Category Archives: Bill de Blasio

Wild Thing, Wild Rumpus: A Day in the de Blasio Transition



“Let the wild rumpus start!” said the mayor-elect today.

As part of his rollout of a campaign to develop his pre-K plan, Bill de Blasio read Where the Wild Things Are to a pre-K class at the Northside Center for Child Development this afternoon.  It was a good reading; engaged with his audience, a few jokes for the press, a great story with a couple of easy metaphors and some memorable lines like “wild rumpus”.

Update – press Q&A:

de Blasio held a press conference immediately after this reading.  Video of his press Q&A is available here.

de Blasio Press Conference



Bill de Blasio held a press conference this afternoon in City Hall Park, following his meeting with the New York State Assembly Democratic conference to discuss his pre-K/middle school proposal.  According to de Blasio, his plan was “very warmly received” by the Assembly Democrats.  With his soon-to-be office behind him, de Blasio answered questions on other topics, including his expected administration appointments, the Metro North train crash and Mayor Bloomberg’s reaction and his family’s decision on living in Gracie Mansion.  Here is full video of the press conference.

de Blasio In de Bronx (Updated)



Bill de Blasio visited the true forgotten borough of New York City politics today, holding a noisy and crowded news conference under the el at Fordham Road and Jerome Avenue in the Bronx.

Charlie-whistle:

The press conference started with an assist from Rep. Charles Rangel, who appears to have some experience in front of a noisy crowd.

Update – Full Press Conference:

Here is the complete press conference, rumbling trains and all.

de Blasio In Breezy Point (Updated)



Bill de Blasio visited Rockaway’s Breezy Point today, seeing Sandy recovery progress firsthand.

As part of his visit, de Blasio met with a small group of community leaders in Breezy Point.  The discussion (during the portion the press was allowed in, at least) focused on some longterm challenges for Rockaway, including rebuilding and the powerful economic issue of flood insurance, both it’s pricing and it’s applicability.  Changes underway, in part the result of the Biggert-Waters Act, and changes in the National Flood Insurance Program, may have profound consequences for Rockaway and other waterfront areas.  The answers aren’t easy, or even apparent yet for some questions.

Press Q&A:

Here is de Blasio’s full Q&A with the press.

Update – Beware the Basketball Invite:

In a lighthearted (we think) moment, Kevin Boyle invited mayoral candidate Bill de Blasio to join a 50+ basketball league organized by the Graybeards.  de Blasio wisely deferred on agreeing to give angry Yankee and Giant fans an opportunity for revenge.

de Blasio, Crown Heights & 2013



On Thursday, both mayoral candidates addressed the Crown Heights riots through the prism of Bill de Blasio’s tenure as a junior city hall staffer.  By de Blasio’s description, he was working in City Hall on those days and received an unspecified number of phone calls from concerned community leaders.  He further says, however, that as a junior staff member he was not actively engaged in responding to the rioting.  Lhota has seized upon de Blasio’s receipt of phone calls without further engagement as evidence of de Blasio’s lack of readiness to govern the city.

There is much to unravel in the current discussion of this ugly 20 year old chapter in the City’s history, particularly the inverted resuscitation of the bitter Dinkins/Giuliani rivalry.  Giuliani, of course, redeemed his initial loss by besting Dinkins in their second and final mayoral election and is widely viewed as having rescued the City from the long-running street crime epidemic that continued into the Dinkins era.  In the 2013 inverted edition, however, it is the Dinkins junior staffer who is electorally crushing the once high-ranking Giuliani aide.  Forgotten by much of the City, the riots nonetheless remain a paradigmatic moment for the man elected in part on public revulsion of the City’s response to the riots and for his former deputy.  Whether that former Giuliani deputy can transform the failures of 1991 into 2013 electoral gain remains unanswered.

Lhota & de Blasio Debate



Joe Lhota and Bill de Blasio faced off in their first one-on-one debate Tuesday evening.  The full debate, hosted by WABC-TV 7, is available here.  Following the debate, both candidates spoke with the press, continuing their attacks.

Joe Lhota:

During and after the debate, de Blasio continued working to tie Lhota to the Tea Party and Republican Party dysfunction in Washington.  Lhota has fought back, asserting for weeks that he rejects both the Tea Party and the Republican tactics in Washington.  In his post-debate remarks, Joe Lhota continued pushing back, arguing that he is independent of those elements of his party.  He accused Bill de Blasio of “lying about me” and “continu[ing] to lie about who I am and what I am,” and calling de Blasio a “typical classic political hack.”

     A Uniter, Not a Divider:

I asked Lhota whether it’s instructive for voters to consider his service under Rudy Giuliani and de Blasio’s service under David Dinkins.  He responded by describing himself as a problem-solving unifier during the Giuliani administration, without reference to Dinkins or de Blasio’s time in the Dinkins administration.

Lhota Q&A:

Here is Joe Lhota’s full press Q&A.

Mayoral Race Shapes Up



Here is a look at the mayoral race, as sent to our subscribers this afternoon.  (You can join our subscriber list on the right side of this page.)

Mayoral Race Shapes Up

The race for mayor has shaped up, but it certainly has not heated up.  With election day exactly three weeks from today, the race has settled into a lopsided contest with Bill de Blasio leading Joe Lhota by 40 to 50 points in public opinion polls.  As de Blasio and Lhota meet tonight in their first televised debate, Lhota desperately needs to shake up the race.   

Although the consistently lopsided polls paint the race as finished and predictable, a close watching of what the candidates are saying reveals many unexpected moments.  For example – which candidate said this? 

“What we need to do to deal with income inequality, which we have in this city, is talking about what programs we’re going to have to be able to deal with the income inequality, how we’re going to make New York affordable, how we’re going to make affordable housing more plentiful in the City of New York.”  It was Republican Joe Lhota.   Continue reading Mayoral Race Shapes Up

A Fiscally Responsible Progressive



Today Bill de Blasio sought to refine his fiscal self-description to “fiscally responsible progressive.”  Speaking on Friday to business leaders at an ABNY breakfast, de Blasio described himself as a “fiscal conservative.”  That description was a surprise to some, but it goes to de Blasio’s possible electoral vulnerability of being portrayed as a wild-eyed spendthrift.  When I asked de Blasio about his “fiscal conservative” self-characterization today, he responded with the refined term and offered a lengthy description of how achieving his goals will require fiscal responsibility, saying that there’s “no contradiction between good fiscal management and an activist government.”

de Blasio Working To Define Lhota



Today Bill de Blasio continued seeking to define Joe Lhota as part and parcel of the radical wing currently dominating the national Republicans, the Tea Party House Republicans.  de Blasio has been hitting that theme for a few days, seeking to define Lhota at a moment where Lhota is still fairly unknown and the Tea Party House Republicans, as the deeply unpopular face of the Republican political brand, are in the national spotlight.

Yesterday, Lhota tried to avoid being linked to the House Republicans, condemning them  for the federal government shutdown and calling it “outrageous and wrong”.  He also described the Tea Party as a “bad force” in the Republican Party.

Today, responding to a question from Politicker’s Ross Barkan, de Blasio continued his effort, describing the current Republican Party as “a very right wing party” and saying of Lhota that “if you’re a member of the Republican Party, you’re buying into the whole idea.”   Team de Blasio smells political blood, and appears focused on framing this city race through the lens of Washington shutdown politics.

de Blasio Visits Rockaway (Updated)



Mayoral candidate Bill de Blasio visited Rockaway yesterday, touring the closed Peninsula Hospital, visiting a family who continues to work on post-Sandy repairs to their home and attending a forum hosted by Faith in New York at St. Mary Star of the Sea in Far Rockaway.  Although Rockaway has progressed greatly in recovering from Sandy, much work remains.  Many residents and businesses continue repairing their damaged property and reorganizing their lives as the city and federal governments repair infrastructure and contemplate future steps.

Rockaway has long had severe financial and social stresses, with some sections as rough and impoverished as any in the city.  Those rougher sections of Rockaway happen to have an ocean beach, but they’re weighed down by the same troubles as neighborhoods in less bucolic locations.  Everyone in Rockaway, whatever their economic status, race and ethnicity or political views, was severely affected by Sandy and has faced great challenges in struggling to recover.  Unsurprisingly, however, those on the down side of Rockaway’s long standing economic and social fault lines faced Sandy with the least; the least money, the least ability to relocate, the least political influence, the fewest options, and have been the slowest to recover.  It was this part of Rockaway that de Blasio visited yesterday.

Press Q & A:

Following the forum, de Blasio spoke with the press.

Here are two excerpts covering Rockaway-specific questions.  The first, from Kevin Boyle of The Wave, addresses the dramatic increases in flood insurance resulting from the Biggert-Waters Act.

The second, from Katie Honan of DNAinfo and co-founder of Rockaway Help, addresses the hospital crisis in Rockaway following the closing of Peninsula Hospital and the current stress on Rockaway’s sole remaining hospital, St. John’s Episcopal.

Here is de Blasio’s full Q&A with the press, including his opening statement describing his visit.


Update – Forum on Sandy Recovery:

In his remarks at the forum on Hurricane Sandy recovery, hosted by Faith In New York, de Blasio called for an expansive use of Sandy recovery money.  He advocated addressing many of Rockaway’s long standing social and economic issues, calling it “our obligation … to figure out how much good we can do with the resources that we’re receiving, and not just in the narrow sense of helping people immediately in need, but how can we change the structure of things.”  Here are selected excerpts from his comments.