[music]

Brian Lehrer: It's the Brian Lehrer show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone on early voting day six in the New York city primaries. People are choosing upsides and showing up. Lots of people are agonizing over your rankings until the last minute, we get it. Last night on channel four and online, there was a final televised debate in the Democratic mayoral race. We'll get analysis in just a minute from our Liz Kim and the New York Times, Jeff Mays. We'll take your calls, but let me begin with our first excerpt from the debate. This is an exchange and it was quite something between Andrew Yang and Scott Stringer. The question from the moderator was if they could name a new idea, they have to deal with mentally ill homeless people who live on the street? Yang got his turn to answer.

Andrew Yang: This question is so important because the fact is mentally ill homeless men are changing the character of our neighborhoods. A woman, my wife, Ellen is friends within her mom group in Hell's Kitchen was punched in the face by a mentally ill man, sent a picture of a bruised face around the mom group, it spread like wildfire. This is happening in New York City, and we're not talking enough about it. Families are leaving as a result. In East Harlem, the neighborhood has been changed. Upper West Side, the neighborhood has been changed. We owe our people and our families better than this. I'm frustrated by the political nature of these responses.

We're not talking about housing affordability. We're talking about the hundreds of mentally ill people we all see around us every day on the streets, in the subways. We need to get them off of our streets and our subways into a better environment. When you ask what I'm going to do differently, I'm going to rebuild the stock of psych beds in our city because the number has gone down 14%. It should be going up 100% until there are resources necessary for anyone who's mentally ill to not be on our streets. It's not right for them, it's not right for a city. There will be no recovery until we resolve this. I will fix this, New York.

Moderator: Thank you, Mr. Yang.

Scott Stringer: That is the greatest none answer I've ever heard all of our debates.

[chuckles]

Not one specific idea, not one specific plan. You started out this campaign talking about using hotels. Now you're into psych beds, but how much is this going to cost if I could ask if that's the real question. Do you have any idea on the amount?

[crosstalk]

Andrew Yang: Scott, how much is it going to cost if families leave because of the quality of what you're seeing around us? I can't believe you're attacking me on this, Scott. You think we can't afford this?

Scott Stringer: Let me tell you how much it would cost. This is a teaching moment.

Andrew Yang: We can't afford not to do this, Scott.

Scott Stringer: You can't just walk up and say psych beds for all. This is not how the next mayor has to comport themselves. We need specifics.

Brian Lehrer: Andrew gang and Scott Stringer. With that, we welcome Gothamist reporter Elizabeth Kim who's covering the mayoral race, and New York Times Metro reporter, Jeffrey Mays. Hi Liz. Hi Jeff. Liz, you wrote that up as Stringer perhaps inflicting one of the most serious blows of the debate in that exchange but that was pretty hardcore on Yang's part, build up the stock of psychiatric beds and almost solely framing the issue as one of the neighborhoods, rather than the people experiencing homelessness themselves. Was that a new proposal or a new tone from Andrew Yang?

Elizabeth Kim: It's definitely struck me as a new tone. Last night, he was leaning very heavily into this idea that the mentally ill who are living on the streets and subways pose this immediate threat and danger to New Yorkers. It was interesting the way Scott Stringer chose to attack him because he was attacking him basically saying that this proposal is just too vague. You're not putting a cost on it. He wasn't speaking to the criticism that Progressive's have made, which is that moderates are fear-mongering. If there was any moment in the debate where it felt like a candidate was fear-mongering, it was that moment. I think at a later point you do hear Dianne Morales interject, and she makes that argument and she says, "Being mentally ill and homeless is not a crime."

Brian Lehrer: I thought Stringer was trying to make the point that that's fear-mongering. He didn't say it that way. You're right.

Elizabeth Kim: He didn't quite get there.

Brian Lehrer: He stated it in terms of, you have to say how much this would cost and the idea is vague. Jeff Mays, on the Stringer side of that, he's been down in the polls but that's part of the strength of his campaign, what he was leaning on explicitly in his answer, the experience that he would bring to the job along with his progressive credentials, along with his financial savvy as comptroller. How did you see Stringer trying to punch back up to the top tier in general last night?

Jeffery Mays: I think Scott was trying to really still make the argument that he is the most progressive candidate in the race who happens to have the most experience. That was his argument, as you said, going in and it was working. The Progressive coalitions in New York City had coalesced around him. After the two sexual abuse allegations, all of them peeled off. Now we see those groups now coalescing around Maya Wiley who's Mayor de Blasio's, former council. I think last night he was really aggressive. You played that exchange with Andrew Yang, but it wasn't the only time that he really went after Andrew Yang, questioning his plans, whether he understood policy. He went after Ray McGuire again called him a Wall Street guy with a lot of money. He was really taking his shot last night, realizing that this is the last major debate before the primary and that he had been really damaged by those abuse allegations.

Brian Lehrer: Liz, on Andrew Yang, I don't hear him running very much on the prospect of being the first Asian-American mayor. There's a lot more explicit talk about Black and brown, New Yorkers than Asian-American ones. How do you see Yang's approach to that pioneer status for Asian-American voters or how do you see the voters in the many Asian American communities? Of course, they would come from so many different national backgrounds in New York City, but taking that or not taking that into account.

Elizabeth Kim: No, you're right. This idea that he would be the first Asian-American mayor of New York City is something that he's talked about in select audiences, for instance, or a-- select moments like most recently when he was endorsed by John Liu, the state Senator who was the last Asian-American to run for mayor. He's generally brought it up when he's talking to Asians and Asian-Americans in New York City, but he hasn't brought that message to a broader audience. That's an interesting choice. Is it because he feels that it would not be as compelling to maybe non-Asian voters? I'm not sure.

Brian Lehrer: Asian-American voters are not much of the electorate. 10% ish, right Liz?

Elizabeth Kim: Correct.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, we can open the phones for your reactions to last night's mayoral debate. Anybody got solidified for against Andrew Yang because of that exchange in particular, or let's say anyone who's made up your mind for first and second choice regarding any candidate in the last week? Your reactions to the debate last night, if you watched it, or if you've made up your mind for first or second choice in the last week, 646-435-7280, or with any questions you have for our guests', reporters, Liz Kim from Gothamist and Jeffrey Mays from the New York Times at 646-435-7280, 646-435-7280, or tweet your comment or question @BrianLehrer.

Here are a few moments from another question from the debate. The question was to name the worst idea of the campaign. This is one of those a cheap shot question, but it did produce some substance. Maybe it wasn't a cheap shot question. The question was to name the worst idea of the campaign from any candidate that you have heard so far. First, here's Kathryn Garcia's response.

Kathryn Garcia: To be quite honest with you, these are complicated times and several of my opponents are using hashtags to hashtag defund the police. I just don't think that's the right approach. You need to sit down and really think through these things.

Brian Lehrer: Then along similar public safety lines, Maya Wiley and Eric Adams had a back and forth. Remember the question was, what's the worst idea you heard during this campaign?

Maya Wiley: My Godson, who is 6'3, 6 foot 3 and feet tall, Black and beautiful, I've had to accompany him to court for riding his skateboard while Black. I've had to accompany him to court for sitting in a park while Black. The worst idea I've ever heard is bringing back Stop and Frisk and the anti-crime unit from Eric Adams, which one, is racist. Two, is unconstitutional and three didn't stop any crime, and four, it will not happen under my Wiley administration.

Moderator: 10 seconds Mr. Adams.

Eric Adams: Oh, you don't have to worry about danger when you have private security on your block. I don't and never will allow Stop and Frisk to be returned and abuse people. I know real solution for real people in New York is you have private security, you don't have to verify any of that stuff.

Brian Lehrer: All right. Jeffrey Mays, your article in the Times yesterday was largely about Wiley and Adams appealing to Black voters with different visions of public safety. How did you hear it play out there along the lines that you describing your piece?

Jeffery Mays: Yes, it was exactly the same argument that they've been making to voters large, but also specifically to Black voters. Eric Adams has really leaned on his background not only as a former police officer but someone who spoke out against discriminatory policing when he was in the department. Also as someone who he says was abused by police when he was a teenager to say that, look, I understand police. I understand the practices, Stop and Frisk is constitutional. There are ways that it could be done legally. He's focused on gun crimes and gun violence and the rise in homicides. One of his ideas is to bring back the plainclothes squad that focused on guns and violence that was just disbanded by the police commissioner. He thinks that those things can be brought back safely.

Maya Wiley has used her background as a civil rights lawyer the former head of the CCRB to question those policies as things that are regressive that will bring the city back. In 2013, a federal judge ruled that the city was using Stop and Frisk in an unconstitutional manner. Her argument to Black voters has been that look, we don't need to go back to this era of Stop and Frisk where 700,000 men were stopped in 2011, I believe, and that causes problems in our communities. They've been making that argument to voters.

Right now, we've seen a spike in violent crime homicides and shootings. Eric Adams has really been hammering the safety argument, and that he is the best person who can strike that balance between public safety while not violating the constitutional rights of specifically Black and brown New Yorkers. It's been an interesting debate. When I was out talking to voters this weekend, ran into a lot of Black voters, almost all of them mentioned the crime issue as at the top of their list of issues that they're concerned about in the city.

Brian Lehrer: Let me ask you to follow up on one thing you just said. Adam says he would use Stop and Frisk legally and therefore differently from the Bloomberg program that was declared unconstitutional. Is it clear how different Adam's approach would be from whatever legal uses of Stop and Frisk are happening now with the current NYPD under Mayor de Blasio?

Jeffery Mays: Well, look, Stop and Frisks have declined precipitously since the Bloomberg years. I think there were about 10,000 last year. The problem is that even though the numbers have declined--

Brian Lehrer: Just so people know the context, they were like 700,000 under Bloomberg at the peak.

Jeffery Mays: Right. At the peak in 2011, there were about almost 700,000. There around 10,000, somewhere around that number 8 to 10, I believe. What's happening is that you are still seeing the large majority of people that are being stopped are Black and Latino, and still the overwhelming majority, two thirds of them are being found to have not done anything wrong. Now, Stop and Frisk is a constitution, you can use it but they're supposed to be a basis for stopping someone.

Meaning you believe that this person may be involved in a crime. Then the standard to search someone is to believe that they may pose a danger to the police officer. That's not how the city was using it. They were saying, this person is making a jittery movement, or they looked behind them. They were using that as a reason to stop people and also ultimately search them. Eric Adams argument is that, if you monitor a police officers, if you monitor the stops, if you make sure there is a real underlying cause for a Stop and Frisk that it can be a good tool to prevent gun violence to prevent crime.

The problem is the data doesn't always play that out. We know that a lot of people who are stopped and frisked are not found to have weapons, it's not the best way to necessarily get weapons off the street. I think in this period where people are seeing violent crime rising, Eric Adams's message has been resonating with certain New Yorkers. Back to my article, particularly Black and brown New Yorkers who live in neighborhoods where they've been subject to this policing, but they also live in neighborhoods where they've been subject to shootings.

Brian Lehrer: Before we go to our first block of callers, and then we'll get to another debate exchange from last night. Liz, can you explain what we heard in the Eric Adams side of that exchange regarding the Maya Wiley private security thing. Our listeners might be wondering what Eric Adams is talking about there.

Elizabeth Kim: Sure. Maya Wiley lives in the Brooklyn neighborhood of Prospect Park South, and it has a neighborhood association that pays for private security. Her family pays into that fund, but she's explained that it's a decision that her partner made. Her partner happened to be assaulted. She's tried to walk this line where she said she respects it as a personal decision that her partner made, but tried to distance herself from it as well. Adams, who's tried to promote himself as this very, blue-collar guy. He's trying to make a point of the hypocrisy of someone who's trying to reduce the level of policing across the city while at the same time is paying for extra policing in her own backyard.

Brian Lehrer: Let's take a phone call. Here is Amy in Flatbush calling to react to the Andrew Yang build up the stock of psychiatric beds and mentally ill homeless New Yorkers on the street are transforming many neighborhoods. Amy, thanks so much for calling in you're on WNYC.

Amy: Hi, Brian. Can you hear me long-time listener technology dinosaur.

Brian Lehrer: All right. We hear you just fine. There must be this thing called the telephone that works pretty well in your house.

Amy: It's amazing, car Bluetooth, the whole thing. First of all, thank you for all you do. Second of all, I was just listening to the exchange in my car and I apologize. I don't know who the other participants are on the forum this morning, but I just want to acknowledge that the mental health issues are real in the streets. I live in Flatbush, I'm from the Midwest, I'm white, middle-aged woman. The only time I've ever been actually scared in the city since I've lived here isn't around people that need resources, that need help.

However, we cast it left, right, middle, we have to come to some common solutions for our city. I'm proud to live in a diverse neighborhood now. I'm proud to live in a place that is different than where I grew up. It's been a wonderful growth in my life to live in New York City, but the only time I've ever been scared for the other person as well was in two or three different interactions with people that had in my opinion, mental issues. I had to call 911, and that was to help me, but also to help them.

Brian Lehrer: Have you seen it get more prevalent in your neighborhood? I guess you're in Flatbush during, let's say the 15 months or so of the pandemic.

Amy: Well, in honesty, I wasn't here in the first few months of the pandemic. After I did return to the city, I don't know that I've seen an increase in it. I do see the same people that live in my neighborhood that I say good morning to every morning when I walk my dog. I do see the same people on the streets. I don't know that I've seen more, but I haven't seen my regular people that I see every morning.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you so much for your call. Amy, please do call us again. I knew there was one person who came back to New York during the pandemic. Now we know who it was. On Twitter people are reacting to this same thing on both sides. Someone writes Andrew Yang's comment about creating beds for mentally ill was very disturbing. On-house people with mental disabilities need-- as I'm clicking on the rest of this tweet, need supportive housing. That listener was against the idea of building up the stock of psychiatric beds as Yang, put it as a solution.

Somebody else writes, "It did not seem to me the Yang was demonizing homeless men. He was stating that citizens are fearful and that homeless mentally ill--" Sorry, again, this second half of the tweet is skewed. "He was not demonizing homeless man, he was stating that citizens are fearful and that the homeless mentally ill are not being served. Nuance, please." There you go. Liz, I'm just curious if that exchange broke out in a way since lots of people are calling and we're not going to continue on that, we're going to go into some other things, but it's easy to get a reaction on that particular exchange. I'm curious if you have an impression. as to whether that broke out as a particularly noticed moment?

Elizabeth Kim: I definitely thought it did. It was a very sharp tone for him and he's a candidate who has had to try to walk this line between being this very sunny, optimistic character, but also be aggressive in these debates and try to score some points. That moment stood out because he was basically, he looked into the camera and he was saying, this is enough and I'm going to do something about it. I think it's interesting that the caller Amy, like you asked her, have you seen more of this?

I think she said, she's seeing the same level of people but what's changed now is people are more fearful of those people, in part, because there've been so many headlines about violence on the streets like there've been stories about Asians being attacked. If you speak to people who work with people who are mentally ill, their concern is that somehow this conversation is now turning the mentally ill people into making them seem dangerous. They will tell you that if you look at the data, mentally ill people are not prone to be excessively violent, but now it seems there is this fear among many, many New Yorkers like Amy and I think Andrew Yang was tapping into that

Brian Lehrer: Phillip in Rigo Park, you're on WNYC. Hi Philip.

Philip: Good morning. I'm a Chinese American, and you just talk about the advertising for Andrew Yang. If you look at the Chinese media, especially, three major Chinese newspapers in the great New York area, you can see Andrew Yang advertising every day. I just check up during the waiting, I even see Andrew Yang wife do advertising for him. In general scene, do not need the major Chinese, because he is covered in the Chinese media, especially newspaper. That's all.

Brian Lehrer: What kind of appeal is he using in the Chinese newspapers, Phillip, as you see it?

Philip: Of course, the first Asian American man, that's it. All the Chinese voters, they say, we want to have first Chinese male, vote for Andrew Yang, regardless to even appear to Republican. They don't mention he's a Democrat, they mention he's a Chinese. Other Chinese, they won't mention let's together. Let's vote so we have a very first Chinese American in New York City.

Brian Lehrer: Phillip, thank you so much for your call. We really appreciate it. We'll continue with more of your calls and more excerpts from last night's debate right after this.

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Brian Lehrer on WNYC. As we talk about the mayoral primary in New York City, and last night's final televised debate on Channel Four, talking about it with Jeffrey Mays, New York Times, Metro correspondent, and Elizabeth Kim, who's covering the mayoral race for Gothamist in WNYC. With your reactions to the debate or your decisions for first and second place, if you're coming up with them just in the last few days, let's say, or any questions, 646-435-7280, or a tweet @Brian Lehrer.

Before we go on to our next clip from the debate that features an exchange between two other candidates, Liz, we were talking about Maya Wiley. Let me ask about one of Wiley signature proposals that she made sure to emphasize last night, that she would hire 2,500 more teachers to reduce class size. The city has something like 80,000 teachers now, I don't know the exact number. Maybe it's even more than 80,000. How much of a class size different citywide would another 2,500 make?

Elizabeth Kim: She estimates that she could reduce about 10,000 classes and she would focus on early childhood and K through five classrooms that are in neighborhoods that already have overcrowded classrooms, and which have been disproportionately impacted by COVID.

Brian Lehrer: Anything more on that from you, Jeff. I don't know if you've covered this particular thing, but Wiley is coming back to this as the final days of the campaign are going on. She must feel that this is an attractive proposal.

Jeff Mays: Yes, I don't have the exact specifics. I've heard her propose more teachers but just generally speaking the first debate she came on and one of the first things she said is I'm a mom, I'm a parent. She has really been looking to identify with New Yorkers along those lines. She understands how difficult schooling is. She understands the concerns that minority parents have about sending their kids out, being safe from police. She's really emphasize this idea that she is a mom, she's a Black mom.

She understands and has to deal with these issues, and part of her proposal on defunding the police is also to increase trauma care in school. Yes, identifying with parents is one of her key points. I was out in Sunset Park the other day. I talked to a gentleman who was a dad and he was going to vote for Maya Wiley as his first and only choice on the ballot. One of the reasons was that he felt she could identify with him as a parent.

Brian Lehrer: Now, just a few seconds after the exchange on public safety that we played a few minutes ago, this exchange broke out between Dianne Morales and Ray McGuire. McGuire speaks first.

Ray McGuire: Let's be very clear for Black and brown communities, neither defund the police nor Stop and Frisk, nor private security--

Dianne Morales: You don't speak for Black and brown communities. How dare you assume to speak for Black and brown communities as a monitor? You can not do that. You can not do that.

Ray McGuire: Can I talk to Black and brown communities? Can I talk to them? Oh, I can. I just did. You know what? I just did do it.

Dianne Morales: You cannot speak for the community as a whole.

Ray McGuire: I'm going to do it again. Black and brown communities do not want either defund or stop and frisk, full stop.

Dianne Morales: You're not speaking for all Black and brown communities because I am a member of that community and you are certainly not speaking for me.

Ray McGuire: Let's exclude you.

[crosstalk]

Moderator: I need to stop you, candidates.

Brian Lehrer: There was some crosstalk there. I think nevertheless, it's notable that that exchange did end with McGuire saying, let's exclude you, and Morales saying, let's not exclude me. Liz, right or wrong on the issue, that was not a good look for McGuire calling to exclude the Latino candidate in the race. Even if he was just trying to say, you don't speak for everybody either. Are people reacting to that?

Elizabeth Kim: I thought that was a very interesting exchange because we have four leading Black candidates who are running for mayor and they are ideologically divided over policing which has disproportionately affected Black and brown communities. It's this question of which of these candidates is really speaking for Black and brown New Yorkers? To get at Diane's point, it's not a monolith, like any group, you're going to have divisions and people are going to be broken down a lot in class, generation, national origin. If you go into Black communities you'll find different opinions on this. I think the only consensus that I've heard is that people in Black and brown communities, they want to feel safe in their communities, but they also want to be safe from police abuse.

Brian Lehrer: Meanwhile, neither of them are in the top tier and Jeff, you referred to that in your Times' article yesterday about how the candidates are trying to appeal to Black voters on public safety. Why do you think McGuire hasn't caught on more than he has? Some analysts at the start of the race expected him to.

Jeff Mays: He really came on strong. In the beginning, he had strong support from the business community. He raised $5 million in three months. Politics in New York City is rough, it's one of the ways I could say. It's tough to be a candidate. He started with no name recognition whatsoever, whereas several other, the leading candidates' Eric Adams and Scott Stringer and even Maya Wiley and Andrew Yang who ran for president and Maya Wiley, who was on MSNBC, they came into the race with some level of name recognition and people who knew who they were.

This is a strange primary season. We're having a primary now in June as opposed to September where it had been in the past. Maybe if there were a few more months for him to get out and know voters and meet voters, but it's a lot to do in a few months to not only introduce yourself to voters but to explain to them that you're the best choice to lead the city and so I think he's really fallen victim to that and you're right. He has not done as well as some people had expected.

Brian Lehrer: Ross in the East Village, you're on WNYC. Hello Ross.

Ross: Hi, Brian. Thanks for taking my call.

Brian Lehrer: Sure.

Ross: Yes. I spoke with you a couple of weeks ago. You asked at the end of May who was my number one choice as opposed to beginning and I'm sticking with Eric Adams. My union, a local six hotel restaurant union, which we're finally getting back to work in July they backed Eric, to be the choice for mayor. They also backed de Blasio when he had his failed presidential run. I think they were just posturing to the next mayor. Yes, I'm sticking with Eric Adams. I think it's a little disingenuous for everyone to question Eric Adams and Ray McGuire on their approach to the Black and brown communities. When these are two guys that actually grew up in New York City in Black and brown communities. Do you agree with that? Why do people question their commitment to the Black and brown community? They're not going to sell out their communities.

Brian Lehrer: Jeff, having reported on that precise angle, do you want to react to the context of the question he's posing?

Jeff Mays: Yes. Ray McGuire, actually grew up in Dayton Ohio came here as a young man to begin working on Wall Street. Eric Adams of course grew up in Queens and Brooklyn and talks about that a lot in his bio. I'm not sure what the callers question is. I know for both of them the Black voters were going to be a strong base. They both went after Black voters. Eric Adams has really won that battle in the Marist Poll that came out. I think about 42% of Black voters said he would be their first choice and Maya Wiley trail behind with about 11% and Ray McGuire had anywhere from six to 8%. We know it's hard to become mayor in the city without some strong Black support.

Mayor de Blasio was able to put together a coalition that included Black voters, a strong coalition that actually stuck with him, even when white voters were not ranking him well. I think both of them throughout the campaign have tried to speak to issues relating to the Black community. Eric Adams really has focused on crime and public safety and Ray McGuire, using his background as a Wall Street executive has often talked about financial empowerment and generational wealth for Black people. I think both of them have really tried to address important issues, longstanding issues that have not been resolved in the Black community.

Brian Lehrer: Liz, I guess another factor is how generational this appears to be, Jeff was just citing some striking results from the Marist Poll between Adams and the rest of the park broken down along racial lines. Along age lines, Adams leads clearly among people over 45, which was their dividing line, under 45 he's only coming in third.

Elizabeth Kim: Yes. I think that tracks with what we've seen in the Defund Movement, Black Lives Matter, a lot of energized young people, maybe under 40, I would say. I think that that's consistent this idea of how do we tackle, how do we reform the police? Can we have increased policing without it being aggressive and racist policing? These are questions that I think that perhaps a younger generation sees in a more nuanced way you can argue.

Brian Lehrer: Dash in Hell's kitchen, you're on WNYC. Hi Dash.

Dash: Well, Hey, Brian, how's it going?

Brian Lehrer: Good.

Dash: I'm so glad that you played the McGuire clip of him talking over Morales because it emphasizes so much how I have felt about this race and I'm just like, I'm so fed up with the male candidates and I'm done with all of them and I'm not putting any man on my ballot. McGuire says he supports women and that he just talks right over Morales and tells her, "Let's exclude you." Meanwhile, the women in the race have been keeping their heads down and trying to be heard while the men all attack each other and posture.

Yang gets a ton of response on Twitter and from the media, because he says and names things like what he said about mental health, and he conflicts it with crime. Then Adams is moving along in the boroughs in first place and I'm really worried that he's going to get in. I'm putting the women at the top three of my ballot, and then the rest I'm leaving blank.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you very much Dash. We appreciate it. Jeff, I see the last little piece from you on the Times website is quoting somebody saying, "Let a woman run the show." What was the context for that?

Jeff Mays: I was out in Sunset Park the other day and talking to voters and this gentleman, his name was Andrew Lang and he's a chef a cook. He had real concerns about Eric Adams becoming mayor because of the policing issue. He did not agree with him that more police are necessary did not agree about stop and frisk or would turn into anti-crime units and felt that every issue that Eric talked about ended with more police being the answer, and he was concerned about that.

As a father, he was really concerned that what the city needs is someone who has more compassion, who is going to try to understand what parents and what residents are going through. The person that he found that he thought could win was Maya Wiley. He liked her because he felt she was more progressive on a lot of issues than other candidates. Also he was struck by the fact that New York City has never had a woman mayor. Yes, that was his concern.

Brian Lehrer: Go ahead, finish your thought. I'm sorry.

Jeff Mays: No, I was going to say, that argument the women in this race from Kathryn Garcia to Diane Morales, to Maya Wiley have all struck on the fact that the city has never had a woman mayor and what that would mean how the city would be run differently with a woman in charge.

Brian Lehrer: Interesting that you found a random voter named Andrew Lang and he's not voting for Andrew Yang. Let me finish with you, Jeff, on one other thing to the points you were just making. In your article yesterday, you referred to Reverend Al Sharpton at his forum in late May asking Maya Wiley and Eric Adams about the Stop and Frisk issue. Sharpton I believe at that forum had said that he would endorse in the race about two weeks before primary day, and now he's decided not to endorse. I'm curious what you make of-- well, I'll put it this way, what do you make of Sharpton, not endorsing Maya Wiley, who is the police better behave candidate, which is what Sharpton's career has been so much about?

Jeff Mays: Well, I think what Sharpton actually said was that he was going to make a consideration about whether he would endorse and he would make an announcement about two weeks before. He didn't actually say he would endorse. I think for him rank choice voting unclear who's going to win, it maybe makes sense in his mind to stay out of it. I wonder with the issue of policing, Maya Wiley has really been a late riser in the polls.

Initially, she has built herself as the most progressive candidate in the race but if you look at what has happened, she was not considered the most progressive candidate. Scott Stringer had wrapped up most of the endorsements of progressive coalitions. They had decided to back him as their candidate when he had his sexual abuse allegations, those same progressive leaders then began moving to Diane Morales.

Then when Diane Morales had issues with her campaign wanting to unionize and allegations of an abusive environment and things of that nature, then those progressive groups started coalescing Maya Wiley. She's really been like the third choice of some of the progressive coalitions in the city. I think that may be because of her background with mayor de Blasio as his counsel and her role on the CCRB and giving advice to the mayor. I think there maybe some just residual concern about how she would run the city, whether she would follow in the footsteps of mayor de Blasio. It makes sense that the Reverend has not jumped onto her train at this point, because she wasn't the first choice of many of the progressive groups in the city.

Brian Lehrer: Jeffrey Mays follow his campaign coverage and other Metro reporting in the New York Times. Elizabeth Kim, follow her campaign reporting these final days on gothamist.com. Liz, does there happen to be a voter's guide on Gothamist where people could get a lot of information about every race?

Elizabeth Kim: Yes, we've written about all the races and you can expect us to re-feature that coverage as we get closer to primary day, which is on Tuesday.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, if you're still trying to make up your mind about any of the races to great voter's guide on gothamist.com, there are others. The Times also has one with citizens union. Those voter guides you get in the mail, if you're a registered voter in New York City, they have a lot of information about a lot of candidates. There were various places you can check if you're still studying up, especially about some of the down-ballot races. Jeff, thanks a lot, Liz. Thanks a lot.

Elizabeth Kim: Thank you.

Jeff Mays: Thanks, Brian.

[00:41:21] [END OF AUDIO]

 

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