DAYS THE BUDGET IS LATE: 49
YOU GET A PASS, AND YOU GET A PASS, AND YOU GET A PASS…: Mayor Zohran Mamdani is conceding the way City Hall doles out press passes is “not” good policy – after a trio of Luigi Mangione admirers celebrated the alleged murder of a health care CEO while flaunting newly minted press passes.
“Those three individuals should not have received press passes,” the mayor told reporters today, referencing the three Mangione supporters, who call themselves the Mangionistas.
The Mangionistas told reporters Monday outside a Manhattan courthouse that the children of slain UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson are “better off without their Dad” and that they “don’t give a flying fuck he died.”
They also posed for pictures with their press passes in hand — an image that landed on the cover of The New York Post this morning, with the tabloid squarely blaming City Hall for the fiasco.
Mamdani is now distancing himself from the city’s press pass policy — saying his administration will review its media credential application process, a job previously handled by the NYPD. That changed after 2020 protests in response to George Floyd’s murder prompted questions about whether the city’s police should control journalists’ access.
The internal review from Mamdani comes as he has sought to publicly ease tensions with business leaders after the mayor filmed a “Tax the Rich” video outside the pied-à-terre of Citadel CEO Ken Griffin that inflamed the hedge fund titan and other business leaders.
In public remarks, Griffin criticized Mamdani’s decision to use his personal address to promote his soak-the-rich policies and even referenced Thompson’s murder last year, which occurred only a few blocks away from the pied-à-terre in question. He also said he is excited to move much of his company’s operations to Miami.
Since then, Mamdani has seemingly been in rich-biz-exec damage control mode, publicly praising Griffin and reportedly reaching out via intermediaries to try and schedule a meeting. Mamdani also set up one-on-one sit-downs with other CEOs, including JPMorgan Chase’s Jamie Dimon and Goldman Sachs’s David Solomon on Monday. He also met with Blackstone president Jonathan Gray last week.
The Mangionista press pass debacle certainly doesn’t stand to help his tension-easing efforts.
City Hall refused to answer a question from Playbook about when their passes were awarded, though The Post declared the three Mangione fans were awarded the credentials under Mamdani. A reporter for The Guardian, Victoria Bekiempis, posted the result of a records request she made which indicated dozens of individuals have obtained press passes in connection with the Mangione trial, with about half granted before Mamdani took over as mayor.
“There is a good-natured debate to be had about where a press pass should extend and where it shouldn’t. However, the three people that we are talking about don’t fall within that debate,” Mamdani also said today. “I, as the mayor, should not be deciding who is considered a journalist worthy of a pass and who is not. However, what we should have is a process that people can trust.”
As mayor, Mamdani has embraced “new media” influencers and content creators, even holding press events exclusively for them. Journalists from Room 9 — the City Hall press room — also say they’ve lodged complaints to Mamdani’s press office about the lax availability of city press credentials.
For instance, Raul Rivera, a man who allegedly bit a Mamdani campaign volunteer at a rally before his election, still held onto his press pass after his arrest, according to eyewitnesses who saw it around his neck at press conferences outside City Hall, where he is a frequent disruptor and provocateur. Other independent news gatherers, like the man behind the far-right “Viral News NYC,” were incensed about the Mangionista’s getting credentialed.
“I remember when I first got my press pass,” wrote the account, which internet sleuths have identified as written by Oren Levy. “I was proud that I was able to get one. Now it’s just another piece of plastic with no real meaning behind it because every jerk off and their mother has one.” — Jason Beeferman
From the Capitol
ALMOST THERE: Voting on the seven-week late state budget may begin next Tuesday.
Assembly Democrats were told during a closed-door conference today that votes are being eyed for early next week as top lawmakers and Gov. Kathy Hochul try to finish up the $268 billion tax-and-spend plan.
“Next week is looking more promising,” Assemblymember Michaelle Solages said.
Read more from POLITICO Pro’s Nick Reisman and Bill Mahoney.
NO IMPACT: The deal between the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and five unions to end a three-day Long Island Rail Road strike won’t affect the yet-to-be-completed state budget’s bottomline, state Senate Transportation Committee Chair Jeremy Cooney said.
On Monday night, Hochul announced the agreement ending the strike for the commuter rail service that connects New York City to a vital, vote-rich suburban bellwether.
Standing beside the governor, MTA CEO Janno Lieber said they were able to reach a deal that was structured in a way that doesn’t prompt new fare increases or tax hikes.
The unions have been working without a contract for three years. Salary increases for those years — 3 percent, 3 percent and 3.5 percent, respectively — will be paid retroactively, but the sticking point was how to handle a fourth year that begins next month. NY1 reported the salary increase would be 4.5 percent with a $3,000 lump sum and that the contract year would be extended by six weeks. — Nick Reisman and Ry Rivard
FROM THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL
BLAKEMAN’S DESANTIS BASH: The New York GOP is hosting a fundraiser with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis tonight as their gubernatorial candidate Bruce Blakeman hopes to unseat Gov. Kathy Hochul.
The New York Republican State Committee’s annual gala, set to take place at 7 p.m. at The Plaza Hotel, will feature remarks from the Florida governor as he makes an uphill push for Blakeman and others to turn New York red.
The event will occur at the same time as the Legislative Correspondents Association’s annual “LCA Show” in Albany, where the city’s press corps spoofs the New York politicians they cover with an original musical in a longstanding tradition. Hochul and Blakeman were originally scheduled to deliver the show’s “rebuttals,” where the electeds who are the targets of the jokes get the chance to give comedic retorts in front of the live audience, but Blakeman canceled his appearance. He will send a video instead.
“We regret the conflict with the LCA show, which was unavoidable,” the state GOP said in a press advisory.
Other GOP candidates like attorney general candidate Saritha Komatireddy and comptroller hopeful Joseph Hernandez will also deliver remarks.
The swanky gala is taking place as another big name in the GOP — President Donald Trump — is flying to New York this week to hold an event with Republican Rep. Mike Lawler in the Hudson Valley on Friday.
Despite the show of support for New York candidates from some of the Republican Party’s biggest names, not all is kumbaya between national and local leaders. Just weeks ago, Trump broke from state GOP Chair Ed Cox with his endorsement in the race to replace Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik. — Jason Beeferman
TERMINAL TURMOIL: The path forward for the Brooklyn Marine Terminal is turning into a point of contention in the heated primary between Rep. Dan Goldman and former City Comptroller Brad Lander.
The initiative to revamp the Red Hook terminal — led in part by Goldman — has been a delicate process. A task force approved the proposal last September after five delayed votes due to holdouts from Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso and City Council Member Shahana Hanif, who eventually came around. The project is still years away from construction.
But at a forum hosted this morning by Abundance New York and NYC New Liberals, Lander said he thinks “a little more time is needed to refine that plan” — a sentiment he’s recently shared publicly. But privately, Lander reportedly “lobbied holdout members of a city task force last year to line up support” for the plan, according to Crain’s. When asked if he changed his position on the terminal, Lander replied that he “didn’t take a public position at the time that the plan was adopted,” later adding that he had “doubts about the plan at the time.”
Lander noted that people questioned the nature of port operations at the harbor and transportation in the area.
“With a new administration, with some doubts about it, it is worth a few more months,” Lander said during the forum. “I will be a champion to get it done, and you know I will be, because you’ve seen me on every single project, every single hard choice, being on the side of spending some time building consensus, and then moving forward productively.”
Goldman appeared on stage after Lander, who said he didn’t want a debate because he didn’t think “one minute sniping back and forth” would be as productive as the moderator Ben Max “asking thoughtful questions that push each of us.” The incumbent wanted seven debates; Lander committed to two.
Goldman agreed the plan “certainly needs some work in terms of the transit and infrastructure, and making sure that the space can support what is proposed,” but he was quick to fire back. He accused his challenger of “flip-flopping” on his support for the project and drew a contrast with Lander’s Gowanus rezoning. The incumbent said that rezoning “was done well” — but that he also hears from Gowanus residents now priced out of the neighborhood — a dynamic he doesn’t want to see unfold with the Brooklyn Marine Terminal.
“The concerns that you hear about, ‘Oh we need a few more months, the process,’ that is NIMBYism — that is how things don’t get done,” he said. “We went through an exhaustive process that considered all of these things.”
Goldman also mused that there’s “some surprise” that Trump hasn’t “tried to stop” the project. “I think it’s obviously because he’s afraid of me,” he joked. — Madison Fernandez
IN OTHER NEWS
— FOLLOW THE BLUE BRICK ROAD?: New York Democrats see a potential opening in Rep. Elise Stefanik’s deep red district. (Gothamist)
— ‘HATEFUL ACT’: The NYPD’s Hate Crimes Task Force is investigating an incident where a Muslim man was hit with an egg outside a Brooklyn mosque. (New York Daily News)
— LOOK MA, NO HANDS: State Sen. Patricia Fahy introduced a bill that would bring self-driving cars to Albany. (Times Union)
Missed this morning’s New York Playbook? We forgive you. Read it here.