Adams' fate could affect a Cuomo run for NYC mayor
Former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo has emerged as a clear favorite in the NYC mayoral race among potential Democratic primary voters in the latest poll. Credit: Kendall Rodriguez
The circumstances are uncanny. Designating petitions in New York City’s mayoral contest are due to begin circulating Feb. 25 and we still don’t know whether the federally indicted Eric Adams, the city’s first Black mayor in a generation, will seek reelection as an underdog.
Much discussion and speculation among political professionals focuses on how soon Donald Trump, the previously federally indicted and state-convicted president, might get his newly tilted Justice Department to drop or dilute corruption charges against Adams.
The sooner that happens — if it happens — the better it looks for a "vindicated" Adams to try for a second term, the insider thinking goes. And if Adams is even nominally in the race, that could be bad for ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who is clearly preparing for a big-city campaign 3½ years after resigning amid a long-familiar scandal.
It’s a good guess that for numerous reasons Trump would dislike a Cuomo "comeback" story with the potential to eclipse his own, coming as it does out of the media capital of America. As governor during the COVID pandemic, Cuomo won plaudits for his televised crisis briefings.
Adams’ continuing, if distracted, presence on the scene means no matter what, the race would be about him. Cuomo’s camp has let it be known he’d prefer not to face Adams in a Democratic primary in June. Whether that still holds is anyone’s guess as the hour grows late. Cuomo continues to make the rounds of communities that previously backed Adams.
If a Cuomo announcement were not expected soon, Curtis Sliwa, who’s fixing to run for mayor again as a Republican, might not be on WABC radio with ad hominem attacks. That’s in Sliwa’s wheelhouse as a street-smart comic. In 2010, he memorably crashed the Democratic state convention dressed up as "King Cuomo II." There's also a video on the web and on cable attacking Cuomo on the old themes of nursing home deaths, his moneymaking book publication, and spending state dollars to fend off #MeToo allegations. It's sponsored by a group called United for a Brighter Tomorrow.
Of course, when the time comes, the ex-governor will push to offset the derision and stress his analysis of key issues such as crime and housing rather than personality. He's unlikely to offer any sweeping ideological contrast to Adams — but would promise to straighten out dysfunctional municipal agencies. The city charter, at least as applied, gives more unchecked power to a mayor than the state constitution does to a governor. If elected, Cuomo could be serving a half-century after his father Mario Cuomo lost a titanic mayoral race to the late Ed Koch.
Remember that in Albany, Andrew Cuomo had lost support in the Democratic Party whose other elected leaders he seemed to have irreversibly alienated. But like the job itself, a nomination in a multi-way mayoral primary offers a different dynamic than a state race.
This week, strategist Brad Honan released a poll of 769 likely Democratic voters that showed 35% favoring Cuomo and 10% the leftier City Comptroller Brad Lander, with Adams tied for third place with state Assemb. Zohran Mamdani. Honan's survey showed about half of Democrats with a favorable view of Cuomo but nearly half unfavorable. Most said they dislike the direction of the city.
Under the circumstances, those are numbers with which Cuomo can work considering he's been outside the public arena in recent years.
Columnist Dan Janison's opinions are his own.
Dan Janison is a member of the Newsday editorial board.