Final New York mayoral debate begins
Zohran Mamdani, Andrew Cuomo and Curtis Sliwa have taken the stage for a two-hour debate in Queens, New York, before city residents head to the polls to decide who will become their next mayor.
The debate, which is likely to focus on public safety, the rising cost of living, housing and Donald Trump, is the last time candidates will be able to make their pitch to New Yorkers before early voting begins on Saturday, 25 October.
Key events
Debate ends
The final debate of the campaign just came to an end with an exchange in which the candidates were asked to name one thing that New York got right during the pandemic.
Sliwa says Cuomo got nothing right.
Mamdani says it only took 15 minutes to get his covid-19 vaccine shot. “That was an efficient experience,” he says.
Cuomo says, “Thank you for the compliment.” Mamdani replies: “That was a city-run vaccine site.”
“No, it wasn’t,” Cuomo says.
Jenna Amatulli
Cuomo and Mamdani had yet another heated exchange in the first half of the second hour of the debate after a question was raised on whether, if elected, the candidates would close Rikers Island, a prison in the Bronx that houses more than 7,500 people. A bill in 2019 approved by the New York city council in has mandated its closure by 2027.
If elected, Sliwa said he would keep Rikers open. Cuomo answered by immediately firing a shot at Mamdani, saying he would not close Rikers as Mamdani has said he wants to because Cuomo wouldn’t release 7,000 criminals into New York City.
Mamdani pushed back, noting that the current mayor, Eric Adams, has made it “nearly impossible” to close the prison by the stipulated timeline but that he would do his best to meet it. He also called the prison a “stain on the history” of New York City.
Things devolved shortly thereafter with Cuomo and Mamdani fighting again about the former’s history and the latter’s inexperience. Cuomo aggressively listed some of his achievements in managing projects, including the Second Avenue subway and the Mario Cuomo Bridge, to contrast Mamdani. Mamdani responded with: “You will hear from Andrew Cuomo about his experience as if we don’t know about it. We experienced your experience! The issue is your experience!”
Mamdani turns to Cuomo to ask him about the 13 women who worked in his administration who accused him of sexual harassment.
“You have even gone so far as to legally go after these women. One of those women, Charlotte Bennett, is here in the audience this evening. You sought to access her private gynecological records,” Mamdani says. “She cannot speak up for herself because you lodged a defamation case against her. I, however, can speak. What do you say to the 13 women that you sexually harassed?”
“If you want to be in government, you have to be serious and mature,” Cuomo replies after a brief pause. “There were allegations of sexual harassment. They were then, went to five district attorneys, fully litigated for four years, the cases were dropped, right? You know that as a fact, so everything that you just said was a misstatement.”
“Everything I said was a misstatement?” Mamdani says.
“Yes, because the cases were dropped,” Cuomo says.
Given an opportunity to ask a question of another candidate, Cuomo presses Mamdani on why he posed for a photograph with an anti-LGBTQ+ Ugandan leader, and why he would not support a boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign against Uganda on its anti-LGBTQ+ laws.
Mamdani says that he would not have posed for that photograph had he been aware of the Ugandan figure’s anti-LGBTQ+ politics.
He then accuses Cuomo of having no policies to support LGBTQ+ New Yorkers. “All you have are the insults that you have lobbed,” he adds.
Jenna Amatulli
In response to one lightning-round question that asked “What is your favorite live music venue?”, a brief moment of levity broke up some of the tensions among the three candidates. Sliwa emphatically shouted: “Chainsmokers! EDM!” Notably, the Chainsmokers are a musical group, not a venue.
Mamdani said Forest Hills, a stadium located in Queens, while Cuomo said Under the K Bridge, a park venue in an industrial part of northern Brooklyn.
The candidates were just asked in a lightning round if they support increasing ticketing by the police in line with a recently enacted a 15mph speed limit for e-bikes.
Mamdani says that he would rather crack down on the app-driven delivery services that put pressure on the people driving the bikes too fast.
Asked if they would accept the endorsement of Eric Adams, Cuomo says yes, the others no. Sliwa says that he wants Adams to be in jail.
They were also asked if the mayoral election between the three of them was ranked-choice, how they would vote. Mamdani says that he would rank himself first and Sliwa second. Sliwa responds: “Zohran please don’t be glazing me!” He says he would vote for just himself. Cuomo also says he would only vote for himself.
Jenna Amatulli
Things hit an apex between Cuomo and Mamdani nearly halfway through the debate after the latter was questioned on being evasive or unclear on his ideology.
Mamdani initially said: “When it comes to our schools, I believe that every single child should have an excellent public education.” He then mentioned public school funding and a need for greater literacy levels, but did not further explain his plan for overhauling schooling in New York City. He switched gears and called out Cuomo specifically for taking so long during his tenure as governor to establish more housing.
Cuomo immediately fired back to note that the governor doesn’t build housing, prompting Mamdani to interject with: “Not if it’s you!”
Things quickly escalated to a moment of chaos as the candidates talked over each other with increasingly louder comebacks. Cuomo, again, mentioned Mamdani’s inexperience while Mamdani took aim at Cuomo for his shortcomings as governor.
“You don’t know how to run a government and you don’t know how to handle an emergency,” Cuomo said to Mamdani at one point.
After being told by moderators to keep order, Sliwa weighed in and said his fellow candidates were “fighting like kids in the school yard”. Of Mamdani, Sliwa said, “Your résumé could fit on a cocktail napkin,” while of Cuomo he said, “Your failures could fill a public school library.”
In a discussion of public safety, on the question of prosecuting misdemeanor quality-of-life crimes, Andrew Cuomo just said: “Mayor David Dinkins did it.”
He goes on to accuse Zohran Mamdani of being in thrall to the democratic socialists of America.
Cuomo did not note that Dinkins, the former New York mayor, was also a member of the democratic socialists of America.
On social media, Mamdani’s account just shared video of Sliwa telling Cuomo, “You’re in the back pockets, Andrew, of the developers who wined, dined and pocket-lined you.”
“This happens to be true,” the account added.
Cuomo accuses Mamdani, who has been critical of Israel, particularly its war on Gaza, of being among those who “stoke the flames of hatred against Jewish people”.
The former governor has previously pushed the idea that Jewish New Yorkers, who make up a significant share of the city’s population, should not feel safe with Mamdani as mayor, given his views on Palestinian rights.
Sliwa, apparently also equating support for Palestinians with support for terrorism, then suggests that Mamdani supports “jihad”, or holy war.
“I have never, not once, spoken in support of global jihad,” Mamdani says, suggesting that this attack is being fabricated because he is the first Muslim to be on the verge of leading the city.
Mamdani has previously refused to say that he supports the right of Israel to exist as a Jewish state by saying that, as an American, he supports a state that grants equal rights to all, regardless of ethnicity or faith.
Mamdani adds that he wants to be a mayor that will keep Sliwa’s Jewish children safe.
Zohran Mamdani’s campaign team is live-tweeting the debate as it unfolds, giving him a virtual chance to reply to Andrew Cuomo online even at points where he does not do so on stage.
“Andrew Cuomo didn’t just watch from the sidelines as the homelessness crisis grew,” the account posted moments ago. “He was in power – and made political choices, time and again, that made it worse.”
Andrew Cuomo suggests that Zohran Mamdani will not be able to freeze rents for New Yorkers because he does not control the rent guidelines board.
“If you want a candidate for mayor who tells you everything he can’t do, then Andrew Cuomo is your choice,” Mamdani replies. He then argues, correctly, that the mayor chooses members of the board.
“The number of homeless since I left has more than doubled,” Cuomo says of his time in office as New York governor.
“Andrew, you didn’t leave, you fled from being impeached,” Sliwa says, looking across the stage at Cuomo. “Leave? You fled!”
Asked about dealing with Donald Trump, Curtis Sliwa says, “You can’t beat Trump, he has all the cards,” suggesting that he is the candidate who can deal best with the president.
“I’ve confronted him and I have beaten him,” Cuomo says, and suggests Trump “will take over New York City” if Mamdani wins.
Mamdani is withering in his response, telling viewers they just heard from the Republican candidate and “Donald Trump’s puppet himself, Andrew Cuomo”.
Mamdani argues that Trump has made it clear that he wants Cuomo to win, amid reports that the former governor has consulted the president on strategy in the race.
The first question deals with an Immigration and Customs Enforcement raid on street vendors on Canal Street in Manhattan on Tuesday.
All three candidates criticize the ICE raids, with Cuomo saying he would have pushed the White House to pull back the federal officers.
“ICE is a reckless entity that cares little for the law,” Mamdani says.
Sliwa also says the raids were a bad idea, but calls the reaction of New Yorkers, who pushed back on the officers as the raid was taking place, wrong.
