Mayor Bill de Blasio’s presidential campaign is going all-in on the idea that the only way to take on a New York bully in the White House is with someone who’s sparred with the type for decades.
“I’ve known Trump’s a bully for a long time,” de Blasio said in the video launching his campaign. “This is not news to me or anyone else here, and I know how to take him on. … Don’t back down in the face of a bully. Confront him.”
Yet when it comes to taking on tough political fights, de Blasio is known more for backing down than for his muscularity, our Dana Rubinstein and Sally Goldenberg report. When the mayor decides to challenge powerful adversaries — be they Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Uber or charter school doyenne Eva Moskowitz — he often loses.
Even in de Blasio’s most significant head-to-head battle with the Trump administration, the mayor conceded by handing oversight of the city’s beleaguered public housing authority to the federal government without getting additional funding commitments in exchange.
The mayor has been especially outmatched by Cuomo, and while their list of battles is far too long to detail here — that deer in Harlem will never be forgotten in these parts — de Blasio tends to play the Washington Generals role very often for someone who wants to be in charge of Washington’s actual generals.
That’s not to say one can manage to become a two-term mayor in the nation’s largest city without a number of accomplishments. He’s won every election he’s ever run in and implemented numerous progressive changes, including his signature pre-K program — even winning over an initially reluctant Cuomo to do so.
Dana and Sally detail some of the mayor’s higher profile brushes with bullies and his less-than-stellar win/loss record here.
It’s Thursday. Got tips, suggestions or thoughts? Let us know … By email: NNiedzwiadek@politico.com and Daniel@politico.com, or on Twitter: @NickNiedz, and @dlippman.
WHERE’S ANDREW? Did not release a public schedule. (Let’s assume Albany)
WHERE’S BILL? Holding a Puerto Rican heritage celebration at Gracie Mansion in the evening.
Today’s Tabloids: — New York Post: “TIME BANDITS” — Daily News: “SHE’S MY HERO” — Newsday: “NASSAU’S NEW ETHICS RULES” — El Diario: “Disabled win a battle” — See them
Today’s Broadsheets: — New York Times: — 1 col., above the fold: “PRESIDENT WARNS OF FADING CHANCE FOR MEXICO DEAL” — 2 col., below the fold: “Tech Titans Build Lobbyist Army, Trying to Repel Threats to Power” — Wall Street Journal: — 3 col., below the fold: “Lowville Had Lots of Water. Then String Cheese Came.” — See them
MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO threw his support behind expanding a land use policy dear to the city’s politically powerful hotel workers union Wednesday, as the labor organization endorsed his presidential bid in an energetic rally. “I think special permits are a very good idea, and I think we should extend it as far as we can with the City Council because what it does is it gives us the opportunity to determine what a hotel will mean for a community,” he told reporters, following the packed event in the union’s Manhattan headquarters. “A hotel has an impact on a community that’s different than many other services and I hear that from community residents all the time. And we should be able to make sure there is a community process around it,” he added, standing beside his wife, Chirlane McCray, and union president Peter Ward. Hundreds of members of the 40,000-person Hotel Trades Council showed up for the endorsement — the first union to back de Blasio’s three-week-old bid for the Democratic nomination. POLITICO’s Sally Goldenberg and Joe Anuta
“CUE THE SAD MISTER SOFTEE JINGLE. Scores of ice cream trucks were seized by the city on Wednesday for their operators’ alleged role in a traffic ticket evasion scam that went on for a full decade. According to the city, the vendors amassed millions of dollars in traffic fines for running red lights, speeding, blocking pedestrian crosswalks, and other safety violations. But those debts went unpaid, thanks to a widespread scheme in which the trucks were repeatedly re-registered with the DMV under the names of various shell companies. By doing so, the operators of 46 trucks allegedly managed to evade $4.5 million in fines accrued through some 22,000 violations since 2009.
“…After apparently giving it a bit of thought, the Mayor’s Office is calling the crackdown Operation Meltdown. Ha-ha. We love a jokey press release, don’t we folks? In a statement, Mayor Bill de Blasio quipped, ‘this seizure marks the end of the road for these scofflaw ice cream vendors.’ (Emphasis added, wincingly.) As a cherry on top an added bonus, the NY Post got an unnamed law enforcement source to say that there is ‘no sugar-coating the danger’ posed by the ice cream truck operators.” Gothamist’s Jake Offenhartz
POLLY TROTTENBERG, a prominent voice of dissension on the Metropolitan Transportation Authority board, has submitted her resignation to Gov. Andrew Cuomo, POLITICO has learned. On June 3, Trottenberg wrote to Cuomo saying that she was resigning “effective immediately” upon the state Senate’s confirmation of her successor. “I thank Mayor de Blasio for the opportunity to serve the millions of MTA riders — and I look forward to continuing to work closely with Chairman Pat Foye and the MTA as NYC DOT Commissioner,” she said in a statement. Trottenberg’s board tenure began in 2014, when Mayor Bill de Blasio first nominated her to the position. Trottenberg has raised pointed questions about several of his MTA initiatives, including the governor’s “enhanced station initiative,” which critics said funded largely cosmetic improvements to the subway system in the midst of the subway crisis. POLITICO’s Dana Rubinstein
— The MTA is investigating potential sabotage of the time clocks used to curb overtime abuse.
“THE NYPD IS CHANGING THE WAY IT APPLIES THE LOITERING LAW after it was sued for illegally profiling and arresting women, transgender people and others on prostitution charges that were based largely on looks, the Daily News has learned. The Legal Aid Society sued the department on behalf of people who asserted that police had arrested and detained them for loitering for prostitution based on personal appearance and then claimed they were working as prostitutes. One cop admitted in a deposition that he would look for ‘Adam’s apples’ when considering whether to detain a suspected prostitute.
“…Under the settlement, the NYPD is amending the Patrol Guide to prohibit officers from relying only on gender, gender identity, clothing and location to enforce the loitering law. The change also requires officers to provide more detailed, factual narratives for why they detained someone. New York Daily News’ Graham Rayman
— “‘Not a big deal’ — NYPD supervisor who dismissed Garner’s death sued 3 times for excessive force,” by Queens Eagle’s David Brand
“THE YEAR 1990 HAS PLAYED ON AN ENDLESS LOOP in Carlton Roman’s mind. It’s the year the Queens County district attorney’s office won a conviction against him for murder—a guilty verdict Roman has been trying for decades to reverse. … ‘Well, it’s 30 years later, and that still hasn’t happened yet,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t understand why the powers that be weren’t doing anything. Nobody cares that you didn’t do it. That part of it never really sunk in, until later.’
“The Queens DA’s office disputes this notion, adding that since Roman’s conviction, the case was reviewed by three executive assistant district attorneys who found no evidence he was wrongfully convicted. Now 57, Roman says his best hope for exoneration may come when voters in Queens elect a new district attorney this year.” The Appeal’s Aaron Morrison
TRANSIT FOR THE 1% — “Uber Copter to Offer Flights From Lower Manhattan to J.F.K.,” by NYT’s Shivani Vora: “For an 8-minute, one-way flight, the average ride will cost between $200 and $225 per person and include private ground transportation on both ends of the trip.”
ASSEMBLY GRINDS TO A STOP, BRIEFLY — POLITICO’s Bill Mahoney: THE BUSINESS OF THE ASSEMBLY CAME TO A HALF FOR HALF AN HOUR on Wednesday afternoon over a dispute about whether it was fair to characterize a member’s comments as racist. Members were debating a bill that would ease sanctions on welfare recipients who run afoul of guidelines set by social service agencies. Assemblyman Andy Goodell (R-Jamestown) spoke up against the measure. His initial comments were not widely heard and a transcript was not immediately available. But he later characterized them as focused on his belief that the bill would “[slow] down our effort to get people gainfully employed by helping them get job experience and job training.” POLITICO’s Bill Mahoney
“CITY CAR WAS WORKERS ARE ON THE CUSP of a guaranteed minimum wage, without the help of customer tips. The state Senate passed a long-stalled bill Wednesday that would require car wash workers in New York City, Long Island and Westchester to be paid a minimum wage of up to $15 an hour. Under current state law, car wash employees — like bartenders, waiters, nail salon workers and hair dressers — are considered tipped workers, with a base minimum of between $10.20 and $12.75 in New York City. The idea is that gratuities from customers get workers up to the full minimum wage, which will hit $15 an hour in the city by the end of the year Employers are legally required to make up for their employees’ financial shortfalls when tips, plus base pay, fall shy of the minimum hourly wage — a practice that isn’t always followed, car wash workers say.” The City’s Josefa Velasquez
“REGISTERED SEX OFFENDERS IN NEW YORK RECEIVED $63,000 worth of erectile dysfunction drugs and other sexual treatments courtesy of the state’s publicly funded Medicaid program, according to an audit released Wednesday. Federal rules bar Medicaid coverage of sexual treatments for all recipients, not just sex offenders. Yet state Medicaid officials approved $930,000 in improper payments for the drugs between 2012 and 2018, according to the audit released by state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli and first reported by The Associated Press. According to the audit, 47 of those Medicaid recipients were also state sex offenders, who are prohibited from getting Medicaid-covered sexual treatments under a state law.” Associated Press’s David Klepper
GOV. ANDREW CUOMO HAS NOMINATED A FORMER TELECOMMUNICATIONS EXECUTIVE and local government official from Huntington to serve on the Public Service Commission, potentially filling a long-vacant seat. The nomination of Tracey Edwards has been received by the Senate, which will have to approve the appointment, according to sources familiar with the decision. Edwards is currently the head of Habitat for Humanity of Suffolk. Before retiring in 2016, Edwards worked at the company that became Verizon for nearly four decades and was regional president for Long Island and upstate New York. POLITICO’s Marie J. French
“…EVERY YEAR, THE NEW YORK POLICE DEPARTMENT arrests or issues criminal summonses to hundreds of thousands of people, the vast majority of them to people of color. Most are for misdemeanors or criminal violations, and a high proportion of them involve marijuana possession—even as New York state and city have reduced pot-related arrests and summonses and the penalties associated with these offenses. Some cases still lead to convictions, but many are dismissed for a variety of reasons. Increasingly, offenses that used to be misdemeanors are treated like violations and punished with fines. Regardless, these encounters all create records, though those records are sealed if the case is dismissed or the person is acquitted.
“That means, in theory, no one in the public can discover even the existence of such a record, and that law enforcement authorities can locate the files but not access its contents without a court order. Here are some of the things those records can contain: arrest charges, location of arrests, fingerprints, photographs, detailed physical descriptions, Social Security numbers, date and place of birth, residence and contact information, occupation, known associates and family members and their contact information.” WNYC’s Fred Mogul
“TWO VOTES COULD BE ALL THAT IS STANDING between recreational marijuana and passage in New York’s Senate, largely due to opposition from lawmakers in New York City’s suburbs. Thirty Senate Democrats have pledged support for legalizing marijuana for adult use in the state or have said they are leaning that way, according to a tally by the USA TODAY Network’s Albany Bureau. Not all of those senators have taken a position on the current marijuana bill under consideration. But even if each backed the measure, that’s still two votes shy of 32 — the minimum number Democrats need to pass a bill in the Senate without outside support. ‘I’ve been consistent from the very beginning: This is a hard lift,’ said Sen. Liz Krueger, the Manhattan Democrat who sponsors the marijuana-legalization measure.” Gannett’s Jon Campbell and Joe Spector
#UpstateAmerica: Police in Ogden had to wrangle an adorable miniature horse.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY: … Jacky Monterosso … EY’s Jen Hemmerdinger … Bloomberg WH reporter Justin Sink is 32 (h/t Andrew Beaty) … Frederic Block is 85 … Snap’s Farrin Jay … Kathryn Riccobono … Keith Perine … Sarah Gadsden, associate at Eagle Hill Consulting and a Georgetown McDonough MBA candidate … Bloomberg Tax reporter Lydia O’Neal (h/t Anna Massoglia) … Thomas Pritzker is 69 … Boaz Weinstein is 46 (h/ts Jewish Insider)
SPOTTED: Mike Barnicle and David Ignatius on Wednesday walking between the headstones of Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial. “They appeared to be speaking with tour guides and walked out to the sea wall above the cliff. Ignatius appeared to be taking notes on a notepad,” per our tipster. Pic
REVOLVING DOOR — “Former Chicago mayor and longtime Democratic operative Rahm Emanuel will join boutique investment bank Centerview Partners LLC, bringing a Rolodex built over a 30-year political career. Mr. Emanuel, who left office last month, will open a Chicago office for Centerview and advise clients on merger deals and other matters, he said in a joint interview Wednesday with Centerview co-founders Blair Effron and Robert Pruzan.” Wall Street Journal’s Liz Hoffman
MEDIAWATCH — @alexweprin: “Some news: I’m excited to announce that I have joined The Hollywood Reporter, based in New York City. I’ll write THR’s daily tip-sheet newsletter, Today In Entertainment, and contribute to coverage.”
— Nausicaa Renner will be the new senior politics editor at The Intercept. She previously was digital editor at the Columbia Journalism Review.
SPOTTED at a Greenwich Village reception Wednesday night, hosted by Craig Newmark, to welcome the Center for Public Integrity’s new CEO, Susan Smith Richardson: Deborah Norville; Bill Whitaker, Marsha Cooke, Geneva Overholser, Christie Hefner, Sree Sreenivasan, Chuck Lewis, James Kiernan, Dick Lobo, Amit Paley, Scott Siegler, Marianne Szegedy-Maszak, Gil Omenn and and Sarah Bartlett.
HOT JOBS — “4 of Queens’ 5 CUNYs are searching for new presidents,” by Queens Eagle’s Victoria Merlino
A FEDERAL JUDGE DECLINED to rush hearings Wednesday on allegations that the Trump administration knowingly added a citizenship status question to the U.S. Census to create an electoral advantage, citing a pending Supreme Court decision on whether the question can be added to the decennial count. The American Civil Liberties Union alleged in a court filing last week that the Trump administration developed the citizenship question for the 2020 Census to benefit Republicans by depressing population counts in communities with high immigrant populations. The group is alleging the administration added the question after consulting with Republican strategist Thomas Hofeller and subsequently obscured his involvement. POLITICO’s Amanda Eisenberg
“ARENA HAS AN IMPRESSIVE TRACK RECORD AFTER JUST TWO YEARS. The Silicon Valley capital-funded group that recruits, trains and supports Democratic candidates running for office nationwide helped launch state Sens. Alessandra Biaggi, Zellnor Myrie and Jessica Ramos into office. Reps. Max Rose, Antonio Delgado and Lauren Underwood of Illinois made it to Congress. And Stacey Abrams nearly became governor of Georgia.But the organization found that winning elections was one thing. Passing laws was another.
“…So Arena, which operates across the country, is trying a new tack in New York City, launching an effort this week to restructure the political process in the city and the state. The campaign is called Five Borough Future, and it’s sold as ‘a vision of self-determination and policy progress for NYC.’ In practice, that means Arena will be turning its considerable money and increasing clout towards electing New York City candidates and getting them to commit to specific policy platforms.” City & State’s Jeff Coltin
— David Gantt, the former Assembly Transportation committee chairman, told police officers he stopped at a stop sign — which video evidence shows he did not — before he hit a passing minivan last week and injured four people.
— The Assembly is poised to pass a bill that would fine retailers for charging more for products marketed to women than the equivalent product for men, though its fate in the state Senate is more uncertain.
— A contractor is accused of defrauding victims of Hurricane Sandy out of hundreds of thousands of dollars.
— Upstate counties have begun selecting the number and placement of early voting sites.
— Newburgh police found 157 snakes in a man’s home after he was bitten by one of the poisonous ones.
— Brooklyn Democratic District Leader Kevin Peter Carroll, the cousin of Assemblyman Robert Carroll, has died at 33.
— “Capital Tonight” will return in the fall — though longtime host Liz Benjamin is still leaving — after Spectrum reversed plans to end the show.
— Louis Levi Oakes, the last of the Mohawk code talkers, who helped American soldiers triumph in the Pacific Theater during World War II, along with code talkers from other tribes, died on May 28 at a care facility near his home on the Akwesasne Mohawk Reservation in Quebec. He was 94.”
THE DE BLASIO ADMINISTRATION SOUGHT TO BEAT BACK lawsuits in the state Supreme Court Wednesday over its decision to greenlight four new towers on the Lower East Side waterfront, where local officials are accusing the mayor of steamrolling the working-class community and the City Council. And in a win for critics of the projects, the judge hearing the cases later extended a temporary restraining order in the afternoon against the developers, and indicated that he’s sympathetic to arguments that the projects should have gone through a more extensive approval process. The City Planning Commission approved the proposals in December, having determined that the area’s existing zoning did not require them to go through a formal land use review process. But Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer and City Council Member Margaret Chin, who represents the area, disputed that assessment, arguing that the projects — which include a tower exceeding 1,000 feet — were far too large to move forward without more oversight, particularly from the City Council. POLITICO’s Janaki Chadha
“NEW YORK HAS LONG BEEN A CITY IN THE CLOUDS, but with 16 buildings around 500 feet or taller slated for completion this year, 2019 could be the city’s busiest year ever for new skyscrapers. For many years the city’s skyline was primarily defined by the Empire State and Chrysler Buildings, both over 1,000 feet tall and built in the early 1930s. But New York’s horizon has been in perpetual flux now for the better part of a decade. There are currently nine completed towers in New York that are over 1,000 feet tall, and seven of them were built after 2007. Nearly twice that many — another 16 such towers — are being planned or are under construction, according to the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat, a Chicago-based nonprofit that tracks high-rise construction.” New York Times’ Stefanos Chen
Mets 7, Giants 0: Sometimes, strange things happen in the course of a baseball season. So it came to pass on Wednesday night, when Jason Vargas pitched a complete-game shutout.
Blue Jays 11, Yankees 7: A trio of home runs in a five-run eighth inning sank the Yankees, with Vladimir Guerrero Jr. delivering this blow.
The day ahead: Matinee at Citi Field, skip work and go see Mets-Giants. The Yankees are in Toronto, freeing up Yankee Stadium for FC Cincinnati to take on NYCFC.
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