Associated Press: “While creating big profits for the firm’s investors, Carlyle’s deals sometimes triggered layoffs, outsourced jobs and complaints from the people served by the companies acquired.”
“Carlyle made investments in several companies under Youngkin’s leadership that moved at least 1,300 American jobs offshore.”
“A federal judge on Wednesday blocked a Florida law that would penalize social media companies for blocking a politician’s posts, a blow to conservatives’ efforts to respond to Facebook and other websites’ suspension of former President Donald Trump,” the Washington Post reports.
“The law was due to go into effect Thursday.”
New York Times: “The outcome of the New York City mayor’s race will likely come down to the results of the more than 125,000 absentee ballots that still remain to be counted.”
“According to preliminary and unofficial results released Wednesday, Eric Adams leads Kathryn Garcia by about 15,000 votes after all rounds of ranked-choice tabulation.”
Key factor: “The areas that cast the most absentee ballots were Manhattan and parts of Brooklyn, where Kathryn Garcia drew stronger support in the Election Day vote tally.”
Kyle Kondik: “There are some operatives who believe that early ad spending can help define a candidate positively and protect them from negative attacks later on.”
“A recent, anecdotal example of this we have heard from professionals on both sides is the campaign of now-Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ). Sinema did not have to worry about her primary in 2018, so she spent the months leading up to Arizona’s August primary bolstering her image while her opponent, Martha McSally (R), had to tack to the right in her own primary, which she ended up winning convincingly but which she could not take for granted. By the time the November campaign started in force, Sinema had positively presented herself to Arizonans, arguably taking some bite out of Republican ads that sought to portray her as radical.”
“Youngkin is effectively trying to do the same thing in his general election advertising.”
“The New York City mayor’s race plunged into chaos on Tuesday night when the city Board of Elections released a new tally of votes in the Democratic mayoral primary, and then removed the tabulations from its website after citing a ‘discrepancy,’” the New York Times reports.
“A new tally of votes in the New York City Democratic mayoral primary suggested that the race between Eric Adams, the primary night leader, and his two closest rivals had tightened significantly, plunging the closely watched contest into a period of fresh uncertainty,” the New York Times reports.
“According to Tuesday’s unofficial results, Mr. Adams prevailed over Kathryn Garcia by two percentage points, 51.1% to 48.9% — a margin of 15,908 votes — after 11 rounds of elimination, with Maya Wiley in third place.”
“But those numbers could be scrambled again as the city’s Board of Elections tabulates outcomes that will include more than 124,000 Democratic absentee ballots, with a fuller result not expected until mid-July.”
David Leonhardt: “Black, Hispanic and Asian American voters are to the right of white Democrats on many issues. Many voters of color are skeptical of immigration and free trade. They favor border security, as well as some abortion restrictions. They are worried about crime and oppose cuts to police funding. They are religious.”
“One way to make sense of these patterns is to focus on social class. Many professionals, with college degrees and above-average incomes, have political views that skew either strongly right or strongly left, largely lining up with one of the two parties’ agendas. Many working-class voters have mixed views.”
“If there were any doubt about that, the 2020 election — when voters of color shifted right — should have cleared it up. And last week’s New York mayoral election has become the latest piece of evidence.”
“Byron Brown on Monday launched an unprecedented write-in campaign to reclaim the mayor’s office he apparently lost in the June 22 Democratic primary as an increasingly chaotic situation surrounds the victory of newcomer India Walton,” the Buffalo News reports.
Brown lost in a Democratic primary to democratic-socialist Walton last week.
Glenn Youngkin (R) “has bankrolled a $2 million radio and television blitz since securing his party’s nomination for Virginia governor in early May, an unusually early and aggressive start to advertising by a wealthy, self-funded candidate,” the Washington Post reports.
Politico: “It was a disappointing finish for someone who spent much of the race in a comfortable lead. When he launched his campaign in January, Yang was the most famous candidate by far. He topped his competitors in name recognition and quickly amassed a campaign warchest that allowed him to spend more than $8 million on the race. And his early support could be measured in individual donors — 21,138, compared to 9,390 for Adams, according to the city Campaign Finance Board’s latest disclosure.”
“It was never enough. Damaging Yang’s chances were both circumstances outside of his control and his own failure to overcome his deficit of knowledge about municipal government.”
“India Walton, the community activist barely known to many Buffalo voters just months ago, shocked four-term incumbent Byron Brown in Tuesday’s Democratic primary for mayor in what may rank as the most historic upset in the city’s political history,” the Buffalo News reports.
NBC News: “If Walton, 39, wins the primary and the general election later this year, she would become the first socialist mayor of a large American city since 1960, when Frank Zeidler left office in Milwaukee.”
Walton was captured on video telling her mother that she won.
“Eric Adams rode an anti-crime message to a commanding lead in the crowded race to replace outgoing Mayor Bill de Blasio, ousting former presidential contender Andrew Yang and holding off nearly a dozen other Democrats,” Politico reports.
“But under New York’s new ranked-choice voting system, the election now heads into an instant runoff that could last for weeks and keep the Brooklyn borough president from officially claiming his party’s nomination.”
“More than 31% of voters listed Adams as their first choice to be mayor. Attorney Maya Wiley, who won a late surge of support on the left, took 22% of first-place votes, and former sanitation commissioner Kathryn Garcia won 20% of first-place ballots as of midnight.”
Andrew Yang officially dropped out of the race: “I am not going to be the next mayor of New York City based on the numbers that are coming in tonight. I am conceding this race.”
Playbook: “There are 13 candidates on the ballot, and polls show no one coming remotely close to a majority. That means it’s virtually certain that we won’t have an outright winner tonight, and it will be necessary to move to the ranked-choice, ‘instant runoff’ tabulation to determine the Democratic nominee.”
“But ‘instant’ it is not — far from it. The problem is you need to know which candidates finished the race in which places before their supporters can be reallocated in the correct order. And that’s only possible after all the votes are tabulated.”
“The city board of elections is reportedly not going to run those calculations for the first time until next Tuesday. And that will only include votes cast in person — whether today or during the early-voting period, which ended Sunday. Then there are absentee ballots, which won’t start to be added to the tallies until after the Fourth of July. That means it could be until the middle of next month before a winner can be identified.”
Slow Boring: “His campaign has not laid out a clear set of ideas about how to govern the city but instead has focused on building a coalition between leading unions, some business interests, churches, and what’s left of the Democratic Party apparatus. These groups are part of the warp and woof of the city and its politics, providing campaign workers in off-off-cycle city council races, lobbying administrative agencies, and mastering the dark arts of navigating the city’s Byzantine ballot access system. Adams has held event after event touting and cementing this coalition.”
“By contrast, the policy section of his website is a bunch of blog posts and platitudes — an afterthought. The coalition is the point. Adams is trying to create a political machine for the 21st century.”
A new Ipsos poll the race for New York City mayor has Eric Adams at 28%, Andrew Yang at 20%, Kathryn Garcia 15%, and Maya Wiley at 13% on the first ballot of ranked-choice voting.
A new Fairleigh Dickinson poll in New Jersey finds Gov. Phil Murphy (D) leading challenger Jack Ciattarelli (R), 48% to 33%.
Manhattan City Council candidate Zack Weiner confirmed to the New York Post it was him in a bondage video circulating on social media.
“The footage shows a gagged Weiner, unable to speak, subjecting himself to various abuses by a leather-bound woman who pours wax on him and clips his nipples with clothespins.”
Said Weiner: “I didn’t want anyone to see that, but here we are.”
Taegan Goddard
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire -- which for more than two decades has been one of the nation's most influential political news sites.
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