Anything can happen, so being skittish or gun shy is probably warranted, as history has shown us. But, as a native New Yorker I can tell a you a few tidbits from my front row seat to the greatest electoral show on earth.
The debates were instructive for those who have barely paid attention to NY politics— including New Yorkers. Cuomo showed himself to be dismissive, petty, smug, belittling, and patronizing. He failed to honestly answer questions and generally brought really skeevy Dad energy to the debate. He made kooky Curtis Sliwa look positively loveable by comparison.
This is who the guy is and who he has always been.
If you are not a political junkie and merely have read the local press ( we have not had a solid progressive newspaper left in NYC in my opinion since the Village Voice disappeared), you’d think Cuomo was merely a former flawed statesmen who fell from grace, but was otherwise a smart guy with generally progressive politics.
I think that image has been shattered by Mamdani, and I could not be more delighted.
99% of the state unions have detested Cuomo for some time ( we have the greatest union density in the country). He tried to upend the state pension system, assailed the teacher’s union, and attempted to intervene in unhelpful ways with Chris Christie, when the Ebola virus landed on our shores ( remember that). His tawdry public fights with Mayor diBlasio were sickening. He is a racist and a conservative puppet of big business, no matter how many people-of-color he puts in his campaign literature. He sided with the odious Pat Lynch of the NYPD police union during the BLM protests…I could go on… He is awful and no amount of whitewashing a turd is going to make this image of him go away…