STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. – Mayor Bill de Blasio is term-limited out of office at the end of this year.
But hold your applause. De Blasio still wants to serve in public office. So we’re not done with BDB just yet.
Is he kidding?
De Blasio is so unpopular in New York that even former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, banished from Albany after sexual misconduct allegations, could likely beat him in a Democratic primary.
Or, as Suffolk County Democratic chairman Rich Schaffer put it, Osama bin Laden is probably more popular in Suffolk than de Blasio.
“De Blasio, I would say, would have zero support if not negative out here,” Schaffer told the Times.
De Blasio would drag a lot of bad baggage into a statewide race.
This after decades of ever-lower crime in the five boroughs and with New York City routinely hailed as the safest big city in America.
Homelessness, including among the mentally ill, has spiraled out of control under de Blasio. His vaunted Vision Zero plan has not made the streets safer, despite all the speed cameras and lowered speed limits.
Overall, New York City feels more dangerous and dirtier than it did when de Blasio took over, giving rise to the quintessential political question: Are you better off now than you were eight years ago?
The answer for the five boroughs is a resounding no.
How does de Blasio sell all that around the rest of the state? He certainly couldn’t convince Democratic voters of his effectiveness when he made his laughable run for president in 2020.
Then there’s the de Blasio who’s been slammed for arriving late to work most days and for taking Fridays off. The de Blasio who regularly scampers off to his gym and other familiar haunts in Brooklyn. The de Blasio who as mayor has seemingly wanted to be anywhere but City Hall.
Speaking of his White House bid, de Blasio the other day got slammed by the city Department of Investigation for failing to reimburse the city for the more than $300,000 he rang up by taking his NYPD security detail on the campaign trail with him.
The same report said that the mayor’s security detail also regularly ferried both of de Blasio’s adult children hither and yon.
And who can forget how de Blasio blew through more than $700 million before shuttering his failed Renewal school improvement program? Or how the mayor’s wife, First Lady Chirlane McCray, couldn’t account for $800 million spent in her ThriveNYC mental-health initiative?
None of that is good stewardship of public funds.
Never mind the reek of pay-to-play that has followed de Blasio for years, with those seeking favorable treatment from city agencies ponying up money for de Blasio campaigns or non-profit organizations.
Gov. Kathy Hochul, who took over after the Cuomo implosion, is already running to win the job for herself.
And it’s a good bet that Attorney General Letitia James, who rid us all of Cuomo, will also be a candidate. Public Advocate Jumaane Williams might get in as well.
All of which sets up an interesting game board for de Blasio: How does the mayor, who fashions himself as Mr. Diversity and Mr. Inclusion, beat back two high-powered women and two candidates who are Black in a race for governor?
How can he hope to sail against James, who would be the first woman and first woman of color elected governor in New York and who chased Cuomo, the Big Bad Wolf, out of Albany?
Only in de Blasio’s self-absorbed mind can it all work.