Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news for.
Speaker 2: All of you nationwide. We are transfixed in New York
Speaker 2: City by a mayoral race. There is an election in November,
Speaker 2: which months ago was like no big deal because there's
Speaker 2: twelve Republicans in New York City. But all of a sudden,
Speaker 2: it's like, Okay, this could be a really interesting election
Speaker 2: because this candidate is an independent. This one's an independent.
Speaker 2: There'll be four even five people on the ballot. Governor
Speaker 2: Cromo was in the other day. As a disclaimer, I
Speaker 2: want to make clear that he's received the endorsement of
Speaker 2: mister Bloomberg. Michael Bloomberg is the owner of various Sundry
Speaker 2: Bloomberg events, including Bloomberg LP in, Bloomberg Television, in radio.
Speaker 2: Whitney Tilson joins us right now after surviving the race.
Speaker 2: Is mister Krome said, Whitney Tilson is a financial guy
Speaker 2: in a hedge fund community and such, and has gone
Speaker 2: through the public process of being a candidate. This word
Speaker 2: cross indors in rank voting. Can you cross endorse Governor
Speaker 2: Cuomo this morning?
Speaker 3: Yes, And it's not a cross endorsement because I haven't
Speaker 3: asked for his endorsement. In return, but at the on
Speaker 3: the mayoral stage. At the last debate on Thursday night,
Speaker 3: when asked, I was the only candidate who was willing
Speaker 3: to say who I would vote, No, just that, why
Speaker 3: are you.
Speaker 2: The only candidate just lining up buying Cuomo Jessica did
Speaker 2: in the Queens. I believe it was as.
Speaker 3: Well because the rest of the candidates are more progressive
Speaker 3: lefty types, and Cuomo and I are the only two
Speaker 3: people in the moderate lane. So I'm happy to throw
Speaker 3: my support behind him and just say, don't rank zero
Speaker 3: on Mom Dannie, who's the far lefty thirty three year
Speaker 3: old inexperienced Democratic socialists.
Speaker 4: Whitney crime, homelessness. If you ask I think the average
Speaker 4: New Yorker, those two topics would be at or near
Speaker 4: the top of their list of concerns.
Speaker 3: Yes, second only to housingford ability.
Speaker 1: Yep, how do you deal with that issue? Brobably tied together. Well,
Speaker 1: it's a tough one.
Speaker 3: There's no quick solution, but a bunch of legislation passed
Speaker 3: five years ago that effectively decriminalized all low level crime.
Speaker 3: Not surprisingly, shocker, you had a huge increase and New
Speaker 3: Yorker has got upset and we're in the process slowly,
Speaker 3: too slowly rolling some of that back, but it demoralized
Speaker 3: police and we've were down to a thirty four year
Speaker 3: low in the number of police officers. The good news, however,
Speaker 3: is that on his fourth attempt, is fourth police commissioner
Speaker 3: in three years.
Speaker 1: Eric Adams, our.
Speaker 3: Current mayor, was sort of forced to hire a competent person,
Speaker 3: Jessica Tish, who has came in in November. She's done
Speaker 3: a great job, got more police out in the streets
Speaker 3: started and forcing quality of life stuff. The murder rate
Speaker 3: is down twenty eight percent year to date, shootings are
Speaker 3: down twenty one percent. Almost every type of crime is
Speaker 3: down smaller amounts, So I'm hopeful that we're going in
Speaker 3: the right direction for the first time in five years.
Speaker 4: Housing affordability top of the list. I've been in this
Speaker 4: city for a long time. It's always been an issue.
Speaker 4: Everybody wants to come to New York and we know why.
Speaker 4: I don't care what's going on in the world or
Speaker 4: what's going on with the city. People keep flooding into
Speaker 4: the city. You see him every single day. How do
Speaker 4: we house these folks?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I should say one more just got added to
Speaker 3: that list yesterday. My youngest daughter graduated from college in
Speaker 3: Minnesota on Saturday, and she has already.
Speaker 1: Accepted a job back in New York.
Speaker 3: My third daughter, all three of them are now back
Speaker 3: in New York working building their lives here. It's the
Speaker 3: greatest city in the world, but housing is key. My
Speaker 3: youngest daughter is going to be living at home because
Speaker 3: she can't afford on a teacher's salary to live in
Speaker 3: New York.
Speaker 1: So what do you have to do to do about it?
Speaker 1: Four words?
Speaker 3: If I were to summarize unleash the private sector, all
Speaker 3: the candidates have their various proposals because voters are screaming
Speaker 3: about this issue. I'm the only one who said there's
Speaker 3: not primarily a governmental solution.
Speaker 1: Trust me.
Speaker 3: The private sector wants to invest in the richest city
Speaker 3: in the world with a sixty year low vacancy rate.
Speaker 3: But we've just put up so much the zoning ranks,
Speaker 3: environmental ranks, the city bureaucracy where they have to hire
Speaker 3: expediters to try and navigate the city bureaucracy. We've got
Speaker 3: to clear that out and shorten what's a four year
Speaker 3: process on average down to a two year process, which
Speaker 3: is what it was under Mike Bloomberg, and the difference
Speaker 3: in two years and four years to project start to
Speaker 3: finish in a higher interest rate environment like today, is
Speaker 3: a viable project or a non viable project?
Speaker 2: I look at it. I brought this up with Governor
Speaker 2: Cuomo the election to ed coch One, where Mario Cuomo,
Speaker 2: Governor Cuomo's father took Staten Island, and I believe Brooklyn
Speaker 2: I can't remember, but Doo took Bronx. You know, Bella
Speaker 2: Abzug took Manhattan, but ed cotch One. With this Democratic primary,
Speaker 2: how does Whitney Tilson frame the first Tuesday of November
Speaker 2: all of a sudd sudden. It's complex.
Speaker 3: Yes, it's particularly complex is we have the primary coming
Speaker 3: up in eight days and it's ranked choice, so voters
Speaker 3: can rank up to five candidates. The way the polling
Speaker 3: looks right now is whatever round of ranked choice, as
Speaker 3: other candidates are eliminated, it's going to come down to
Speaker 3: Andrew Cuomo, the former governor, and Zoron Mamdanni, the thirty
Speaker 3: three year old sort of phenom who's run a great
Speaker 3: campaign but is very dangerously in experience, has radical views.
Speaker 3: I'll just point your listeners read the new York Times
Speaker 3: editorial today. New York Times, the liberal lefty paper of record,
Speaker 3: just destroyed Zoron Mamdanni and their editorial today said he's
Speaker 3: completely unqualified, his ideas are extremists, would be the ruin
Speaker 3: of this city is effectively what they just said. So
Speaker 3: they said, don't rank Mom Donnie. And then they said,
Speaker 3: whatever your feelings are about Cuomo, rank him somewhere. They
Speaker 3: had a mixed view of Cuomo. And then they said
Speaker 3: Whitney Tilson is the heir to Mike Bloomberg, and if
Speaker 3: you're a moderate, vote for him. So that I was
Speaker 3: thrilled by that.
Speaker 2: What are we going to see in November? If Whitney
Speaker 2: Tilson doesn't get traction.
Speaker 1: Well I will.
Speaker 3: I am only running in the Democratic primary, and realistically,
Speaker 3: with eight days left, there's a very narrow path for
Speaker 3: me to win the primary.
Speaker 1: If I don't win the primary, I will not be
Speaker 1: there in November. November.
Speaker 3: What's interesting is is both Mom Donnie and Cuomo, regardless
Speaker 3: of which one wins and loses, is likely to be
Speaker 3: in November. And then you have the current mayor, Eric Adams,
Speaker 3: Curtis Sliwa on the Republican side. In all likelihood, and
Speaker 3: it's not ranked choice, So you could have a scenario
Speaker 3: where someone gets forty percent and becomes.
Speaker 1: Mayor with only a minority of the.
Speaker 3: Vote because three or four other candidates could split the
Speaker 3: remaining sixty.
Speaker 4: We've seen some very troubling images for many people coming
Speaker 4: out of Los Angeles as the deportation a plan with
Speaker 4: President Trump ramps up. What's your view and how New
Speaker 4: York should deal with it? How how would you deal
Speaker 4: with that?
Speaker 2: This is great, Paul, thank you for bringing us up.
Speaker 2: Whitney Tilson, one of our staff had a close friend's
Speaker 2: husband picked up this weekend in New York City.
Speaker 3: H Yeah, I strongly support New York status as a
Speaker 3: sanctuary city. I do not think we should be cooperating
Speaker 3: anyway with the Trump administrations lawless, I would argue campaign
Speaker 3: of terror against our immigrant communities. We though, as Democrats,
Speaker 3: need to be smart and not lose the narrative and
Speaker 3: not appear to be or in reality be protecting the
Speaker 3: very small number of people who are here illegally, who
Speaker 3: have joined gangs and are making our city less safe.
Speaker 3: So there needs to be limited cooperation there. But you know,
Speaker 3: I was asked on the debate stage. What would you do,
Speaker 3: you know, if Los Angeles, you know, protests came here
Speaker 3: and I'd be like, I'd get out in front. I'd
Speaker 3: be out there protesting as well what the Trump administration
Speaker 3: is doing, but.
Speaker 1: Critically in a peaceful way.
Speaker 3: And the flags we should be waving shouldn't be Mexican
Speaker 3: or Palestinian flags. We should be waving American flags. We
Speaker 3: are patriots fighting for our country, for our democracy against
Speaker 3: an authoritarian power grab, which is what I think is
Speaker 3: going on here.
Speaker 4: What's the biggest issue from your perspective that you want
Speaker 4: to get across when you go out and meet New
Speaker 4: Yorkers on the street.
Speaker 3: Well, I was one of the founders of Teach for
Speaker 3: America thirty six years ago, my first job out of
Speaker 3: college a few blocks from here.
Speaker 1: I've been on the board of KIP Charter School.
Speaker 3: So I've been trying to elevate the issue of education reform,
Speaker 3: improving our public schools where we spend more and get
Speaker 3: less than any city or state in the country. It
Speaker 3: just hasn't been a big issue, honestly, and it always
Speaker 3: comes back to, you know, housing slash affordability and crime and.
Speaker 1: Safety and so but I do my best.
Speaker 3: To elevate an issue that I care about a lot.
Speaker 3: Is by far the single biggest part of our city budget.
Speaker 3: Forty billion dollars of one hundred and fifteen billion dollar
Speaker 3: budget goes into the DOE, and it's not well spent.
Speaker 2: Waiting until soon. I want to ask a delicate question
Speaker 2: here in that there's such a distrust of Governor Cuomo.
Speaker 2: There are those that support them. You know, we all
Speaker 2: know the debate here in New York, and I think
Speaker 2: frankly nationwide people know the debate. If we have Mayor Cuomo,
Speaker 2: how does he move on from the baggage that was
Speaker 2: in Albany. Are you optimistic that he can if he's mayor,
Speaker 2: that he can move on from the train wreck that
Speaker 2: was his term in Albany?
Speaker 3: Yes, And I would not characterize his years in Albany
Speaker 3: as a train wreck.
Speaker 1: He's got a lot, he got a lot of study on.
Speaker 2: Politically I'm talking about and I'm on the cover of
Speaker 2: the New York Post.
Speaker 3: I know how I know how it ended. But I
Speaker 3: have had some interactions with him over the years. Back
Speaker 3: when he was governor, he was a strong supporter of
Speaker 3: charter schools, and at the end of the day. He's experienced, competent,
Speaker 3: and can get things done. And to those who you know,
Speaker 3: he's referred to as a vindictive followed by an expletive
Speaker 3: by many people. And my argument back to them is
Speaker 3: is there's a lot to be said for someone with
Speaker 3: a fearsome reputation trying to get things done here in
Speaker 3: a very fractious city where you've got to deal not
Speaker 3: only with the city council but with Albany and now
Speaker 3: with the federal government is going to be a real
Speaker 3: challenge as well. We need I think we need someone
Speaker 3: like Cuomo, and I'm optimistic he'd be up to the job.
Speaker 4: I guess as a relates to the federal government, can
Speaker 4: he work with the Trump administration, because perhaps that's maybe
Speaker 4: one of the things the city needs someone to work
Speaker 4: with the Trump administration on behalf of New York's interests.
Speaker 4: Is that's something you think he could do.
Speaker 3: I think Trump is a bully and he respects other
Speaker 3: bullies and people who will stand up to him, and
Speaker 3: I think Governor Cuomo fits that bill. They've known each
Speaker 3: other for a long period of time, and I think Cuomo,
Speaker 3: I would hope, would be smart in standing up to Trump.
Speaker 3: But not needlessly provoking him. And when the alternative for
Speaker 3: us is a thirty three year old socialist, I think
Speaker 3: he would just get destroyed by city politics, would get
Speaker 3: destroyed and all, but it would be destroyed by Trump.
Speaker 3: And so you know, that's an easy decision between those two.
Speaker 2: Winny Tilson, thank you so much for joining us today,
Speaker 2: whatever our political persuasions, and thank you for your public
Speaker 2: service of running for office.
Speaker 1: I accept your condolence stetting out there and running.
Speaker 2: I hope it is RESTful as time moves out