Errol Louis on the Presidential Race and How the Mayor is Doing

1. “They're gonna have to build an organization really, really quickly, I mean really quickly. This is an uphill climb — as a matter of fact, for your listeners, who are all in for Kamala Harris, and think that this burst of enthusiasm and all the fundraising and the gigantic zoom calls means she's gonna steamroll to victory, I have some bad news for you. It ain't gonna be that simple.”

2. ”There's no reason to have journalists there as [debate] moderators if they're not going to act as journalists, if they're not going to correct the record. You know, make clarifying additions to the conversation, so that people are not misled. If they're not going to do that, then you could pretty much get anybody. You get a game show host and have them just do the debate.”

3. On Mayor Adams comparing himself to Mayor Dinkins: "You know, it's interesting you should bring that up. There's a little bit of, there's some guilty consciences out there because one of the stories of the fall of the Dinkins administration and their failure to get reelected is that they actually got quite a lot of heat from the left back then — in particular from Al Sharpton, who, I think, doesn't want to do to Eric Adams what he did to David Dinkins. They gave Dinkins a really, really hard time, and the fact that he ended up losing to Giuliani by something like 26,000 votes tells you that even a small amount of criticism really could have made a difference. And I think there were a number of people who were saying, ‘OK, we had the first Black mayor in New York history. We were all very proud of him. We all worked very hard to get him there and then, because he wasn't perfect we went at him so hard that we undermined his reelection effort. And then we had 20 years of Republican mayors. So you know, just politically speaking, there are people who are saying, OK, let's not do that again. Democrats in particular, Black Democrats. But I think also, then look, as is often the case with politicians who are crying whoa is me, they're partly kind of full of it, I mean, you know these two men are very, very different. First of all, there's a habit that Mayor Adams has that once you're tuned into it, you can't unhear it, which is that he says they said this, they said that, and there's never a person, right. And then, in fact, you can't find a quote. You can't find an individual. When he insists that people are saying that he's incompetent, I don't know you. You find it for me. I don't see it. I don't see it. I'm not hearing that. I've heard charges that the policies are wrong. That the policy is not being implemented properly. That's the bread and butter of conversations about the city. None of us agree that this or that policy is being executed perfectly to our liking. There are ethical issues, I mean, he did have his phones taken from him by the FBI — that never happened to David Dinkins. That's a different kind of a question. That's not about competence. You know, that's about ethics, that's about character. Look, I, I know most politicians don't ever want to be questioned about anything. Eric Adams doesn't ever want to be questioned about anything he's done or might do. But you don't get that privilege. That's one of the things that you don't get with the mayoralty. You get the keys to Gracie Mansion. You get the detail. You get a lot, but you don't get invisibility. You don't get invulnerability. You get asked questions, and you know it's probably better that you answer some of them. Then continue to act as if you're a victim. I don't see him that way…Like you wrote, he's got a mixed record, done some things pretty well, some other things that are problematic. He made some promises. Accountability means we openly and honestly put our cards on the table, and we ask how he did on this promise, that promise, and the other promise. And it's we who raised those questions, not him, boasting about all the the wonderful things he's done that nobody thought he could do. It's we who are bringing to him the concerns of our various audiences, what the public is saying, different advocacy and other groups that are out there, saying we need more attention here or there. And so whether it's the migrants or it's the schools, or it's the traffic.”