Mayor Bill De Blasio speaks to the media at the opening of the coronavirus vaccination post at Citi Field. | David Dee Delgado / Getty Images
NEW YORK – Mayor Bill de Blasio stopped dealing with the pandemic one night last week to turn his attention to local politics.
Worried about keeping his legacy intact, the outgoing mayor called a meeting of three Labor leaders to discuss the race to replace him and raise concerns about the potential damage that a pro-business candidate would do to the city, several people familiar with the closed door discussion said POLITICO.
De Blasio received the presidents of District Council 37, Hotel Trades Council and 32BJ SEIU – unions he counts as allies – at his residence at the Gracie Mansion last Wednesday night for a long discussion on the state of the race and the future of the city. people said.
The outgoing mayor, whose term ends on December 31, did not endorse or admonish any of the Democrats seeking their job before the June primaries, but made it clear that he wants the next mayor to continue his record of expanding kindergarten and affordable housing and require retrofits of buildings to reduce emissions.
De Blasio, a political trade agent, also expressed a preference for Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, questioned the veracity of Andrew Yang’s good leadership in the polls and asked union presidents whether they would join forces in the dispute, people said.
“He said he liked Eric’s story,” said one person, referring to the biography Adams often shares in the campaign: The black son of a single mother who grew up in poverty and was beaten by police as a teenager before becoming a police officer himself. Adams and de Blasio share a political base in central Brooklyn and the district president is one of the few politicians who avoided attacking the mayor during the difficult times of his term.
De Blasio said publicly that he has not decided who to endorse. In a statement, his spokesman Bill Neidhardt simply said: “The mayor and union leaders, who are close friends, came together to talk about the future of the labor movement in New York City and the need to see progressive policies in the coming years. years old”.
The mayor did not openly discredit Yang, but questioned his status as a leader in a survey commissioned by Yang’s team, people said. Subsequent independent research confirmed that Yang is in the lead among likely Democratic voters.
Several people familiar with De Blasio’s thinking recently told POLITICO that the mayor is hesitant about Yang, a private sector political outsider who has a strong ideological and stylistic contrast. One said the mayor is suspicious of Yang’s ties to advisers to former mayor Mike Bloomberg.
And while de Blasio has a particularly hostile relationship with one of the race’s pioneers, city supervisor Scott Stringer, he said he preferred Stringer to “a type of Bloomberg who would undo or make the city go back 10, 12 years,” said one person , counting the mayor’s comments.
He offered measured support to Maya Wiley, his former City attorney who is also running, but expressed skepticism about his chances of winning the primaries, people familiar with the meeting said.
POLITICO interviewees asked to remain anonymous to speak freely about a private meeting.
Union leaders – who wore masks, sat at a distance and were sometimes unsure about the exact purpose of the meeting – told de Blasio that they have not decided who to endorse and are unlikely to join together behind a candidate.
One person said that de Blasio seemed “in a good mood” and “freer”.
He recalled his own recovery victory in 2013 and reminded those in attendance that his first place status was not consolidated until a month before that year’s primary.
Chris Coffey, Yang’s campaign co-manager, said that “a Yang government would be a complete break from the past eight years of missed opportunities and internal politics. It’s time to change.”