Unbiased mayoral candidate Andrew Cuomo launched a brand new line of assault towards Democratic front-runner Zohran Mamdani on Friday, denigrating him as “a shorter” model of ex-Mayor Invoice de Blasio, citing the 2 males’s shared coverage prescriptions on housing, schooling and taxation.
“[De Blasio] talked a lot, played politics, accomplished nothing. You know, my opponent is just a shorter de Blasio,” Cuomo instructed reporters in Manhattan’s Chinatown after a rally the place he was endorsed by the Asian Wave Alliance, a politically average advocacy group.
Cuomo mentioned the 6-foot-5 de Blasio and 5-foot-11 Mamdani are like peas in a pod as a result of the previous oversaw lease freezes on town’s stabilized tenants, proposed tax will increase on millionaires and scaled again the Division of Training’s controversial Gifted & Proficient program — insurance policies the latter has vowed to copy if elected in November.
“So we know his policies are going to fail because they already failed,” mentioned Cuomo, who had a really fractious relationship with de Blasio as governor earlier than resigning from the state’s prime job in 2021 amid sexual {and professional} misconduct accusations he now denies.
De Blasio, who has endorsed Mamdani for mayor, didn’t instantly return a request for remark.
Barry Williams / New York Each day Information
Invoice de Blasio and Zohran Mamdani. (Barry Williams / New York Each day Information)
One coverage level Cuomo referenced specifically that he believes de Blasio failed on was housing, contending the previous mayor’s lease freezes didn’t tackle a disaster that has led to a extreme dearth of reasonably priced flats within the metropolis. Cuomo didn’t point out he served as New York’s governor for nearly the whole time de Blasio was in Metropolis Corridor.
In a press convention later within the day in Midtown, Mamdani, who because the Democratic nominee polling as the favourite to win the Nov. 4 contest, mentioned the ex-governor’s deal with his top is the kind of private rhetoric he associates with President Trump.
“The remarks from Andrew Cuomo sound more like remarks from Donald Trump,” mentioned Mamdani, who defeated Cuomo in June’s Democratic mayoral major after operating a marketing campaign centered on making town extra reasonably priced.
“To focus on the appearance of a politician is to do disservice to the people of this city who would prefer to actually have a substantive debate as to the policies that we are putting forward. What our campaign has been grounded in is matching the scale of crisis in the lives of working New Yorkers.”
On coverage, Cuomo, who’s operating for mayor on an impartial poll line, vowed in remarks to members of the Asian Wave he would “double” the variety of seats in Gifted & Proficient, a DOE program that gives tougher schooling for youths in kindergarten by way of Grade 4.
Citing issues about racial disparities in this system, with most college students skewing white and Asian, Mamdani introduced earlier this week he would remove this system for kindergarten and doubtlessly Grades 1 and a pair of as nicely, a proposal mirroring an initiative de Blasio pursued as mayor.
Additionally on schooling, Cuomo mentioned he would as mayor attempt to construct eight new specialised public excessive colleges within the metropolis on prime of the eight that exist already.
Although he has beforehand raised concern in regards to the equity of the admissions check for the elite colleges, Mamdani, an alum of Bronx Excessive Faculty of Science, mentioned this week he would as mayor maintain it in place.
With Mayor Adams suspending his bid for reelection earlier this week, Cuomo is seen as having a greater shot at beating Mamdani in November than he did earlier than. Nonetheless, most polls have proven Mamdani edging Cuomo out by double digits.
In one other proposal certain to please the Chinatown group, Cuomo instructed the Asian Wave crowd he would as mayor “reevaluate” the plan to construct one of many substitute jails for Rikers Island within the neighborhood. The plan has drawn intense outrage from Chinatown residents, who argue the residential neighborhood isn’t match for a lockup.
Nonetheless, whereas he known as the siting of the Chinatown jail “extremely problematic,” Cuomo wouldn’t completely rule out the potential of constructing it there as he affirmed he does assist the general idea of shuttering Rikers and changing it with smaller borough-based penitentiaries.
Initially Revealed: October 3, 2025 at 3:45 PM EDT
