Few political operatives have it simpler than opposition researchers in New York Metropolis this yr.
New York’s 2025 municipal races characteristic a scandal-laden solid of characters whose alleged or confirmed misdeeds have made front-page headlines for years. They embody the front-runner heading into Tuesday’s Democratic mayoral major.
Former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has spent a lot of his bid to turn out to be New York’s subsequent mayor cleansing skeletons out of his closet, whether or not he’s wished to or not. The scion of a storied political household, Cuomo resigned in shame from the governorship in 2021 after an investigation led by state Legal professional Basic Letitia James discovered that he had harassed 11 girls and subjected a few of them to undesirable touching and groping. A proper settlement between the state government chamber and the U.S. Justice Division, launched in 2024, discovered Cuomo had subjected at the least 13 feminine workers to a “sexually hostile work environment.”
However Cuomo isn’t the one candidate in search of political redemption in New York Metropolis this month. Ought to he win Tuesday’s Democratic major, he’ll tackle incumbent Eric Adams, a Democrat working for re-election as an impartial. Adams was indicted in September on federal corruption costs, which have been dropped this yr when the Justice Division argued, amongst different issues, that the case distracted from Adams’ capability to enact President Donald Trump’s immigration agenda.
AP
AP
On this Sept. 1, 2020, file picture, Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams makes an announcement about early voting, within the Brooklyn borough of New York. Adams, a former police officer who served 4 phrases in New York’s state Senate earlier than profitable the borough president’s job in 2013, is a longtime critic of police misconduct working as a pro-business candidate for New York Mayor. (AP Photograph/Mark Lennihan, File)
After which there’s Anthony Weiner.
Weiner is now out of jail, and his political animal can’t be caged. He’s vying for a spot on the New York Metropolis Council — a part of an unofficial slate testing what voters will forgive and what they received’t in 2025.
In an interview this month, Weiner argued that the way in which he’s dealt with his controversies can’t be in comparison with the methods Cuomo and Adams have dealt with theirs.
“I’m not denying. I’m not pointing fingers. I’m not asking for a pardon,” mentioned Weiner, working for a district encompassing the Decrease East Facet and East Village neighborhoods of Manhattan.
“I’ve served my time. I accepted responsibility. Now I’m moving forward,” Weiner mentioned.
Within the first Democratic mayoral debate, when the moderators requested Cuomo to share a remorse from his years in politics, he didn’t share a private failing; as an alternative, he mentioned he regretted “that the Democratic Party got to a point that we allowed Mr. Trump to be elected.”
Cuomo’s rivals aren’t letting him neglect the accusations he’s confronted.
Requested a seemingly innocuous query at that debate about enhancing public security on New York Metropolis’s subway system, underdog candidate Michael Blake jumped in: “The people who don’t feel safe are young women, mothers and grandmothers around Andrew Cuomo. That’s the greatest threat to public safety in New York City.”
One week later, through the subsequent debate, Cuomo’s fundamental rival, democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani, unleashed a brand new slew of assaults. After Cuomo had lambasted Mamdani over his expertise, Mamdani pounced.
“I have never hounded the 13 women who credibly accused me of sexual harassment. I have never sued for their gynecological records, and I have never done those things because I am not you, Mr. Cuomo,” Mamdani mentioned in a monologue that went viral.
The allegations that led to his resignation — which Cuomo has repeatedly denied, although he additionally mentioned upon resigning that there had been “generational and cultural shifts” that he “didn’t fully appreciate” — have come up within the marketing campaign alongside different controversies from his governorship. One other 2021 report from the state legal professional normal accused him of undercounting nursing dwelling deaths through the Covid-19 pandemic. On Juneteenth, Metropolis Council member Chi Ossé, who endorsed Mamdani, posted on X to resurface a 2019 interview by which Cuomo mentioned the N-word whereas quoting a New York Occasions op-ed.
Nonetheless, Cuomo leads the pack in polling, although he might face a battle because of the metropolis’s ranked selection voting system.
Adams, too, has denied wrongdoing and claimed vindication because the federal costs he confronted have been dropped.
Weiner says his expertise has formed the way in which he perceives Cuomo’s and Adams’ conditions.
“Going through the maelstrom of public outcry, outcry and scandal, I do read the papers differently than I used to,” mentioned Weiner, 60. “I have what they say in Yiddish or Hebrew ‘rachmones.’ I have feeling for people in difficult circumstances.”
Regardless of the empathy, he mentioned evaluating his checkered to Cuomo’s and Adams’ is “apples and oranges.”
“They’re denying they did anything wrong. They’re suing their detractors and their accusers. I’m accepting responsibility. I paid my debt to society,” he mentioned.
“I have this notion that everything I have done up to now has led me to this exact spot.”
For New Yorkers heading to the poll this cycle, forgiveness shouldn’t be one-size-fits-all.
Carmen Perez, 55, from West Harlem, is prepared to provide Cuomo one other probability however isn’t loopy in regards to the different embattled candidates.
“I’ve seen what Cuomo can do,” mentioned Perez, who runs a program for senior residents. “During the pandemic, he literally just took over and said, ‘This is how we’re going to do this and this is how we’re going to get through this.’”
“That’s what you want to hear from a leader during a crisis.”
On the subject of Adams, Perez is much less enthusiastic. “I would hope that most people would take this opportunity and really examine why people are running and what’s the real purpose behind their running,” she mentioned of Adams, implying the controversies round him are stickier than those round Cuomo.
Within the case of Esther Yang, a yoga instructor from town, not one of the beleaguered candidates deserves her vote. “I think their parents did not raise them well enough,” she mentioned.
“I’m a yoga teacher, so I believe that how you do anything is how you do everything,” Yang mentioned, earlier than turning particularly to Cuomo and Adams: “I believe that if you can’t get your act together for your personal life, then I don’t think you should be a mayor for your professional life.”
Weiner’s candidacy can also be a nonstarter for Yang.
“I like to see how somebody’s going to be a good husband, a good father, and how they conduct their personal life,” Yang mentioned.
