Chrissy, Katie and Harry take a summer week to consider Mamdani’s political winning streak as a new poll shows Zohran Mamdani is only more popular now than when we was elected mayor, and to note what his approach does, and does not, have in common with the one then-new mayor Eric Adams took just four years ago.
Then Katie talks with Mike Flynn, Mamdani’s new Transportation Commissioner about his approach to the job, and much more:
“The work that we do is so tangible, especially in New York where the streets are our front yard, basically, and something that touches everybody every day in one way or another. You’re going to feel changes to your streets. Obviously, those elicit a lot of strong feelings and opinions and I get that, and I think that’s why doing community engagement, really hearing from communities and letting people be heard, is so critical to our work. Not only because it’s the right thing to do, but I think ultimately, in the long run, it guarantees success by getting buy-in, by making sure we’re considering the key issues.
“It needs to be done sort of with some direction. We still have our overall policy goals. We know we want to move busses faster. We know we want to ultimately eliminate traffic fatalities. We know that we want to support the most disadvantaged New Yorkers. We know we want to make it easier to do business in New York City. So these are all kind of our north star. And when we do community engagement, when we talk to communities, we need to keep the focus on the outcomes [and] where we need to get to, and let’s work together to figure out the best way to get there. But it can’t be used as something that just derails good ideas, or if it’s a venue only for the loudest voices to be heard.”
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