NEW YORK CITY (WABC) — New Yorkers will head to the polls in 5 weeks to choose the next mayor and the top two candidates, Zohran Mamdani and Andrew Cuomo, are pounding the pavement while politically blasting each other.
The third candidate, Curtis Sliwa, insists he is going to stay in the race.
Since suspending his campaign, Mayor Adams has yet to make any official endorsements but stated in an interview that he is considering putting his support behind one of the candidates.
Outside of NYPD Headquarters, Andrew Cuomo insisted the Democratic nominee has some explaining to do.
On Central Park South, Zohran Mamdani accused Cuomo of doing the bidding of billionaires.
“The billionaires may have spent more than $25 million on Andrew Cuomo in the primary and failed. They may spend more money again in this race. We beat them then. We will beat them again,” Mamdani said.
Both Mamdani and Cuomo see vulnerabilities and opportunities. With Mayor Adams out of the race, the uniformed services endorsements are back on the table.
“He is a member of an organization called the Democratic Socialists of America, DSA. They have the position currently to abolish jails. They would disband, defund the police,” Cuomo said.
“You’ve said several times that he wants to abolish the police. He doesn’t want to abolish the police,” Eyewitness News’ N.J. Burkett said.
In an Eyewitness News interview on Monday, Cuomo insisted that Mamdani needs to clarify his positions.
“How about everything else you said? You called the NYPD racist. That’s okay? When he said the NYPD was corrupt and wicked, was that okay? He shouldn’t be called out for that, N.J.?” Cuomo said.
Mamdani told reporters that defunding the NYPD is not part of his platform.
“Our focus is about addressing the retention crisis, delivering on public safety, and ensuring that officers are actually able to do their jobs,” Mamdani said.
And as for Cuomo’s billionaire backers?
“Those donors will find the same thing they found in the primary, which is that there is no amount of money that can suppress New Yorkers’ desire for change,” Mamdani said.
And all of this, as Republican Curtis Sliwa struggles for attention.
“It’s almost like these billionaires give me vertigo. Maybe they know Wall Street, but they don’t know the streets,” Sliwa said.
In fact, his name was mentioned on the campaign trail just once on Tuesday by Mamdani, who publicly thanked him for remaining in the race.
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