Politics

Democrat Eric Adams officially wins New York City mayoral election

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Democrat and former cop Eric Adams has been elected to become the next mayor of New York City, and the city’s second black mayor in its history.

Eric Adams, 61, won the mayoral election this week, making him one of the most noteworthy Democrats in the U.S. outside of D.C. and state governorships. The democrat decided to run for mayor in 2020 after the death of George Floyd, which involved a white cop.

Adams, a former cop, feels strongly about finding a balance of maintaining law and order, while also being cognizant of police violence against minorities. This was a big campaign point for him, which led him to victory as he won an overwhelming majority of the vote, which came both from the working class and upper class citizens.

The road to becoming the primary Democrat candidate in the race was not easy. Andrew Yang was the frontrunner for a long period and was followed by current city comptroller Scott Stringer, and Maya Wiley, who used to work as a counsel for current NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio. After drop-outs and scandals among those three, his biggest opponent became Kathryn Garcia, a former commissioner of sanitation, who was endorsed by The New York Times. He won the primary with a close 8,246 votes.

His campaign focused on bringing back safety and reducing crime in the city. Despite calls to “defund the police” from numerous Democrats, Adams’ had a different perspective, in which he pushed for more aggressive policing and vowed to bring reform, which would include increasing diversity at the top level. Some Democrats see him as not being progressive enough, but almost 73% of voters thought he was the guy for the job. 

In New York City, Democrats outnumber Republicans 7 to 1, leading to an easy victory for Adams in the final election. He easily beat Republican Curtis Sliwa, who tried to paint Adams as out-of-touch and an elitist. “I am pledging my support to the new Mayor Eric Adams because we’re all going to have to coalesce together in harmony and solidarity if we’re going to save this city that we love,” Sliwa conceded on Tuesday night.

Adams used his life story to appeal to the working class New York City residents, most notably, the Black and Latino Americans. He was born in Brownsville, Brooklyn before moving to South Jamaica, Queens where he grew up. He had six siblings and often used his own story of experiencing police brutality during his and his brother’s arrest. Despite this, he became a police officer in the 1980s, during the city’s infamous crime spell.

He first served as a transit officer and later joined the NYPD. He formed the ‘100 Blacks in Law Enforcement Who Care’ after becoming a critic of the force’s “brutality against minorities”. After retiring, he turned his attention to politics. He ran for Congress in the 1990s, but came up fruitless. Then, in 2006, he was elected to be a state senator, representing central Brooklyn. He continued for four terms before becoming the Brooklyn borough president in 2013, where he stayed until now. 

ARTICLE: RITA VOGT

MANAGING EDITOR: CARSON CHOATE

PHOTO CREDITS: HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

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