Eric Adams, a former police captain, was declared the winner of the Democratic primary for mayor of New York City on Tuesday night. Adams is now on a glide path to Gracie Mansion; Democrats outnumber Republicans 7 to 1 in the nation’s largest city and the GOP’s contender, Curtis Sliwa, is not expected to mount a serious challenge.
Adams will be the second Black mayor in New York City’s history. He presented himself as a blue-collar candidate, a clear-eyed problem solver who recognizes the need for reform within law enforcement, but rejects the ‘defund the police’ movement favored by progressives. Like many other cities across the U.S., New York has been grappling with a troubling spike in violent crime. Shootings in New York were up 73% in May from a year ago.
“If Black lives really matter, it can’t only be against police abuse. It has to be against the violence that’s ripping apart our communities,” he told supporters on the night of the primary.
Adams promised to deliver “the justice we deserve and the safety we need.” He often talks about being on both sides of the police-community divide. As a teenager, he said he was the victim of police brutality. He would go on to serve 22 years in the NYPD. During his tenure, he co-founded 100 Blacks in Law Enforcement Who Care, a group that campaigned for criminal justice reform and against racial profiling. He became Brooklyn borough president in 2014.
Politico summarizes his crime fighting priorities:
He wants to reinstate a plainclothes unit disbanded by the NYPD last year to focus on gun safety. He readily denounces the “defund NYPD” slogan that surged after the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis last year. He has defended the controversial practice of stop-and-frisk if used correctly. He wants spot checks for guns entering the city at Port Authority bus terminals.
Adams’ embrace of stop-and-frisk and his willingness to expand the police department is out of synch with the activist wing of his party. But his victory may show that rank-and-file Democrats – even in famously liberal New York – crave moderate policies and practical solutions to curb crime. It’s an important lesson heading into the 2022 midterms.
Howard Wolfson, a top Democrat strategist, told Axios that Adams’ win “permissions every Democrat around the nation to argue for safety and justice” over defunding police.
Recent polling shows that ‘defund the police’ is an extremely unpopular movement – only 18% of Americans support it. But it’s become closely associated with the Democratic party as liberal activists use their social media megaphones to spread the message. Headed into 2022, the GOP plans to tie the anti-police rhetoric to their Democratic opponents. The Washington Post explains:
Many Democrats are now feeling a growing urgency to rebut the Republican attacks, especially in the battleground states and districts. In the House, the path to power runs through suburban areas, where Democrats dominated during Donald Trump’s presidency. Voters in those districts are getting flooded with grisly news reports of violent crime in adjacent cities.
More from WaPo:
The shifting attitude is already evident in nascent Democratic midterm campaigns. Last year, candidates’ connections to law enforcement were greeted with skepticism by some activists; these days, many Democrats are openly touting their background in law enforcement or their ties to police.
Adams’ campaign may be a model path forward. In his interview with Axios, Wolfson said it attracted the same voters who helped tip the presidency to Joe Biden: blue-collar and non-college educated workers.
“It was the moderates, not the progressives who were ascendant in this mayoral primary, which reflected the focus of Adams…upon common sense solutions, not ideological purity, in regard to promoting safety with justice on crime and managerial competence,” Albany-based political consultant Bruce Gyory told Bloomberg.
The NYC 2021 primaries were the first to use rank-choice voting. There were significant growing pains and the two runners-up, Kathryn Garcia and Maya Wiley have not yet conceded.
The final tally had Adams just 8,426 votes ahead of Garcia.
“I know how we can turn around not only New York, but America,” Adams said Wednesday during an interview on CBS. “New York is going to show America how to run cities.”
