(New York) A candidate was offered by Donald Trump a position of ambassador in exchange for his withdrawal from the race at the town hall of New York. He refused the market by claiming that the president’s favorite candidate is “a snake and a liar”.
Another candidate has declined a similar offer, specifying that only a ball behind the neck and its beer could end his campaign. In his case, the details count: in 1992, he survived an attempted assassination attributed to the Gambino clan.
Meanwhile, the leader continued to laugh in his well -cut beard, despite an unusual fact: the main leaders of the party he won last June still refuse to support it.
The city of New York has undoubtedly experienced other races at the Rocambolesque Town Hall in its long and rich history. But the one that will end on November 4 is in a separate category.
And the efforts made in recent days by the occupant of the White House to prevent the election of a candidate whom he describes as “100 % communist madman” is not for nothing.
To unravel the skein of this unprecedented story, a presentation of candidates in the running and their position in the polls is essential. Unexpected winner of the primary of the Democratic Party, Zohran Mamdani, member of the Socialist Democrats of America and deputy of Queens at the New York Assembly, leads the race with 38.2 % of the voting intentions, according to the average of the Real Clear Politics site.
Photo Victor J. Blue, The New York Times
The New York Town Hall candidate Andrew Cuomo
Follow, in order: the former Democratic Governor of the State of New York Andrew Cuomo, who runs the town hall of his hometown as independent after his humiliating defeat during the primary of his party (23.2 %); Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa (16.6 %); And the outgoing mayor Eric Adams, who is also campaigning as an independent after having given up being re -elected under the Democrat banner (10.6 %).
A simple calculation
Donald Trump’s calculation is simple.
“Cuomo would be competitive against (Mamdani) in a duel,” explains Robert Shapiro, political scientist at Columbia University. “Some surveys suggest it strongly, but that would require that Adams and Sliwa withdraw, which is unlikely, in particular Sliwa, which obtains better results in the polls than ADAMS. »»
Professor Shapiro offered this analysis a few hours before the mayor Adams rejects an unexpected proposal from President Trump. The latter offered him, through Steve Witkoff, his special emissary in the Middle East, the position of ambassador to Saudi Arabia, among other positions, if he abandoned his re-election campaign.
This haggling recalls another. Last April, Eric Adams saw the prosecution for corruption targeting him after promising, it seems, better cooperation of his city with the Trump administration in the fight against illegal immigration.
“I want to be clear,” said the mayor last Friday in front of the journalists. “Andrew Cuomo is a snake and a liar. I am in this race. And I am the only one who can beat Mamdani. »»
Photo Angela Weiss, agency France-Presse
The candidate Curtis Sliwa, who runs the town hall of New York again
Any republican as it is, Curtis Sliwa, radio host and founder of the Guardian Angels, controversial volunteer patrols, also refused to grant the wishes of Donald Trump by withdrawing from the race in return from any position in his administration.
To a radio host who asked him if there was “a scenario where Curtis Sliwa withdraws from the race”, he replied: “Yes, if someone shoots me in the neck, that I am in a coffin and that you pronounce the most beautiful funeral praise of all time. »»
More than 30 years ago, John Gotti Jr, son of the chief of the Gambino clan, tried to put an end to his radio charges against his father by commanding his murder.
Trump’s “puppet”
Even if they are both from Queens, Donald Trump and Andrew Cuomo rarely get on a political level. But the president prefers in the election of Zohran Mamdani that of this moderate democrat who had to resign from his post as governor in August 2021 in the wake of allegations of sexual harassment.
Photo Angela Weiss, agency France-Presse
Candidate Zohran Mamdani, who has become a real political feeling since his victory in the Democratic primaries
After seduced the Democratic electorate of New York with its charisma and its left -wing populism, Zohran Mamdani has fun today of this unavied alliance between the president and the former governor. When the latter challenged him to participate in five head-on debates, he replied: “Let us delete the intermediaries. Why should I debate with Donald Trump’s puppet when I could debate with Donald Trump himself? »»
The current Democratic Governor of New York State, Kathy Hochul, denounced the intervention of Donald Trump by criticizing him for playing the “kings maker”. But she has not yet supported the candidacy of Zohran Mamdani, any more than did the two leaders of the Democrats at the Congress, Senator Chuck Schumer and the representative Hakeem Jeffries, both from Brooklyn. For what ?
The reason for which some important New York Democrats have not immediately supported Mamdani is that it is perceived (with a certain accuracy) as too much on the left and strongly socialist.
Robert Shapiro, political scientist at Columbia University
“He supports the freezing of rents, free childcare services and, in the past, he advocated the definancing of the police,” added Robert Shapiro.
The political scientist adds that the 33-year-old candidate of Muslim confession is also haunted by positions on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict which “seem strongly anti-Semitic”.
“These are positions that he has defended in the past and that it is difficult for him (to erase). But he works there. »»
And the birthplace of Donald Trump could well end up electing his antithesis, whether or not it pleases him.
