Give Mayor Zohran Mamdani this much: He wasn’t afraid to bring the blarney to Albany for the Legislature’s annual “Tin Cup Day,” when local officials plead for more cash from the state.
Among his feats: Admitting that the $12 billion budget gap he pointed to just three weeks ago is already (mysteriously) down to $7 billion — while still citing the larger figure as reason to pass the very same tax hikes he’s been calling for since before he admitted there was any gap at all.
He also complained that New York City sends more cash to the state than it gets back in spending — pretending ignorance of the fact that this is how progressive taxation works.
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That is, Gotham is richer than the rest of the state: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need” means the city should get less back.
It also cuts against his demands for statewide tax hikes to fund spending for his NYC priorities: Democratic Socialists aren’t supposed to play “reverse Robin Hood.”
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He blamed ex-Mayor Eric Adams for “gross fiscal mismanagement” — without complaining that Adams spent too much (after all, Mamdani means to spend more) but simply whining that the last mayor didn’t budget for the city’s “needs.”
And he slammed another bête noire, ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo, for supposedly stiffing the city of its due — again dancing around the fact that the Big Apple is “the rich” compared to other cities, so maybe Cuomo was the true socialist?
As new Assembly Minority Leader Ed Ra pointed out afterward, all of New York state faces huge “affordability” issues, so it’s a mystery why Albany should focus on funding Mamdani’s wish list.
“New Yorkers’ faith in our democracy” is “at an all-time low,” the mayor huffed, thanks to “years of having been deceived by the leadership of the past.”
As best we can tell, his plan boils down to doing a better job of deceiving everybody.