Eric Adams Transition, NY Omicron Response, and More

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Next, we'll get to how Governor Hochul, Mayor de Blasio, and Eric Adams are handling the Omicron variant response and other interesting developments in the de Blasio to Adams's transition but first, this is a GivingTuesday minute. Today is GivingTuesday, a day during the end of the year shopping season when non-profits like ours remind people that this is also the time of year that many donors make their contributions to charities and cultural institutions, and other non-profits like ours.

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Now, Bill de Blasio is going out and Eric Adams is coming in. De Blasio is doing his last things as mayor, Adams is setting up his first. De Blasio finds himself preparing for yet another COVID variant, making one last effort to ban carriage horses as another thing that he's doing, an original campaign promise, you might remember, and a few other things, Adams is setting himself up to try to be the public safety and criminal justice reform mayor. After there was some alleged vandalism in Queens Village last week, for example, following the acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse, Eric Adams said this.

Eric Adams: These are not New Yorkers. These are outside agitators that have one desire, and that is to destroy our city. You are not allowed to destroy property and harm innocent people.

Brian: Adams is also off to Ghana now, keeping plans he had made despite the Omicron variant seeming to have come originally from Africa. Of course, that was Southern Africa, Ghana is in the northwest. I think this is worth saying out loud. My Maps app says the distance between Accra, the capital of Ghana, and Johannesburg, just for the record, about 4,400 miles, but the media is asking about his going to Africa in the context of Omicron.

If Omicron was in Buffalo, would they be asking why someone is going to Honolulu? It's about the same distance. With us now to talk about de Blasio's and Adams's transition, comings and goings are Gothamist and WNYC political reporter, Elizabeth Kim and Gloria Pazmino, political reporter for Spectrum News NY1. Hi, Liz and Gloria. Welcome back to WNYC.

Elizabeth Kim: Good morning Brian.

Gloria Pazmino: Hi, Brian. Good morning. I wish I was going to Hawaii.

Brian: I wish I was going to either place. Gloria, how are Mayor de Blasio and also Governor Hochul reacting on a policy level? What's the latest to Omicron with no New York cases identified yet?

Gloria: I think the first thing we should mention is that we saw Mayor de Blasio yesterday double down on what has been a somewhat flexible policy around the city in terms of mask-wearing indoors. We've been back and forth between do we wear a mask indoors? Do we not wear one? Is it safe not to? Yesterday, the mayor and his health officials went out and did not put a hard requirement in place but strongly recommended that New Yorkers should definitely be wearing a mask when they are indoors and around other people as a result of this new variant that the city is monitoring.

Both the mayor and the governor have acknowledged that is really not a matter of if but when which is what we've said about all of these variants and unfortunately the virus is a whole, that it is only a matter of time until there is a case here in New York. They have also been really, really pushing on the vaccination front. We've seen this at the federal level as well where we were telling adults, telling people over 18 to go out and get the booster, telling parents to get their children vaccinated.

At the federal level, we saw President Biden yesterday tell people that people should be getting vaccinated and really pushing that forward. Here at the local level, the same message being echoed by both the governor and the mayor. The governor offering to set up more vaccination sites across the state. She offered the help of the state government in terms of places that don't have a great vaccination rate so far, particularly places outside of New York City. New York City is doing quite well when it comes to the rate of vaccination, but certainly pushing forward on that booster front and getting children vaccinated.

Brian: Of course, scientists are scrambling as fast as they can to figure out just how protective against Omicron the current vaccines are. We're going to be talking to Dr. Leana Wen about that and other Omicron developments a little after eleven o'clock, listeners. I know that many of you like when Dr. Wen comes on. Liz, I see that Eric Adams attended de Blasio's appearance before reporters yesterday on Omicron. How much was Adams endorsing de Blasio's current response or his record in general on the pandemic?

Liz: I think it was important to have Eric Adams there. Mayor de Blasio last week signal that he's going to focus more on the transition. He's only going to hold two pressers a week as opposed to four. I think in light of the concern about the variant, it was important to show a united front that this was going to be a seamless transition. Eric Adams praised de Blasio and Hochul and he voiced support for more coordination between city and state which, as we may remember, was something we didn't always see between de Blasio and the former governor, Andrew Cuomo.

Brian: Gloria, can you tell us about Eric Adams Africa trip? I'm going to play a clip of Adams speaking about that yesterday. Why was it planned originally and how he's being asked about it in the context of the Omicron variant? Here's a little bit of how he responded to that question. I believe this was at that press event with de Blasio yesterday.

Adams: My ancestors came over here in the bottom of slave ships and 400 years later, I'm the mayor of one of the most important cities in New York. I'm going there to pray, I'm going there to do some spiritual cleansing that's there. The people of Ghana just like Obama when he ran for president, they're waiting for me to go. I'm making a connection with my ancestry background and it's going to help me spiritually. This is very important to me and I need to be spiritually sounded if I'm going to be a sound man.

Brian: Gloria, how spiritual, how political? Maybe that's too cynical a question, why Ghana, why now?

Gloria: Just to clarify, this was actually not at the press conference with the mayor, this was at a later event that Eric Adams held yesterday at the Brooklyn Public Library. Putting that aside, I think what we are starting to see here with Eric Adams, this is now his second international trip in a matter of weeks and he hasn't even been sworn in yet. The last one was to the Dominican Republic after he made a promise that he would travel there should he win the election. We saw him do that shortly after he was elected.

Now, we see him taking off to Ghana and he is saying that this is a spiritual retreat of sorts. The question here is that this trip comes as he is supposed to be putting together his government. He's exactly a month away from taking the oath of office and it is in these next couple of days that any incoming mayor would be putting together his staff, his commissioners, his deputy mayors, presumably doing interviews with people that he is going to appoint to very, very important jobs.

Now, of course, Eric Adams has been asked about this and he has said that he has narrowed down some of his choices specifically when it comes to police commissioner and schools chancellor and some of the other top positions, but he certainly has not made any announcements yet. I think what we are seeing is a bit of a theme when it comes to Eric Adams, that these things seem to come out of nowhere. This trip to Ghana had not been known to the media until it was reported first in the New York Post.

At first, we learned that he had been planning this trip but had put it on hold as a result of the emergence of the variant in Africa, and then decided to go on the trip anyway. As you said, the distance between these two places is quite big so, it appears he decided that distance was good enough and that it was safe to travel. I will note that despite the distance Ghana, like many other countries in Africa, unfortunately, does not have a great rate of vaccination. That is certainly something to consider along with the fact that right now he is very much supposed to be putting his government together.

Brian: Liz, Adams seems to be continuing to establish himself as a law and order mayor in waiting though, one was sensitive to racism in the justice system than say, Mayor Giuliani or some others who would run on that label. He had an op-ed in the Daily News this week again, supporting the legal as opposed to illegal use of stop and frisk, but making the point of putting it out that out there that says, "I'm going to use stop and frisk" with the reputation that that phrase has. What was the point of placing that op-ed at this time as you see it?

Liz: I think that that's something that he's been very consistent on throughout the campaign. He's been talking again, about policing and public safety in the weeks leading up to his inauguration, everyone is awaiting who he is going to appoint for the next police commissioner. I think it makes sense for him to focus on public safety and policing because this was essentially what he campaigned on and also very much in speaking to voters, what he was elected on.

In many ways, this is basically carrying out a pledge that he would substantively change the way policing is done in New York City. When he talks about stop and frisk, he has said that he would change the way that stop and frisk is enforced and used in New York City. Time will tell. That will involve training and we will see exactly how the new procedure works out in New York City and whether it does have an impact at all on crime.

Brian: Liz, about Mayor de Blasio's final weeks in office and what he might want to accomplish as some final acts, you reported on Gothamist on him making one last push to ban carriage horses, which was an original campaign promise in 2013. Remind everyone what the issue there is, why some people want that.

Liz: Right. As you might remember in 2013, the mayor received the support from an animal activist group called New Yorkers for Clean, Livable, and Safe Streets, that's also known as NYCLASS for short. They are against horse-drawn carriages specifically because they believe the practice is inhumane and in the 21st century, it's also very anachronistic. Basically, the activists and the mayor argue that this really doesn't have a place anymore in the modern era.

To some people's surprise, the mayor brought it back. He's been trying over the last eight years. He's tried time and again to ban horse carriages but he's been unsuccessful. What he has managed to get is just some restrictions. He's prevented horse carriage drivers from picking up passengers on Central Park South and they can't operate during certain weather conditions specifically when it's very hot, but he's never been able to achieve a full ban.

Now it's the eleventh hour, he, I think, surprised a lot of people by confirming a news report that he does want to try again. We're yet to see an actual bill. He has though, said that his idea is that he'd like to replace the horse carriages with show cars. He hasn't elaborated what he means by that but what we do know is that in 2017, Mexico debuts these electric carriages. I think the expectation is that we might see some version of that plan. Again, emphasizing he only has a few weeks left, we still haven't seen a bill yet.

Brian: Why couldn't de Blasio get that done in nearly eight years in office if he wanted that ban? Of all the things in the world that are complicated about running New York City, this wouldn't seem like the most.

Liz: This is a complicated issue because even though the animal activists are very strong lobbying group in New York City, the horse carriage industry, while it's small, it's still a small business. It's made up of a lot of immigrants and these are people who are also struggling. During the pandemic, they basically had almost no business and now they're struggling to come back.

They're seen as this vile part of New York City tourism. This idea of taking a carriage ride through Central Park, that's an iconic image, so there's not a lot of political appetite to get rid of horse carriages altogether. I think the question that will remain for Adams-- Adams has said he does not support the ban, but he's willing to consider a possible replacement industry for these horse carriage drivers. We'll see whether or not perhaps the mayor is somehow-- maybe he doesn't get the bill through but maybe he elaborates on this plan for electric carriages and maybe that pushes the ball a little forward, we'll see.

Brian: Or helps them run for governor. Listeners, we're talking about the last days of it de Blasio mayoralty and Eric Adams getting ready for his first days with WNYC and Gothamist reporter Elizabeth Kim and Gloria Pazmino, political reporter for Spectrum News NY1. By the way, Gloria, thanks for pulling that sound from NY1's reporting of Eric Adams talking about his trip to Ghana for us.

Gloria, de Blasio has seemed to be preparing to enter the Democratic primary for governor, but I saw him on your station last night with your colleague Errol Louis, say unequivocal, nice things about two of the people already in the race, Governor Hochul and Congressman Tom Suozzi. It made me wonder if he's decided not to run after all because they could use that clips in their ads. Did you see that?

Gloria: I did, yes. He actually has been quite complimentary of mostly everyone in the race, even public advocate, Jumaane Williams. He's talked about their long-standing relationship even if they've had times where they have disagreed on certain issues. I think that the mayor has made it clear, he intends to stay in public service. He has not gone as far as saying, "I am running for governor officially" yet, but all of these things that he's been doing recently point in that direction.

I would even point to the vaccine mandates, which I would be really interested in seeing if he has done any polling on that issue trying to figure out if it actually polls well. I think that this handling of the new variant and how he will deal with it over the next couple of days will either help or hurt him if he does eventually decide to run for office. He is going to have to make an argument about what sets him aside from the rest of the field, but that's true of all the other candidates as well.

The other thing he has been speaking about a lot recently is this expansion of the school year and his signature accomplishment and his signature issue, which is universal pre-K. In fact, I have been getting the emails that he sends to supporters where he's asking people to sign a petition if they believe that the school year should be extended year-round. It certainly seems like he is trying to take the temperature of the electorate.

We do know from sources close to the mayor and those he has been speaking to that he is asking about whether or not he should be launching this run. It certainly seems like he's inching closer and closer to it. Once he does make that decision one way or the other, of course, there will be a race to run, and that will be the place where he will have to either attack his opponents or figure out a way to stand to differentiate himself from them.

Brian: Liz, this other weird story in the news, at least it seems politically weird to me that intersects the mayoral transition with the governor's race. Congressman Suozzi, whose district is mostly the north shore of Long Island with a little bit of Northeast Queens. He's more centrist than most of the New York City congressional delegation and most of his district is not in the city, so why did Eric Adams offer him a job? He's also a resident of Nassau County. Why did Eric Adams offer him a job as deputy mayor of a city he doesn't even live in and why did Suozzi turn it down?

Liz: That was another interesting, unexpected, weird event involving Eric Adams. At the time when that was announced, me and my colleagues immediately, we were online and asking each other and trying to read the tea leaves, why would Eric Adams do this? He knows that Suozzi is interested in running for governor. Some of the speculation is, the two do go back a long way. They do have a relationship, and it actually does put Suozzi in this now interesting-- Because of that offer, immediately the next day, there were stories about Suozzi. This immediately preceded his announcement that he was going to run for governor.

I think it gave Suozzi a little boost and this endorsement from the mayor of New York City that, "Hey, I really respect this guy. I like this guy. I would want him as part of my administration." Adams has said that he does intend to plan to endorse someone for governor. I don't know that he would endorse Suozzi but in the days leading up to Suozzi's announcement, he gave him a little bit of a nice boost or endorsement.

Brian: Let me do my, legal ID here so the FCC doesn't fire us as a radio station and then Gloria, you're going to get the last word in this segment. This is WNYC-FM HD and AM New York, WNJT-FM 88.1 Trenton, WNJP 88.5 Sussex, WNJY 89.3 Netcong, and WNJO 90.3 Toms River. We are New York and New Jersey Public Radio. Gloria, this governor's race is quite a jumble right now, isn't it? Letitia James and Jumaane Williams both have political bases in Brooklyn. James and Hochul both have been elected statewide. Suozzi and Hochul find their political bases outside New York City. De Blasio, I have no idea to be perfectly honest. It's a little this year's mayor primary with all the unique, but politically overlapping candidates. Is this another ranked-choice voting election?

Gloria: We are in for some primary season once again, Brian. This will not be ranked-choice on the ballot to be specific, but we are looking at a set of candidates that are going to be very different. There will also be some candidates that are going to be appealing to the same voters, particularly when we talk about New York City. I think the entrance of Tom Suozzi to the race is interesting and perhaps most troubling to the incumbent governor, Kathy Hochul because as you said, they draw their bases outside of New York City.

Kathy Hochul is certainly looking to appeal to those moderate voters while still trying to appeal to the left here in New York City. She has certainly taken moves while in office, that would seem to appeal to a more liberal-leaning base here within the five boroughs. It's interesting to see Tom Suozzi in the race because he's certainly going to be going after that suburban voter, who I think Kathy Hochul would also be trying to go after.

It's going to be an interesting race. I think ultimately it will come down to who can really get the perfect coalition between New York City support and the rest of the state. However, that is a very simplistic way of explaining this equation that is required to ultimately win statewide office. You do absolutely need New York City, but you also want to be able to get some substantial support in the suburbs of New York, Western New York, Upstate New York so that if you're looking to win in a landslide and really declare that you have some sort of mandate, that's what you want to be able to do. I don't know if that's going to be possible for any of these candidates considering how many there are and how many there may be in the future, with some of them pulling votes from one another.

Brian: Reporter Gloria Pazmino, I know NY1 is always sending you running around everywhere, so thank you for lending us some time today, and we'll be watching for you on TV. Liz Kim of course, we'll be reading for you in go Gothamist and listening for you here on WNYC. Thanks to both of you.

Gloria: Thank you, Brian.

Liz: Thanks, Brian.

 

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