There was a wonderful parody of a TV lawyer ad in the series Arrested Development, in which Scott Baio’s character Bob Loblaw asks, “Why should you go to jail for a crime someone else . . . noticed?” I’m reminded of that by this story by CNN’s Edward-Isaac Dovere, in which New York Democrats are lining up to blame New York City mayor Eric Adams for what they expect to be the looming defeat of governor Kathy Hochul and multiple House candidates in Democrat-led districts. Are they upset that Adams is doing a bad job? No, of course not. They blame him for noticing the city’s crime problem:
Democratic officials and strategists in New York tell CNN they are bracing for what could be stunning losses in the governor’s race and in contests for as many as four US House seats largely in the suburbs. With crime dominating the headlines and the airwaves, multiple Democrats watching these races closely are pointing to New York City Mayor Eric Adams, accusing him of overhyping the issue and playing into right-wing narratives in ways that may have helped set the party up for disaster on Tuesday. “He was an essential validator in the city to make their attacks seem more legit and less partisan,” said one Democratic operative working on campaigns in New York, who asked not to be named so as not to compromise current clients. . . .
Going into Election Day, New York Democrats worry about a double whammy from how they’ve struggled to address crime: Swing voters turned off by Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul and suburban House Democrats go vote Republican, while base Democrats in the city, dejected by talk of how awful things are, don’t turn out at all. . . . Democratic groups like the Democratic Governors Association are moving in millions of dollars to prop up Hochul in a deep-blue state instead of spending that on tight races elsewhere, with Vice President Kamala Harris flying in on Thursday in one of her own last campaign stops and President Joe Biden heading to Westchester County, north of New York City, on Sunday to rally with the governor.
Sure seems as if more of these people are listening to the same bad advice that led Hochul to scoff at locking up criminals and claim that the crime problem is just a Republican “conspiracy.” There remain a few voices of sanity, including my own Democratic congresswoman, whom Republicans are aiming to replace with Hempstead councilman and former NYPD detective Anthony D’Esposito:
Rep. Kathleen Rice, a retiring moderate Democrat from just outside New York City and a former Nassau County district attorney, said at first she was encouraged by Adams. As a former police officer, he understands the problem, she said, but “the general consensus is that he hasn’t shown he has focused on the issue enough for it to have made a difference.” Rice said she’s heard from constituents from just outside the city who are turned off by reports of Adams spending late nights at pricey private restaurants juxtaposed with stories about murders on the subways and other horrific incidents. . . . “It’s both true that crime is down from the 1990s and that it has been increasing and that people feel uncomfortable,” said Mark Levine, the Manhattan borough president. “Democrats have to be able to talk about that and offer real solutions.”
Some campaign consultants get it, too: “Other Democrats argue [that blaming Adams] has it backwards. While they accuse Republicans of political ploys they call cynical, racist, and taking advantage of a situation fostered by the pandemic, they insist that candidates would be in better shape if they had followed Adams’s lead in speaking to the fear and frustration that voters feel.” Listen to voters? What a novel idea.