I actually want to start with some horse race before we get to some ideas. There have been a number of polls by now and they all find Andrew Yang in first place, and Eric Adams second, but the latest one I saw known as the Fontas score poll which came out last week, had a full 50% of likely voters undecided, undecided is a clear winner at this point. Yes, Yang came in first, but with only 16%. He had a much bigger lead in previous polls. How would you describe the state of the race right now, and how it's affecting how the candidates are campaigning?

Elizabeth: The polls are something that I ask strategists about all the time like, "How do we interpret these polls?" I think what's become obvious is the big takeaway from the last poll, which was the Fontas poll that you mentioned, the full 50% of likely voters being undecided, that really suggests that this race is very wide open.

Even though Yang has the lead, it's not insurmountable by any means. We're seeing that on the campaign trail because the candidates are really-- They're going after Yang and they're going after some voter-rich areas. You look at someone like Ray McGuire, he's been spending a lot of time in South East Queens. Now, that's an area which if you know is home to a lot of middle-class Black families, and it typically has high voter turnout, and you wouldn't be surprised but Eric Adams has also been going to that area a lot like visiting churches in those neighborhoods. You really see that the candidates are trying to see if they could solidify some support from key areas in the city.

Brian: As you mentioned, with Yang continuing to lead in the polling, other candidates are beginning to run against him explicitly as a front runner, attacking him more in addition to promoting themselves. Here's an example of that from Scott Stringer.

Scott Stringer: The truth is that this is par for the course of Mr. Yang, whether it's an illegal casino on Governor's Island, housing for TikTok stars, or being baffled by parents who live and work in two-bedroom apartments with kids in virtual school. We don't need another leader who tweets first and thinks later.

Brian: Oh, we don't need another leader who tweets first and thinks later, and housing for TikTok stars. Scott stringers got some of his lines down, Liz, you flagged that clip for us. How come?

Elizabeth: Well, I flagged that because I thought it was interesting that that was a speech he gave to the civic group, the Association for a Better New York. Just to give you some context as to how important this group and that forum is, this is where Mayor de Blasio initially unveiled his universal pre-K plan. So this is a very huge platform and the fact that he reserved some of his precious time for hatting Yang, and that was only just one part. There was like a part prior to that where he also criticized Andrew Yang.

I think it shows you that it's not just him but Eric Adams, Maya Wiley, they all view Yang as someone who is the front runner, but again who doesn't have an insurmountable lead. I think they're seeing the last-- We have less than three months to go that this is the time where they need to ramp up their attacks and maybe start cutting into his lead.

Brian: Listeners, we can take your questions on the Democratic New York City mayoral primary now for Gothamist Senior Editor, Liz Kim, as she covers the race for Gothamist and WNYC. Our last two call ends for those of you who happen to be around on those days where informal polls for you to say who you're leaning towards supporting, we're not inviting those calls today. Today it's questions about any of the candidates or about the state of the race for Liz as a reporter. 646-435-7280, 646-435-7280.

Bring on your questions as we try to present a meaningful and good faith picture of who these candidates are in such a crowded field and such an important race as we are in April now and starting to get close to the primary which as Liz just mentioned is in June. 646-435-7280, with your questions on the candidates running for mayor in New York. 646-435-7280, or your observations.

Your article that came out Monday Liz, I'll tell everybody, it's called, "More Than Three Decades After David Dinkins, Is NYC Primed To Elect Its Second Black Mayor?" And it's about the four Black candidates considered serious candidates in the race; Eric Adams, Maya Wiley, Ray McGuire, and Dianne Morales. In most years, we might say this is bad for the prospect of electing a Black mayor because they might split the Black vote if there's so many candidates, and some other candidate maybe Yang, maybe Scott Stringer would sneak past, but you quoted a political analyst saying rank choice voting might change that equation. Can you explain that?

Elizabeth: Yes. I spoke to Sid Davidoff who actually advised David Dinkins during his campaign for mayor. Since that time, he's been a lobbyist and he's advised several mayors and has been speaking to the mayoral candidates. He told me that he thought that rank choice voting would give a path to a Black candidate because for one thing there are four choices. If you assume that there are still ethnic voters, they can now put down a Black candidate as their first choice, their second choice, the third, and fourth choice. In rank choice voting that's important because if no candidate wins a majority of the vote, those second choices start getting counted and that can be enough to catapult a candidate to victory.

Brian: Racial injustice in so many areas, of course, economic criminal justice, so much more are such big factors in new york city life, but those four candidates are so different in their backgrounds. Like Eric Adams was a cop, Maya Wiley ran the Civilian Complaint Review Board that monitors the cops, Ray McGuire was a Wall Street executive, and Dianne Morales ran a nonprofit housing organization. Given their background and the politics of the moment, how much and how differently are any of the four Black candidates running on their plans to bring more equity to the city?

Brian: Right. When I was talking to someone about how different these candidates are, they said, "It really evokes David Dinkins's gorgeous mosaic description of New York City." What you see with the race is that you know that race is a focal point of all the campaigns, but what the Black candidates can do is they can talk about race not just in terms of policy, but in very personal ways.

If you've been listening to any of the forums when they start talking about education, you'll frequently hear Maya Wiley say that she attended a Black segregated, underfunded public school. If you've listened to Adams and McGuire talk about their upbringing, they're frequently talking not just race, but also class. McGuire grew up in Dayton, Ohio, the son of a single mother, he's talked about overcoming racial barriers as an executive on Wall Street.

Adams also grew up in poverty, but in Queens, and he was the victim of a police assault, and he talks about that experience and then deciding to become a police officer himself. Diane Morales has talked a lot about her Afro-Latino heritage, which actually is really interesting because it really reflects something that's going on in the city's demographics where we have a lot more Latinos who are identifying as Black on the census. I would say that race has become the center of a conversation about how to fix government by emphasizing that race is a lived experience, these candidates can make the case that they're even more qualified to address these issues.

Brian: Part of that article was about how traditional democratic political machines or other institutions matter less today than in the past. Some endorsements like from the Reverend Al Sharpton might still matter. Sharpton has not endorsed to date, do you think he will?

Elizabeth: I think ultimately he will. Because what's the point of being a power broker if you're not going to use your influence in the most important local election? So far, he's hosted two forums for the mayoral candidates at his National Action Network in Harlem. The first one was to commemorate Martin Luther King Day. Then, just last month, he had all the candidates come in to condemn the anti-Asian violence that's been sweeping not just the city, but the country. He's definitely inviting the candidates to speak at the National Action Network, and he's giving them a platform.

Brian: We're talking about the New York City mayoral race with Gothamist Liz Kim. Josh, in Carroll Gardens, you’re on WNYC. Hi, Josh.

Josh: Hi, Brian. Hi, Liz. My question is who do you think the best candidate for the Subway is?

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Brian: Go ahead. I was going to say your job is not to endorse, I'm just clarifying that for the caller. You can describe how they're approaching mass transit issues, obviously.

Elizabeth: I would interpret that question as like, "Who has the best subway plan?" The problem with the subway is that none of the candidates, no mayor has control of the MTA. While you'll have some candidates like Andrew Yang, who says that he's going to try to seize control of the MTA. Well, that's going to be very difficult. A lot of it is how much impact can they really have on the subway? That's the question like, "How much impact has Mayor de Blasio been able to have on the subway?"

Brian: Who's Yang's constituency so far? One early poll I saw seemed to suggest that it was Asian-Americans and White men. Can you say?

Elizabeth: I think that there's certainly strong support among Asian-Americans. Like if you are on the campaign trail with Andrew Yang, you see him in places like Flushing and Elmhurst, and you see young Asian-Americans coming up to him trying to get selfies. They themselves, they've recently released some internal polling, and they said that they were very strong among Asian-Americans, although, you have to take it with a grain of salt because it's their internal poll. In general, the group that they're really trying to win over are disaffected voters, people who have for whatever reason been turned away from politics. That can really be a mix of different racial and ethnic groups.

Brian: We talked about the top-tier Black candidates and their relationship with race as an explicit issue a few minutes ago. Let's talk for a minute about Andrew Yang in that context, of course, there's so much focus now on anti-Asian American hate crimes with a horrible wave of them that's still ongoing. I asked Queens Congresswoman, Grace Meng, when she was here recently to talk about that if she's endorsing Yang or considering that he would be a historic first as the first Asian-American mayor if elected at this time for the community, whether that is leading her to endorse him and she shrugged it of listen.

Grace Meng: We have opportunities to make history here. Andrew or Maya or Eric would be the only second person of color to ever be the mayor of New York City.

Brian: Congresswoman Grace Meng put all the candidates of color in the same bucket there. Does Yang run on this at all, or run away from it, or how would you describe his relationship with identity in the campaign?

Elizabeth: This is really interesting because when I did a profile on Yang, I spoke to a lot of Asians in the city's political sphere. It's very similar to what a lot of Black leaders say, which is that it's not enough that he's Asian-American, he really has to know and represent their issues. It's interesting what the congresswoman said, Senator John Liu was the first Asian-American to run for mayor in New York City has also not endorsed him yet. At the same time, they're all very excited. They see this as a historic moment for Asian-Americans. What it says is there are limits to identity politics both with all the candidates, with the Black candidates, and Andrew Yang as well.

Brian: We'll continue in a minute with Liz Kim and your calls as we assess the democratic mayoral primary in New York, stay with us.

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Brian: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. If you're just joining us, we are previewing the fact that April is going to be Ask The Mayor month here on the Brian Lehrer Show. We've invited the eight leading candidates for the Democratic mayoral nomination to come on the show for Ask The Mayor tryouts. It's going to be like what we do with de Blasio every Friday. We're going to start it with Maya Wiley who's accepted our invitation for next Monday.

She'll come on and answer my questions and yours just like we do with the current mayor and the other candidates will fall in during the month after that. I had mistakenly said Catherine Garcia would be here next Wednesday, she is going to be April 14th, but you don't need to know the dates, you just need to know it's Ask The Mayor tryouts month here on the Brian Lehrer Show. We're inviting all the significant candidates to come and give it a shot. We're assessing the race with Gothamist Senior Editor, Liz Kim, who also reports on the radio side for WNYC. Barbara, in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC, thanks for calling in.

Barbara: Hello.

Brian: Hi, Barbara, you’re on.

Barbara: Oh, yes. I'm sorry, I wasn't sure. I love the show, thank you for taking my call. One of the things I really want to say about Ask The Mayor month is just to make sure that when the candidates are answering the questions, that they're really talking about what their proposals are versus what the other candidates will not do. That's one of the reasons why a lot of people are turned off by politics because you ask the question and they don't actually answer it. My question is--

Brian: I hear a lot of them clear on that, and I will try to stick to the standard-

Barbara: That irritates me.

Brian: -because I agree with that standard.

Barbara: Thank you. My question is about school equity and what are the candidates’ plan to make sure that schools are more equal and equal in terms of diversity as well as equal regarding funding. Because schools that are in predominantly richer districts they have a lot more supportive services like enrichments. Schools that are in impoverished neighborhoods, generally shelter neighborhoods, those schools are really, really struggling with teaching the whole child. That's my question.

Brian: Thank you. Liz, compare and contrast.

Elizabeth: The issue of equity and funding is something that really lies at the state level, and that's something that all the candidates have said that they would go to the state and ask for equal funding. In terms of actual policies that the mayor can implement, one big looming question, education question in the race has been whether or not they support screenings for public school children. This is screenings in the form of G&T testing, middle school admissions. Basically, what you have is you have some of the more centrist candidates like a Catherine Garcia or even an Andrew Yang, who are not prepared to completely overhaul testing and screenings.

Then, you have more progressive candidates like Maya Wiley, like Diane Morales, who say they would get rid of screenings. Some of them split it down the middle. Like someone like Scott Stringer who says yes in some cases but not in all.

Elizabeth: That's basically where the candidates stand on screening. The reason why I'm emphasizing screenings is because that is what a lot of education experts have said contributes significantly to segregation in the New York City public school system.

Brian: We should tell everybody that you've been doing the series called The Big Idea on Gothamist featuring one core proposal that various candidates are running on. For Scott Stringer, you profiled an education big idea that your headline describes as far-reaching, but costly. You want to tell Barbara in Brooklyn and everyone else what is Scott Stringer proposing on education?

Elizabeth: He has a really far-reaching plan that's very detailed and there are a lot of components. I think maybe one headline that he got out of this plan which would excite a lot of families is increasing the number of teachers in elementary school classrooms. In certain younger grades, he has proposed requiring two teachers in every classroom. He's also proposed expanding city-funded childcare and after-school programs. Currently, a lot of afterschool programs, some of them are free under de Blasio, but not all of them, so he would make all of them free. Then, he would also try to make CUNY's community colleges tuition-free. That's a lot.

Scott Stringer definitely has issued the most detailed policies out of all the candidates. I think the question is whether voters find a compelling vision in any one of these plans be it education, transportation, or housing.

Brian: Let's do another one because your series are so great. Listeners, you can always go to gothamist.com and search "The Big Idea" and you'll see all the articles in this series. Another one that you profiled was Eric Adams and his plan to provide doulas birthing and labor coaches to all first-time mothers. This isn't just some a sweet warm gesture. It's framed as a with equity measure even potentially life and death, right?

Elizabeth: Right. You might remember that New York City, there is this really terrible statistic that Black women are eight to 12 times more likely than white women to die from pregnancy due to complications. I should say it's not just New York City, but nationally Black women are also much more likely to die than white women from pregnancy. Eric Adams from the start has put out this plan, which-- When we went to him, he actually provided us with more details, but his concept was let's give women doulas. Now, studies have shown that doulas who prepare women for childbirth, and they also serve as an advocate for women in hospital settings.

Doulas have been shown to cut those risks and he's proposed a plan to pilot in some neighborhoods where there are a lot of Black and brown women who have these high mortality risks to give them free doulas. He had originally talked about the plan a lot. Since that time, a lot of the other candidates have mentioned this as well including Andrew Yang, Kathryn Garcia recently mentioned it in her health plan. This is a plan that's actually very doable. It's not that expensive.

Brian: Andrew Yang may be known as the candidate of Universal Basic Income, direct checks to people. You've got something like it as the big idea from former HUD secretary and former New York City Housing Commissioner Ray Donovan, who's in this race. What is he proposing? Shaun Donovan, Sorry.

Elizabeth: Yes, so this is very interesting because Yang got a lot of attention for that so-called UBI plan to give poor families $2,000 year. Donovan's plan is actually a lot more far-reaching and more progressive, but it got very little attention which was why I wanted to break it down for our series. His plan it borrows on this idea from New Jersey Senator, Cory Booker. He had a plan that was called Baby Bonds. This is essentially the same thing. It's a plan that would give all New York City kids a savings account that would have started off with $1,000. Now for the poorest children, they'd receive additional payments, so that would be roughly as much as $2,000 a year. It would depend on your income level. The idea is that if you give poor families this nest egg for their children, you can start addressing some of the racial income inequality that we have in this city.

Brian: With Liz Kim, who's covering the Mayoral race for us and Michael in Inward. You're on WNYC. Hello, Michael.

Michael: Hi, thank you, Brian, and Liz. I heard Andrew Yang mentioned that he had a proposal to take the police misconduct cases that were paying 200 million dollars a year on and put that burden on the pension plan for the NYPD. Which I think is genius to make themselves manage. Is that viable?

Brian: This is when people sue the city over police misconduct and the city has to payout. We know a lot of you have followed the debate over ending qualified immunity "For police officers." Meaning, trying to make them pay out of their pocket if they're sued for misconduct. They will not have to pay out of their pockets even under the reform plan that city council recently passed. The city has to pay these damages when people successfully sue the city over police misconduct. Does Michael have the premise as Andrew Yang proposing that that money come out of the police union’s pension fund?

Elizabeth: I think I've heard that as well. The issue with that again is the difference between what a candidate says and what he can actually do. Something like that truly has to be litigated through the police union. It's really not clear how easy something like that would be. Again, it's kind of like Andrew saying that he wants to take over the MTA. In practice, how could he really get that done? Even if he does, how long would it take and what would he have to give up in return?

Brian: On Yang, in general, on the issues like I said, he's best known for UBI Universal Basic Income, that was from when he was running for president. It was going to be $1,000 a month. It's much smaller $2,000 a year, I believe, and targeted only to the poorest New Yorkers in his municipal version so it fits in the city budget. While that's considered a progressive idea, would it be accurate to say he doesn't line up neatly with some other usual progressive New York policy positions?

Elizabeth: Yes. Yang, I think he'd say it himself. He's not an ideal log. You can't really line up his positions and say, "Okay, he fits this box," because he really doesn't. There are issues like police reform, testing in schools, raising taxes where he's much more of a centrist, but I think that's also his appeal to voters. Two is that he is not someone who will be so predictable on issues or flexible on issues that he doesn't feel that he needs to hew to some party line, some progressive line, that he's going to tackle each issue individually and on its merits.

Brian: Guillermo, in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC. Hi, Guillermo.

Guillermo: Hello, I got the tail end of the talk on education, so forgive me if you've already talked about it. Do any of the candidates talk about group home daycares?

Brian: Group home daycares. Do you mean in people’s homes daycare?

Guillermo: Yes. Those mostly run by women who are struggling so much right now. Their tuition is barely enough to cover the cost. Yes, basically run out of their homes.

Brian: What's your interest, Guillermo? It sounds you'd like the mayoral candidates to take a position for something in particular around this. Are you looking for something?

Guillermo: Yes, just that my wife runs one, so she's a part of networks of women who work out of the Bronx, out of Queen, and they struggle so much with trying to make the ends meet, and they provide such an essential business. A lot of them were taking care of the children of essential workers, but it's a very difficult living. Now, so they always juggling that. That commitment of taking care of kids. A lot of them work overnight taking care of kids. There is a lot of juggling there providing an essential business, but also barely making a living out of it.

Brian: Is there something you would want from public policy to help your wife and others in that business?

Guillermo: Yes, exactly. More assistance, more funding. I know that de Blasio came up with the universal pre-K, but then there were those years before universal pre-K that working-class parents in need, need that place to take their kids to so they can go to work, but the people who take care of those kids, they need to be able to run a sustainable business. I don't know what form that would take of policy, of funding being included under the DOE. I don't know how that would take shape now, but just-- [crosstalk]

Brian: Thank you for raising it though. I think it's really important. Liz, you may have seen the Times article recently on how it's really hard for families to get the vouchers for daycare that are supposed to be available, but the daycares really need the vouchers to stay afloat.

Elizabeth: Actually, Maya Wiley has made this a big centerpiece of her plan. She has proposed giving caregivers a $5,000 a year. These include informal childcare providers, in-home exactly like your caller was mentioning. More recently, Eric Adams has also proposed a plan in which he would give support more subsidies to community daycares. I think that those are at least two candidates that have specifically addressed this issue of daycares.

Brian: We are going to leave it there for now with Gothamist senior editor, Elizabeth Kim, you can also hear the radio versions of her stories on WNYC, of course. She's covering the race in general and doing this series The Big Idea, featuring one core proposal that various candidates are running on, one a piece, I guess. Elizabeth, thank you for coming on and spending a lot of time this morning and filling everybody in. It's going to be interesting between now and June 22nd.

Elizabeth: Thank you so much for having me Brian, I look forward to talking to you guys again.

Brian: As I said at the beginning of the segment, we are declaring April Ask The Mayor tryouts month on the Brian Lehrer Show. We've invited all eight of the leading hopefuls to come on the show and do the same thing that we do with Mayor De Blasio every Friday. My questions and yours in this case for the mayoral hopefuls. We will kick it off on Monday with candidate Maya Wiley. Get your questions ready and call in for Maya Wiley on Ask The Mayor tryouts, Monday on the Brian Lehrer Show.

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