Time Running Out To Topple Cuomo In New York City Mayor’s Race

NEW YORK — The weekend Andrew Cuomo jumped into the mayor’s race, Brad Lander held an “emergency press conference” denouncing his record — and he hasn’t let up since.

Scott Stringer cut a video of himself scoffing at the notion that anyone should be afraid of the fear-inducing former governor.

Zellnor Myrie and Adrienne Adams are telling Black church attendees — who are key to Cuomo’s path — they should vote for candidates who come from their neighborhoods, rather than a New York City newcomer whose Albany record they attack.

And old foes formed a super PAC to take him on.

But that PAC has reported raising a paltry $2,000 so far, compared to the $2.5 million that’s flowed into a pro-Cuomo one. And week after week, the candidates have failed to make a meaningful dent in Cuomo’s significant polling lead.

Now, with seven weeks until the June 24 Democratic primary, Cuomo’s rivals are focusing their resources on the one thing they hope will alter the course of the race: TV ads.

Zohran Mamdani and Myrie are already out with their first spots; Stringer and Lander will air theirs fairly soon, according to their representatives. And Adams, who entered the race late, has yet to raise enough money to afford a TV buy.

It raises the question: Do these lesser-known candidates use precious air time to go after Cuomo, or simply introduce themselves to voters?

“Cuomo is about to be hit with a storm of reminders for New York voters who have very short memories — and a kind of pandemic-memory distortion — of all of the ways he screwed the city and mismanaged the city,” a Lander official recently told New York Playbook. “And those things will begin to unravel the mirage he’s created for himself of competency and good management.”

Lander, who has $4.6 million in the bank, is planning to go after Cuomo. But his team won’t say whether he’ll start with a biographical ad before one that laces into the ex-governor.

Mamdani put about $100,000 — a modest sum in the New York media market and a fraction of his $7.5 million — behind five days of ads in which he blamed New York’s problems on Cuomo. Myrie, who is polling in low single digits, recently dropped $500,000 on a TV and digital ad to introduce himself to voters. It had nary a mention of Cuomo.

Stringer is similarly not signaling any plans to ambush the front-runner, with an aide simply telling Playbook, “Our TV strategy is one that allows us to robustly reach all the voters we need to, when we need to, and when they’re paying attention.”

One Cuomo rival, through a representative, said voters have little appetite for negative campaigning. “They want someone who is seen solving the problems, taking this seriously,” added the person, who was granted anonymity to freely talk strategy. “Going against Cuomo would be detrimental to that.”

So for now, Cuomo is sitting comfortably — at times facing more vitriol from the no-holds-barred, Republican-friendly New York Post than from his Democratic rivals.

And one idea Lander floated to take Cuomo on hasn’t materialized.

The city comptroller, whom supporters — and some rivals — believe will have a late-in-the-race rise, wanted candidates to pool campaign funds for negative ads against Cuomo, according to three people familiar with the matter who were granted anonymity to speak freely.

Mamdani, the consistent runner-up to Cuomo in polls, pulled out of the talks and opted to go his own route, they said.

Some on the political left have begun to privately bemoan what they describe as Mamdani’s go-it-alone strategy, despite what initially seemed like a united front from most of Cuomo’s opponents. On Sunday night, Working Families Party leaders — who've endorsed four candidates to block Cuomo — were among the roughly 1,500 attending Mamdani's campaign rally at a music venue in Brooklyn.

Mamdani’s campaign said conversations about how to capitalize on ranked choice voting are ongoing. Campaign spokesperson Andrew Epstein said the campaign suggested Cuomo's rivals each commit the same percentage of their media budget to anti-Cuomo ads with a coordinated message, but others rebuffed that.

“We are proud to be the only campaign who has spent a single dollar in paid media against Andrew Cuomo,” Epstein added.

Jason Beeferman contributed to this report.

A version of this appeared in New York Playbook. Sign up for it here.