Inside Curtis Sliwa’s Never-Ending Campaign
Many people, even those who will not vote for Saliwa, seem to find his campaign charming and disarming. Mamdani’s supporters asked him to appoint Saliwa the “cat czar.” He spent so long wearing a red hat that a distinct tan line appeared along his forehead. (Sliwa pledged to put the hat away if elected.) During his election campaign, Sliwa spoke favorably of former Black Panther Assata Shakur and said the socialist elected official was nothing new and nothing to be afraid of. Asad Dandia, a local historian who is a friend and early supporter of Mamdani, posted on X, “After the election is over, I really want to break things off with Curtis Sliwa.”
“If everyone who said, ‘I love you, Curtis,’ or ‘You did something for me, Curtis,’ voted, they would have gotten twice as many votes as Eric Adams did,” Bruno told me. “When you campaign, you’re trying to target your base,” he continued. “Try to figure out the Curtis rule.” I was confused. “It’s called New York City,” he said.
In Bay Ridge, I went with Steve, a volunteer activist, to watch a Sliwa ground game in action. Steve, a retired LAPD officer, was wearing…Salute to the mayor” Baseball cap. He was on his way to deliver some signs at a neighborhood barber shop and then talk to voters who were waiting for the bus. A few blocks from the campaign office, he ran into an acquaintance, Patrick Doyle, who was walking his dog, a two-year-old black pit bull named Buddy. They almost immediately started arguing. “My heart is with Curtis, but it doesn’t look right,” Doyle said to Steve. “No, no,” Steve said. “That He is “Looks good.”
“Curtis can vouch for Cuomo,” Doyle said. “If Curtis withdraws, Cuomo will join.” Steve shook his head and told Doyle, “You believe in polls and that’s wrong.”
“It’s going to hurt us in the end,” Doyle said of people who refuse to vote for Cuomo. Buddy strained on his leash and seemed to be coughing a little.
“I will never vote for Cuomo,” Steve replied. “It is a matter of conscience and morality.”
A big part of the reason Sliwa’s supporters are so stubborn may be that they hate Andrew Cuomo. “I call him Killer Cuomo,” Steve told me, referring to Cuomo’s handling of things. Coronavirus disease In nursing homes. Babone, the federal employee — who has not been vaccinated — told me he doesn’t respect Cuomo’s lack of conviction about whether to rehire anti-vaxxers like him. “He kept quiet about it for months,” Papon said. “One thing I’ll give Mamdani, he said to me straight up: ‘No, I’m not going to hire you.’” After the second discussion, I spoke briefly with Joe Tomshi, a union electrician, who was campaigning for Cuomo. “Why are they still campaigning?” Tomshi said of Sliwa’s group. I have no idea.” “We have to join hands and defeat Mamdani. Mamdani’s campaign enjoys divisiveness.” I asked him if he had spoken to any of Saliwa’s supporters to try to convince them. “I haven’t, but the girl in the red jacket over there is really nice,” he said. He pointed to a middle-aged blonde woman. “Go tell her I said so.”
Back on the street in Bay Ridge, Steve approached his voting point. “We have to rush,” he muttered. “This is the time to rush.” Steve speaks fluent Mandarin – having previously lived and studied in Beijing and Taiwan – and was a hit on the S79 bus line, where he conversed in Mandarin with an older Chinese man and a woman in a pink jacket. (“If you see me start speaking Chinese, I don’t want to surprise you,” he told me previously.)
But, in the second row, he was approached by an elderly man speaking with an Eastern European accent and wearing a short green jacket. “He’s a nice guy, but everyone has a ceiling, okay?” The man said. “If he doesn’t run, Cuomo will win.”
“Don’t believe it,” Steve said. “You’re going through the polls.” The man started saying that Saliwa was arrogant. “I think I should run, too. I’m an American citizen,” he said. “How can he win with twelve percent? I can win too – why not? He’s stupid, okay?” I asked the man if he thought Mamdani would win as a result of Saliwa’s campaign. “One hundred percent,” he said and pointed at Steve. “Because of him.” (The man said he would vote for Cuomo. I asked him if he liked Cuomo, and he said, “No.”)