By Nayaba Arinde
Editor-at-Large
There are three testy months before the NYC mayoral election day, with likely voters demanding policy ideas, not platitudes, real fleshed-out agendas, not pandering affirmations.
Lead candidates, such as Democratic-line Zohran Mamdani, former Democrats-turned-Independents, current Mayor Eric Adams, and former governor Andrew Cuomo, are the main focus.
With the public considering the legal issues that pursued both candidates–leading to a Cuomo conundrum and Adams’ adversity—voters are being asked to forget or forgive past not-made-it-to-trial tribulations and vote their informed choice. Curtis Sliwa supporters remind the undecided not to discount their Republican candidate, while the Mamdani-decided want to coast to November 4th, 2025, as if it were an election won.
“This NYC mayoral election is six of one, and half a dozen of the other,” a veteran Black journalist told Our Time Press. “People feel disappointed by Eric. That is the talk in the streets. He has been well known in the community, both professionally and personally. We expected him to do more for the neighborhoods, which he knows have been underserved for decades. Not these campaign community actions.
We thought he would take police harassment more seriously. You see, the neighborhoods are complaining that the ‘tan-pants boys’ will jump out and push somebody to the wall, or on the sidewalk. There is high unemployment, and the kids need something to do. People are saying that nothing has gotten better under his administration in general. All we have is chaos and confusion. The benefits he is always discussing on TV have not trickled down to the average person on the streets.”
Longtime Adams ally Rev. Conrad Muhammad told Our Time Press, “Candidates will say anything to be elected. They will speak in vague generalities. Eric has proven his specific commitment to Black folks. Eric has made City Hall Blacker than it has ever been, with sisters and brothers from The South Bronx, Harlem, the Black Belt of Queens, Bedford Stuyvesant, East New York, and Brownsville top-tier leaders in the City of New York. New York has never had African-American participation in city government and doing business with the city as it has in the past four years. Eric will do even more specific Black empowerment in his second term, and he is going to win, I guarantee it.”
Adams, who again did not respond to the Our Time Press response to a statement, speaks daily about his commitment to helping the City on all community levels. Crime, he said, is down by 1% from last quarter. Yet, there was a stabbing on the C-Line subway on Tuesday, numerous deadly shootings in the last two weeks–including the Park Avenue mass shooting and reported violence, which keeps communities on edge.
Running on the ‘End Antisemitism’ and ‘Safe & Affordable’ independent ballot lines, Adams dismissed the Gothamist report that his campaign included a number of fake signatures in his independent-line ballot bid. He alluded that it was his volunteers and opponents to blame for any discrepancies.
“Everyone who knows about petitioning is well aware that you even have some of your opponents who come and do tricks, you know, to try to sabotage your campaign.”
Gothamist said that over 50 people charged that their signatures were forged or gained under false pretenses. Now over 50,000 signatures will be examined.
Timothy Ford of Afrikans Helping Afrikans told Our Time Press, “When it comes to the mayoral race Eric Adams isn’t going to win…he lost the Black vote…not because he’s a fraud, more because of his pardon by Trump.
Black people can accept his charges and going to trial–what they can’t accept is a sellout and a puppet for Trump. They all know he owes Trump, and will do anything that Trump demands. If he couldn’t stand up to Trump’s attorney general, how can he stand up for Black people? No vote for Eric Adams.”
Speaking on the Tavis Smiley radio show, Adams said that as the incumbent, “The reason people can critique me is because I have a record.” He touted successes in “developing more affordable housing…putting $30 billion back into the pockets of working-class people, everything from no income tax for low-income New Yorkers…more jobs in our city’s history… decrease in unemployment…particularly for Black and Brown New Yorkers.”
As for the recent incidents of gun violence, he said, there are the lowest shootings this year, and “Our subway system is the safest it has ever been.”
As he reintroduced the controversial quality-of-life teams this week, New Yorkers did not feel safe.
Adams once again blamed the media for reinforcing an unrealistic narrative, “You pick up your newspapers…if we focus on the worst thing that could happen in the city of 8.5 million people… then it’s going to tend to make people feel unsafe.”
In actuality, many subway riders simply have to weigh up real safety fears against necessity and convenience. Last week saw failed transformers, which left passengers on hot and delayed trains and platforms, some alongside a dead body at a Prospect Park station not moved for hours, then there were the flooded rains and stations, which saw commuters scrambling to get out, not to mention the fire underneath a train at Coney Island this week. But it is the media reporting, according to Adams, not the actual facts.
Meanwhile, the Staten Island Democratic Party endorsed Mamdani, saying, “The voters have spoken.” Earlier this week, Mamdani sat with Senator Elizabeth Warren and DC37 Executive Director Henry Garrido at DC37 union headquarters in Manhattan.
The Queens assemblyman who said he will see the building of 200,000 affordable homes, freeze rent, and make buses free, reinforced his other mayoral campaign affordability mantra, and pledge to deliver universal childcare, “We know that it is our responsibility to move beyond the broken politics of the past, of our city and our state, and start to offer an alternative across this country to what it could look like to be a people that fight for the families that raise us.”
The Democratic Socialist, who in recent polls is primed to win the November 4th election, showed up at the Grand Army Plaza National Night Out 78th Precinct event, saying of the very same police department that he once called “a major threat to public safety,” he is “not running to defund the police.” Instead, “I am looking forward to working with the rank and file of our police department, the union leadership that represents those same police officers.”
Cuomo’s people did not respond to an Our Time response for an interview/statement, but pre-primary, attuning his tone to the Cultural Christian Center in Flatlands, the former governor told the crowd that affordable housing, more cops, safer streets, and transportation were all part of his political schematic. Plus, he said, “The question on election day—who can get the job done?… I know how to make the government work.” Unprompted, he added, “I can’t sing. I can’t dance. I don’t play golf. But I can make the government work. I can turn the city around.”
