New York City’s mayoral candidates are set to meet for their final debate Wednesday night, with Democrat Zohran Mamdani looking to stay in control of a race increasingly seen as his to win, while former Gov. Andrew Cuomo amps up the pressure on Republican Curtis Sliwa to drop out.<\/p>\n
With just days left until early voting begins, Cuomo has made a series of urgent pleas to the city\u2019s conservative voters to ditch Sliwa and to support him instead, casting the Republican candidate as a \u201cspoiler\u201d whose presence in the race will deliver Mamdani a win.<\/p>\n
The debate may be the former governor’s last and best chance at making his case to run the country\u2019s biggest city ahead of next month’s election.<\/p>\n
But Sliwa, the swaggering creator of the Guardian Angels crime patrol group, has forcefully maintained he will not exit the race and has, in turn, ramped up his criticism of the former governor.<\/p>\n
Mamdani, meanwhile, has spent his recent days campaigning on local issues and energizing his own supporters. Though he is expected to face an aggressive version of Cuomo on stage, as he did during last week’s first debate, he will need to balance his counterattacks with the hopeful vision of the city that has driven his campaign’s momentum.<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tZohran Mamdani, Andrew Cuomo and Curtis Sliwa squared off in the New York City general election debate, with topics ranging from Israel and Gaza, affordability, President Donald Trump, and more. David Ushery, Melissa Russo, Senior Politics reporter at Politico Sally Goldenberg, and\u00a0 Rosarina Breton moderate the debate, hosted by NBC 4 New York\/WNBC, Telemundo 47\/WNJU, and POLITICO New York\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Here’s what to watch for during the 90-minute debate Wednesday night, which will air live on Spectrum News NY1 and be streamed on the station\u2019s website beginning at 7 p.m.:<\/p>\n
Mamdani aims to stay on message<\/p>\n
Mamdani will attempt to stay above the fray and keep his focus on voters. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhile my opponents are focused on speaking about each other and which one of them should drop out, my focus will be on New Yorkers themselves and the concerns I\u2019ve heard from them,\u201d he told reporters Tuesday, according to the Daily News.<\/p>\n
But as the Democratic nominee, presumed frontrunner and rising national star, the state assemblyman is still expected to take heat on Wednesday night.<\/p>\n
Opponents of the 34-year-old democratic socialist have focused on his relatively thin political resume, made accusations that the city would fall into chaos under his leadership, and drawn attention to President Donald Trump’s threats to take over the city \u2014 and even arrest Mamdani \u2014 if he wins.<\/p>\n
Last week, he was able to deflect much of Cuomo\u2019s verbal onslaught while launching his own broadsides at the former governor’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and the sexual harassment allegations that Cuomo denies but led to his resignation in 2021.<\/p>\n
Mamdani also got a little help from Sliwa. The Republican\u2019s sharpest attacks were reserved for Cuomo, forcing the 67-year-old into a defensive posture at a time when he needed to land significant blows against Mamdani to stifle the Democrat\u2019s momentum.<\/p>\n
In or out? <\/p>\n
After losing his first comeback bid in the Democratic primary to Mamdani this summer, Cuomo rebooted his campaign with an odd request: A call for the other candidates to drop out. <\/p>\n
He’s made a similar play in the final stretch of the general election race, saying in a radio interview this week that, “A vote for Curtis is a vote for Mamdani,” while acknowledging that \u201cit’s harder mathematically\u201d for him to win with Sliwa in the race.<\/p>\n
“Republicans believe Mamdani is an existential threat,\u201d Cuomo said. \u201cThen you do what you need to do to stop the existential threat.\u201d <\/p>\n
Cuomo, who is now running as an independent, may use the debate to press the issue and make a last chance play for conservatives and moderates, framing himself as a more viable candidate than Sliwa. <\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tDemocratic nominee Zohran Mamdani, independent candidate Andrew Cuomo and Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa faced off Thursday night in a head-to-head-to-head showdown on topics ranging from affordability to the president and even New York City parades. NBC New York’s Andrew Siff reports.\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Sliwa’s time to shine <\/p>\n
Sliwa made a splash in last week’s debate as viewers got a glimpse of the colorful character who has long been a fixture of the city’s tabloids.<\/p>\n
The 71-year-old launched pointed attacks against Cuomo and Mamdani, while sprinkling in anecdotes like the time he was shot in the back of a cab in what he says what an attempted mob hit.<\/p>\n
On Wednesday, Sliwa will look to parlay his newfound audience into real support as he tries to make his case that he’s a viable candidate in the heavily Democratic city. <\/p>\n
In order to win, Sliwa will have to hold onto the nearly 30% of voters he won in the last mayoral election, while winning over centrists who don’t want to support Mamdani or Cuomo. <\/p>\n
Even as pressure has mounted on Sliwa to exit, he appears more committed than ever to remain in the race.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe billionaires are not going to determine who the next mayor is. You, the people will,\u201d he said in a campaign video this week that called for his supporters to cast their ballots on the first day of early voting this weekend. <\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRepublican candidate Curtis Sliwa came out swinging against both of his rivals, Andrew Cuomo and Zohran Mamdani, making a pitch that the “career” politicians aren’t good for NYC.\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New York City’s mayoral candidates are set to meet for their final debate Wednesday night, with Democrat Zohran…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":12333,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[9,24,55,54,56,87],"class_list":{"0":"post-12332","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-city","8":"tag-new-york","9":"tag-new-york-city","10":"tag-new-york-city-headlines","11":"tag-new-york-city-news","12":"tag-ny","13":"tag-politics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12332"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12332\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12333"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}