Will Eric Adams’s Exit Change the NYC Mayoral Election?

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Welcome back to Risky Business, a show about making better decisions.

I'm Maria Konakoba.

And I'm Nate Silver.

Today in the show, look, we're both in New York City, at least part-time.

We're going to talk about the New York mayoral race.

Eric Adams, the current mayor and cumbrement mayor of New York, dropped out this weekend.

We're going to talk about the implications for the race, talk about the game theory behind Eric Adams' decision, and also a little bit about this vacuum of leadership that has kind of compelled a surprising candidate, Zora Mamdani, to be the the very likely, in my opinion, next mayor of New York.

Absolutely.

And we'll obviously, because this is risky business, get some game theory in there, the game theory of the decision, the timing, all of those fun things.

So yeah, well, we're going to have a politics-centric show for you today.

Before we do that, though, Nate, happy fall.

It is officially autumn.

By the way, so now we're recording this Monday, September 29th.

It is hot as fuck in New York City.

It is muggy.

It is great.

I mean, here in Manhattan, Maria, it's a whole different microclimate than your neck of the woods.

But yeah, it's been a little muggy.

It's, it's muggy.

It's sticky, but yet it's officially fall.

I was in Vermont this weekend leaf watching.

That was beautiful.

But I have to say, you know, whatever, whatever the causes, climate change, et cetera, the leaf colors are much more muted this year.

And by the end of the weekend, they started almost like everything started falling.

I was like, wait, this isn't supposed to be peak leaves yet.

And yet, here we are.

But it was still beautiful.

What if climate change made like fall foliage better?

Would you favor it then?

Yes, absolutely.

No, no, please.

Please.

Doesn't like pollution make sunsets better?

Is that a thing?

Yes.

Yes.

Smog makes smog makes sunsets more beautiful because it filters the colors in a funny way.

And so, so, yes, absolutely.

We have we have some silver lines.

I only see the bright signs.

Silver line.

Nate,

in terms of risky business, business, on the drive back from Vermont, driving down this bucolic road, you know, about to like exit and get on the highway, open windows because it's nice fall weather, a fucking wasp flies into the car straight into my arm and bites me.

I got stung for the first time in, I don't know how long it was.

I had no idea.

I was, while I was watching, I was like, I have no idea if I'm allergic.

I had Benadryl because I have a lot of other allergies.

So I was like, okay, I'm ready.

And I'm in the middle of nowhere, Vermont, with no cell reception.

So I was like, I sure hope I'm not allergic because this ain't good.

Anyway, I'm not allergic.

Everything's good.

It just, there was swelling.

It really hurt.

But so yeah, wasp stung me and I thought flew out of the car.

About two hours later, on the highway, in the middle of the highway, no rest stops in sight.

The fucker starts buzzing around in the car.

The wasp did not leave the car.

So, Nate, risky business question, risk calculus.

What do you do?

You are on a highway driving like 75, 80 miles an hour, and there's a wasp flying around.

Like, you can't turn off because you're on the highway.

What are you supposed to do?

Because that is, you know, it can't just go on.

Okay, first of all, Maria, it's Vermont, right?

You're not like, it's not like, I mean, there's got to be like a little fucking gas station with Maple Springs.

No, this is now.

No, no, this is now two hours later.

This is now on the highway in either Connecticut.

I think it's in Connecticut.

Let's call it Connecticut.

Yeah, pull over to the nearest gas station.

There was none.

Yeah, the nearest gas station was in like 20 miles.

Connecticut?

It's the most.

densely populated state pretty much, right?

There's a part where it says like this is the last rest stop for the next whatever many miles.

That's we had past that point.

No, pull over to the median of the road, put your hazards on and wait for the, right?

Yeah, is that more risky than a wasp sting?

I think it's probably a close call.

I think it's a close call.

I was trying to do the risk calculus.

I was like, this thing is terrifying.

Like if it flies at you, the risk of swerving and getting into an accident.

Anyway,

ended up being able to pull over and get the wasp out of the car.

Superhero moment, Nate.

Superhero moment.

But that was actually, you know, it's one of those things you don't really think about in your risk calculus when you're talking about driving and all of these things.

But that was my, I don't know why.

Maybe Vermont got mad that I didn't love its leaves this year, but it was kind of a final fucking for Vermont on my way out of the state.

Rank the New England states from one to six.

In terms of what?

Goodness.

Oh, man.

Well, I don't know.

I'm from Massachusetts.

You know, I was, I grew up there.

So I'm going to put Massachusetts first because all my family is there.

I went to school there.

You know,

there are lots of things about Massachusetts I don't like.

I think that the term mass hole is very apt.

There are lots of things about Boston I don't like.

And yet Boston's a beautiful, you know, it's a city still.

I think I'm going to put, let me see.

Maine, I think maybe number two.

Although mosquitoes might put Maine at number three.

I don't know.

Maine is such a fucking clear number one.

Like, what are you even talking about?

Maine is gorgeous, but the mosquitoes kill me.

So I'm going to put it number two with an asterisk.

Fuck the mosquitoes.

Let's see.

I would put Rhode Island probably number three.

It's small but mighty.

Weird state.

Yes.

It's a small state.

It is a weird state, but it has a lot of really beautiful stuff.

Lots of interesting things in Providence and Newport.

You know,

I'm a fan.

Let's see.

So you have Connecticut, New Hampshire, Vermont.

So Vermont, maybe.

Vermont's number four, I guess.

No, no, I love Vermont.

I think it's beautiful.

I think the people there can be, like, it's a really weird state as well.

Obviously, I have a personal family connection to Vermont.

And like, for that reason, I do love it.

So, maybe we put, maybe I actually put Vermont before Rhode Island.

New Hampshire is going to be dead last.

I hate New Hampshire.

And I hate Connecticut.

Connecticut and New Hampshire are kind of tied for last.

What about you, Dave?

Yeah, look, Maine, Maine is number one.

Then it gets more difficult.

I mean, I look, I agree that the bottom tier

has to be Connecticut.

And I think it has to be Connecticut.

I like, I don't dislike Connecticut.

In fact, my fucking family, my dad's like from Connecticut.

So maybe I'm going to put, yeah, I just don't want to be insulting.

I mean, maybe put that in the city.

I mean, I have family in Connecticut too.

My sister, whom I love dearly, we're very close.

You know, she teaches and her lab's at Yale.

So her family lives in Connecticut.

So, you know, I

obviously am not going to be anti-Connecticut.

I'm not anti-any state.

We're all inclusive here on the risky of the podcast.

There's a criteria where if you had to live in a state let's say you have to live in that state for 11 months out of 12 per year you're permitted 30 travel days or whatever right and you had to pick a new england state okay by that criteria massachusetts would be i'm going with massachusetts first or second for me right but just overall sentiment though i mean i don't really you know boston is like a

charming European city without the charm.

You know what I mean?

I like the layout of Boston.

Hey, I told you,

I'm not a Boston apologist.

I like the sports.

I don't like the sports teams, but like, you know, I would just go and be a fucking, I would just watch so much fucking sports if I lived in Massachusetts and go to the encore and play poker.

Yeah, absolutely.

I think that Boston would actually be a good place for you for, like, if you were forced to live somewhere for a little while.

I think you'd, you know, because of the sports and it has good sushi in it, you know,

I would

be okay living there.

Maria, Maria.

The food in New England is a problem.

Literally, fucking, who is it?

Graham, you know, the guy who invented the Graham Cracker?

He was like, we don't want to have food with fucking flavor in it, right?

That'll look in our bowels.

The food in New England is, yes, an absolute problem everywhere.

But at least, you know, at least we can get decent sushi in Boston.

Like in Vermont, I really wanted sushi.

Like you do not get sushi anywhere near where I was in Vermont.

You wanted sushi?

I never want to die.

I just, I was in a sushi mood.

I didn't want sushi in Vermont.

I wanted sushi in the abstract, and that's not possible.

Anyway, my wasp sting is getting better.

Fuck wasps.

I hate them.

I hope I never see one again, although obviously I will.

Let's move on to politics.

So we had some news over the weekend.

And again, we're recording this on Monday.

You're going to hear it on Wednesday.

So if there are any developments in the meantime, we will not have caught them.

But Eric Adams announced that he was dropping out of the race for mayor of New York City.

And he did this just a few days before, you know, the race already passed the deadline for his name to be removed.

So he already passed like a while ago.

A while ago.

Okay.

So Mayor Adams announced that he was dropping out long after the deadline to take his name.

off of the ballot.

And it's a pretty historic moment because he is going to be then just the second mayor to not win re-election.

Is that true?

Because you think of New York mayors as having had problematic careers, but

I guess they tend to get the re-election thing right.

Yeah, David Dinkins, who was the city's first black mayor, lost his re-election bid.

And that was the only other mayor who did not serve a second term.

Bloomberg changed the rules to run a third time

and won, actually closer than you might have expected.

But yeah, I guess.

I mean, de Blasio, Bloomberg, Rudy, Dinkins won term.

Ed Koch,

who is Abraham Beam?

I was not aware.

I did not know.

New York had a man named Abraham Beam.

Wait, okay, Nate.

So if I'm understanding you correctly, Bean also didn't win re-election.

Yeah, he left office in 1977.

There's no Bean street, I guess, anywhere, not well remembered.

And there are a couple of others in the past.

Okay, so Adams is the third in modern New York City history who has not won re-election.

Very small group.

That, you know, seems like it's an accomplishment of a sort, negative accomplishment in its own right.

Modern or contemporary?

Sorry, it's a contemporary, contemporary New York City history.

But yeah, it is very notable that he dropped out.

And the timing, Nate, I think, is quite notable as well

because

Well, what happens now with the votes, right?

We talked in the primaries that the primaries were were ranked choice voting.

That is not the case, right, with the general mayoral election.

So it's not the case that, you know, oh, you know, if you don't get 50%, now we're going to, you know, your votes are going to go down to the next candidate, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

And Adams, when he was stepping down, announcing that he was going to be withdrawing from the race, also did something.

notable, I think, when he did not endorse any other candidate, right?

Normally when people drop out of a race close to the election, when it's, you know, an election that has so many political spirits inflamed, you want your votes to go to someone, right?

You want to actually make a statement and you say, you know, I'm dropping out, but I think, you know, Nate Silver is your best choice for mayor.

And instead, he's like, fuck Nate Silver, fuck all these guys.

You know, this guy's a snake.

This Maria person can't be trusted.

She changes her mind.

You know, everyone sucks.

That was kind of his speech.

Not literally, but figuratively speaking.

And that was another interesting choice.

So if we're talking about kind of the game theory of his decision, what it means, other than just like, I'm out,

this is the timing, and a big fuck you.

It is a very, I think he's made some interesting choices.

Yeah, look, I've actually tried to model in the context of presidential primaries when candidates drop out.

And it's fairly predictive.

They basically drop out when they have no shot, right?

And they're more likely to drop out if they were once perceived to have a shot, meaning that they have some type of future.

But then they fall far behind enough in the polls, the fundraising dries up.

But yeah,

he had opportunities, allegedly, to take various lucrative jobs associated with the Trump administration.

Maybe he'll take one of those eventually.

But like, he was going to lose, probably finish in fourth place, right?

And that would have been embarrassing.

So that's, that's, you know, he's trying to preserve credibility for whatever future endeavors that he has.

I mean, with most candidates, it's the main incentive.

With Eric Adams, I'd say, who knows what's happening in terms of, you know, look, you know, it's New York City.

You know, maybe you turn a blind eye to stuff.

But that would be the logical reason.

He wasn't going to win, right?

He wasn't going to win.

He was at 0% in Polymarket.

He was at 8% in the polls.

And so, yeah, the game theory is just that like.

There's a non-zero cost to embarrassment.

So, Nate,

Polymarket, how long has he been close to zero on Polymarket?

So according to Polymarket, we're full disclosure.

I'm an advisor.

It looks like they maybe disabled.

It's actually hard to find the Eric Adams graph, right?

It's just like now at zero, but let me take a look here.

Yeah, so it became clear that the next most viable alternative was Andrew Cuomo fairly early, right?

I mean, Adams is, yeah, I mean, if you're looking back here.

Yeah, it's hard to even find.

The reason I asked that question.

You you got little Brad Lander back in the day you know you got a little lander but the reason I asked the question right is that it was very clear I think to everyone

as you say that's why I asked how long has Polymarket had him at close to zero that he wasn't going to win for a long time and he he made a decision to wait until now to drop out and not earlier.

Now, we could say that, oh, he's just a hubristic, you know, person with head in the clouds and just assumes that he can make changes and that eventually he can.

Eric

I know, I know, I know, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.

And that he just thought that he could somehow pull a win out of his ass.

But that, that is what it seems like.

Or, or he decided, you know what, I want to screw over.

Like, I don't like Cuomo enough that like, I don't want him to have time to consolidate support.

Right.

And so I'm going to spite wait until much longer so that he doesn't have time to do the fundraising and kind of, no, I'm serious.

Like, what are the calculations going through your mind?

Because it's clear.

And yes, we know that allegedly he had been in talks to become the ambassador to Saudi Arabia and that that had fallen through Saudi Arabia.

And

so, you know, he's been mulling an exit strategy for a while.

And the announcement only comes now when there's not much time to do any, to do much of anything.

And I mean, obviously the other part of it is he doesn't have that many votes.

I think he's consistently pulled in the single digits.

He's not like eight or nine percent on so even if all of his votes go to one single candidate, which again, he didn't endorse anyone, so that is probably not happening.

But if that were to happen, that still wouldn't be enough to change the outcome of the election.

So maybe he did that calculus and was like, you know what, I'm going to do this in the most fucky way possible.

Like I said, or maybe he was just hubristic and up until the very end, up until this past weekend, thought, hey, maybe I can actually have a chance.

Yeah.

Look,

in multi-way races you can have

interesting dynamics right where

you basically have casading effects where like if one candidate is rising in the polls and a voter is indifferent between them then that voter might gravitate toward whichever candidate seems to have the most chance right like there is some evidence that like

zoran has his voters and then cuomo curtis liwa who's a Republican, and Eric Adams are kind of competing for the rest of the electorate.

And whether that's 50% or not

can be debated potentially, right?

So like, it's not crazy for somebody to think that, like, by the way, it happened in the Democratic primary where like, you know,

Zoran

was polling

in a, you know, respectable second place in most of the polls.

And originally he was polling at 1%, right?

And I think Eric Adams even like cited Polymarket at one point to say, hey, people discounted Zoran before.

I mean, it's a little flipped around because they underestimated Zoran.

Maybe they will again and he'll win by an even bigger margin than Poll's show.

I don't know.

But like, it's not,

it wouldn't be crazy for Eric Adams to think this race could, you know, have some unexpected turns if he didn't have so many hard negatives, right?

His approval ratings in New York are quite low.

The fact that he's buddy-buddy with Trump, there are some Trump voters in New York, more than there used to be, but does not help him on balance with what's going to be probably a fairly young liberal electorate, right?

So those hard negatives, really, because, you know, he's had opportunities, you know, and also he wasn't,

he's the incumbent.

He was not intimidating enough to deter Cuomo from running, even when Cuomo was, frankly, embarrassed already in the primary, is a glutton for more punishment, apparently.

Clearly.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And it's interesting because, you know, Cuomo has, you know,

I think all of the other candidates except for Silwa have considered potential deals, right?

And Curtis Silwa says, you know, I'm not

sure Sliwa, sorry.

I, yes, Liwa, this is, this is one of those that I,

my dyslexia definitely kicks in.

So Curtis Sliwa has said repeatedly that, you know, I'm not dropping out and I'm not giving my votes to anyone else.

And he's been pretty, I think, consistent about that.

And

that is the one candidate who could have probably moved the needle, right, if he dropped out.

And we'll be right back after this break.

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Tell your doctor if you have new or worsening cough, chest pain, or dizziness.

Before taking Kaskali, tell your doctor all your medical conditions, medicines you take, and if you're breastfeeding, pregnant, or planning to be, as it can harm an unborn baby.

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One of the things you mentioned, Innate, earlier in the episode was kind of this democratic power vacuum and this lack of kind of focus, direction, consensus on the future of the party.

Now, you and I talked about this briefly back in the primary, right, right after Zoran had won.

And I think that that's even more true now.

It's interesting when the Democratic Party is trying to reach the Republicans to try to take votes away from a Democrat, right?

Like that doesn't happen that often.

when they say, okay, this Democrat is a little too Democratic for us.

And so maybe we want to reach out to our republican counterparts to prevent him from becoming mayor um that's an interesting playbook page

yeah look i don't think it's helped uh

i don't think it's hurt zoran much that like there's such explicit attempts at coordination where like every week a new hedge fan billionaire would be like we can't let this socialist win let's let's get all the conservatives together right and it's like you kind of are making the point for zoran that like it's a bunch of billionaires trying to crowd him out of the mayorship, right?

And like, it's, you know,

look, I think a non-scandal-plagued

and

actually interested in being mayor of New York, Andrew Cuomo might have been a better candidate.

I don't know, right?

Um,

but yeah, you got locked into some very flawed alternatives early.

And New York, it does have fairly strict ballot laws.

It was not possible to get like a, a, a new name on the ballot without signatures because the primary was back in june and so i don't know i i have a lot of respect for zoran's political talent um

but yeah and i don't know what do you think about what do you think about cuomo

um i i am not i am not a huge fan did you watch the pandemic briefings

um i I tried.

I started out watching the pandemic briefings.

There wasn't much else to do.

This is true.

This is true.

We were all stuck.

I was stuck in my 800 square foot apartment in Brooklyn at the time.

No, I remember like going to like a,

was it New Year's 2020?

And I guess 2020 is a COVID year.

It's all, it seems like happily so long ago now, Maria, right?

And like we were in some fucking restaurant in Brooklyn outdoors and like it closed like the minute at midnight.

Anyway, all these fucking rules about outdoor dining.

It just kind of brings back those people who have like, oh, I have, I kind of have nostalgia for COVID.

Fuck you.

You know, I

was, you know, maybe you were in a warm state, right?

But not that winter in New York.

But yeah, look, you know, I think Zorgon also benefits from the fact that like

the establishment and the Democratic Party has been kind of discredited, right?

People for better or worse don't really believe that it's going to win elections.

And also you have all these leaders who are either, you know, Nepo babies.

Is it Nepo or Nepo?

I guess Nepotism.

Nepo.

Because nepotism.

Either Nepo babies or

really fucking old.

You know what I mean?

Nepo babies.

Nepo babies.

Thank you.

Yeah.

And like, and like people are tired of that.

And like

the left has

the kind of, you know, I mean, I guess the left gained a lot of cultural power in some ways, like a certain kind of maybe more cultural woke.

left, which I don't consider really the true left.

I think they're just kind of this other thing that's kind of correlated with the left.

But, you know, why not?

Why not give why not give socialism a try, Maria?

We've tried everything else and we're out of ideas.

No, I mean, I think that it's a,

you know, it's a really interesting and pivotal moment in the Democratic Party because

I mean, we've talked about this to death, but there is this major power vacuum and lack of direction and lack of

understanding of how to win votes.

You know, it's mind-boggling to me that a party that used to be able to organize so effectively.

I mean, New York was the center of democratic political organization for so long with, you know, Tammany Hall.

Was that a drag queen?

No, yes.

I mean, actually, Nate, I'm pretty sure there's there must be a drag queen out there whose name is Tammany Hall.

And if there's not drag queens, if you're listening to this, please, can we have a Tammany Hall drag queen?

But the particular one I am referring to, that would be such a great name, was a New York political machine which had influence on a national scale.

It started in

the late 1700s, had a ton of influence in the 1800s,

basically engineered, manipulated,

did a lot of stuff,

some good old-fashioned politics, some more mobby and

strong-handed to basically control New York for a very long period of time.

I'm not nostalgic for Tammany Hall.

That was, you know, we're talking, that was corrupt party politic bosses, et cetera, et cetera.

But they knew how to mobilize votes.

They knew how to get to people, not in the mob way,

but in the actual, you know, mobilizing support way.

And,

you know,

I think that we are now in this moment where

there seems to be just a lack of clear direction of how to get that popular appeal and what direction to take to actually

be able to attain the levels of popularity that are needed to win elections, to get candidates who are then viable, not just on a state, but on a national level, right?

To actually kind of create the next generation of party leaders and figure out, you know, what does the future of the party actually look like?

And, you know, we've talked a lot about how the Kamala Harris campaign just completely failed to do this.

And Yune actually just had a newsletter out last week, I believe, about Mayor Pete and his appeal or lack thereof among different demographics.

It seems like there is a vacuum there.

And if you remember, you know, when we talk about the future of the Democratic Party, the person who we're talking about today, well, partially Eric Adams, he was once that face, right?

People thought that someone like Adams could be the future of the Democratic Party.

People were so excited when he was elected and and like that, that didn't go over so well.

How long did it take for him to appoint his brother to the police?

Like less than 24 hours, not literally, but it was just like a few days after he'd gotten elected.

I mean, the corruption stuff started happening just immediately, immediately upon

election.

And that did not go the way that the Democratic Party thought that it would.

But, you know, if people don't remember, like, Eric Adams was not always a disgraced politician.

There was like a history of a lot of support and enthusiasm and excitement about him as a candidate.

Yeah, I wrote a tweet that people like to resurface in times about like, oh, I think Eric Adams is one of the

one of the five or ten people most likely to have a bright future in the presidential in the Democratic Party, right?

And then the next tweet was like, by the way, it's because he's Hiberian.

It's it might not work out, but it might work out.

People love throwing that back, right?

And it's like, they didn't actually, they don't actually quote the second tweet.

It's all out of context, but you know, whatever.

It's the fucking internet.

So who cares?

But yeah, I was one of those people who thought that like, okay,

this is interesting because you have a

black candidate

who was pretty moderate, especially on issues like policing, where Democrats had moved too far to the left and New York has never been quite as woke about police stuff as some other cities.

Right.

So I thought this template was interesting, right?

That like, you know, given that kind of like the two major constituencies in the Democratic Party were

voters of color.

I don't know how I feel about that term, but black voters, especially Hispanic, Asian American, right?

And then progressive

liberals within this House, we believe Yard Signs is the other major coalition partner.

Like, I thought maybe like a minority candidate who's more moderate could interestingly kind of like appeal to both and might also,

you know, one thing that I think is borne out by the literature, but by anecdotal experience too, is that like

a woman or a minority candidate tends to read as being more liberal than they are, right?

People are applying priors and Adams kind of overcame that with the ex-cop thing and just like, like, no one would mistake him for, although he had pronouns in his bio on Twitter,

but no one would mistake him for like a far left

candidate, right?

And I thought that was an interesting combination for a party looking for

moderates that aren't this kind of cookie cutter white person type of thing

oh absolutely and then he had you know he also always stressed that he had working class roots right which he did um so that was kind of another uh appealing thing where it's like you know ex-cop more more towards the conservative side but man you know man of the people kind of more populist can some of the appeals that we see working from you know Donald Trump, right?

And

the kind of the MAGA-like appeals, he had that.

He had the police.

He had the minority.

And yes, Nate, there actually are some good data points.

There's good literature on this that people do make certain assumptions about how liberal or conservative you are based on how you look.

So if people looked at the two of us and just saw photographs of us and didn't know anything about us, they would assume that you were much more conservative than I am.

That's not right.

Like it's, it doesn't actually, these are not things that are borne out in reality, but people use incorrect data assumptions all the time right snap judgments when you see someone and so yes your your your point about the fact that that made him seem like he'd be more liberal more attractive to liberals is correct you know who was I who was I don't know that he would have a weak spot for Turkish Airlines Airmile I mean like I

Look, I would hold out for, I've never flown Turkish Airlines.

I'm sure it's nice, right?

I would hold out for fucking Emirates or Qatar or something, right?

I mean, you're selling a little cheap there.

I mean, I've never, I've never flown Emirates, but I have heard that it's really, really nice.

And I almost flew an Emirates once to a speaking engagement.

And I was, I didn't really want to do the speaking engagement and it was going to be really disruptive, but I was really excited about flying Emirates first class.

I got upgraded one time on Emirates.

They upgraded, they were like, here's a, I don't know, maybe they're trying to improve relations with the Jews or something like that.

CNAT, maybe you and I would be, maybe you and I would make corrupt politicians.

Maybe all I would take would be a few upgrades.

And all of a sudden, we'd have corruption scandals of our own

as we took the mayoral office.

But yeah, what do we, you know, I think that if we're, if we're talking about, you know, back to kind of the decision to drop out now, I, you know, my gut feeling is that this really isn't going to change the race much, right?

That it was the timing of the exit and the tenor of the exit

makes it seem that it is basically not consequential in terms of the eventual results of the election.

Do you agree with that, or do you think that I'm underselling it a little bit?

That's just my gut reaction based on everything we've talked about.

I don't think you're underselling.

I mean, look, the math, Zoram was ahead about 20 points with everybody running, right?

Adams had about 9%,

right?

So if if you take the whole 9 and give it to Cuomo, then that closes the deficit to 11, which would start to be a more manageable gap, right?

However, he'll probably get two-thirds of it.

So it winds up like reducing Zoran's lead to 15 points.

And like

15 points is a sizable edge.

We still have,

as of the time we're speaking, Maria, we still have

five and a half weeks to go.

The whole World Series of poker is almost this long, right?

There's still a while.

Yes.

But yeah.

there's a time for a one-out or night.

I think he's drawing to an inside straight.

I think we're using that fucking correctly, that analogy.

I mean, his odds at Polymer are 14%.

In my newsletter today, I said I'd probably tweak those down to 10%.

They're, I think, pretty dependent on Sleevo dropping out or something.

We're at the zone where, like, this is not in the statistical or practical margin of error, right?

If Sleevo drops out, then it becomes actually close.

Okay.

But you need like a change in the narrative or something that like, you know, if there were,

you know, I don't know.

I mean, the problem is like a lot of things that would be like October surprises would be like, like, what if Trump sends the National Guard to New York?

I'm not sure that would help Cuomo, right?

I think that Zoro, you're like, this is bad, blah, blah, blah.

Resistance hashtag, help him potentially.

You know what I mean?

Yeah, I was actually going to ask, like, you know, do we, do we think, like, can there be an X-Fact or October surprise type of thing that changes the odds?

Obviously, this is speculative, but what are Polymarket's odds of Sliwa dropping out?

About 16%.

I mean, there's no real reason to drop out.

He won the, it was uncontested nomination.

He won the Republican nomination fair and square.

Yeah, he won.

And he said that he's not, like, he has said multiple times that he has not dropped.

He is not going to drop out.

I mean, that said, so did Adams up until the point where he dropped out.

But his sons are different.

He gets to be on TV a whole bunch, and he's run for many things many times.

He's a founder of the Guardian Angels.

I guess he's trying to build support for his cause.

Actually, kind of an interesting guy,

not as conservative as you might expect.

I mean, he's kind of a typical New Yorker and like on some of the LGBTQ rights, you know, kind of slightly woke, combined with being quite conservative on crime and other subjects, right?

He's a certain type of New Yorker.

And he, I don't think he beat Zoran, but like he's been overshadowed by the Cuomo Adams drama.

Yeah, and And it seems to me that his calculus is very, very different from Adams's in the sense that, as you pointed out, Nate, you know, for Adams, being defeated can cause embarrassment and can potentially, you know, hamper his future political prospects.

Not the corruption or bribery or those charges, but the fact that he, you know.

lost the election is what's going to do him in politically.

So for him, you know, it's that kind of calculus.

But for Sliwa, Sliwa, the calculus is actually mostly upside, right?

Right now, he's getting media exposure.

It's not negative media exposure.

He's getting to speak.

He's getting to voice opinions.

Like, it's actually completely different.

Up until, you know, he probably knows he's not going to win and it doesn't matter, right?

Because he is setting up for a better political future for himself by staying in the race.

And so, the game theory, I think, just is not there for him.

Why in the world would he drop out and give his votes to Cuomo or to anyone else?

That being said, if he doesn't drop out, then Adams' decision to drop out basically changes nothing in terms of, you know, in terms of our calculus of who is going to win the race.

Again, we don't know if there's going to be an X factor.

Maybe someone is busy out there, you know,

preparing to drop a bomb,

bombshell news item.

You already would have dropped, you already would have dropped it, though, right?

In a two-candidate race, it's a little different, right?

But you would have dropped the bomb show.

And also you had the primary.

And like right in the primary,

Zoran

kind of came not quite out of nowhere, right?

But it was a relatively quick rise.

But like, it's been a fucking slow, like, why we have this fucking primary in June for a general election in November.

I'm not sure I understand that you need that much time to campaign anyway.

It is crazy.

You know, the June timing is supposed to help incumbents because all the rich people are out in the Hamptons or Vermont, Maria, for example.

Wait, is that true?

Is that the reason for the June 2012?

I believe that's

something that people who

have knowledge about city politics tend to believe, is my understanding.

Oh, fascinating.

I phrase that oddly.

Yeah, no, no,

I get what you were trying to say.

I did not know that.

I was always curious about why the timing was what it was, but I guess that makes sense.

And we'll be back right after this.

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By the way, yeah, you alluded to before, like, Cuomo, Adams, we're kind of counting on the machine-type turnout where you're good at getting your voters out.

The problem, actually, for Cuomo in the primary, was that, like, turnout was quite high relative to mayoral primaries, right?

So he probably got the voters he expected to get, but like, but Zoran brought up people that had not voted in these primaries before.

Yeah, so Zaran, in a way, was able to activate that machine better than the old Democratic establishment could.

Well, but like the machine is, the machine is kind of fucking, kind of fucking broken.

Exactly.

Nobody likes it.

Exactly.

Nobody likes the machine.

So that's the point.

So, you know, Zoran as the individual he.

Except for those McDonald's ice cream makers, it's like always

broken, except there's no scam to get the repair guy in, apparently.

There's a website that actually tracks those McDonald's McDonald's machines and you can see where the ones, you know, it's basically all broken, but where the functioning ones are.

I found that quite amusing.

I've never tried the ice cream at McDonald's, but I...

for some reason know this little bit of information and find it very funny.

But yes, that's a good analogy.

I think that the, you know, the ice cream machine is definitely broken in most locations in New York.

And Zoron was able to come out with his, you know, Mr.

Softy

little cart

blare his song if we're gonna if we're going to continue this analogy do you ever eat chain fast food no i don't oh i do what not often um the only so i've never i've had mcdonald's fries that's the only thing i've ever eaten at mcdonald's oh you've never had a big mac no i've never had a big mac and i've never are you american i am i am what i've never you've never had a big mac i've never had a big mac night

would you have one can Can we still be friends?

Would you have one?

I mean, if forced to, I might try a bite just to say I've tried it, but no, I don't know.

It's kind of a good sandwich.

I don't really want one.

I like it.

It's pretty good.

I like burgers, but I'm more of like a Moneta Tavern black maple burger type of person.

So you've never been to like an airport where like, because they always have the fucking, like, they have the local fucking concession that's some terrible fucking airport specific version, right?

I'm a big fan.

You got the McDonald's.

You got the Wendy's at the airport.

i've never been to wendy's i've never been inside a wendy's i've never been to burger king have you never been inside a wendy's no i've never been inside a burger king i've never eaten anything from either one of those establishments never been to arby's um

i i have been to in-n-out i've eaten an in-n-out burger

And I've eaten Shake Shack.

But I went to Shake Shack back when Shake Shack was in the park, you know, when the line was like all the way around.

I, you know, I still did.

That was before I lived in New York.

You know, I was, I, I was a teenager when it opened and I remember being so excited.

I came to New York and I stood in that line for I don't know how long to get a Shake Shack burger and concrete.

And that was, I think, yeah, that and In N Out is, and In N Out is, I think, more, more fast foodie.

That is the closest that I have come to trying fast food burgers, Nate.

Five guys, I tried five guys when five guys first came to New York.

Does that count?

It's the higher end.

You got to get into like the, like anything beyond like Wendy's is too high-end, right?

By the way, I own stock in Shake Shock because I'm like, they get people, they get people like you, Maria, to eat fast food.

And that seems like a good business model.

Yeah, absolutely.

You know what I mean?

People would never be caught dead setting foot in a McDonald's, right?

They're like, oh, Shake Shock, this is...

This is premium.

This is premium.

Have you had Chipotle?

Yes, I have had Chipotle.

Okay.

Okay.

I mean, that's, that's in the premium zone still, I think, but like, yes.

Anyway, I have had Chipotle.

And it was actually, I think Chipotle would be my go-to if I had to go to like, if I had to pick a fast food place.

I think Chipotle has the

highest quality, freshest ingredients out of, out of the things that.

Chipotle is the restaurant I've probably eaten at the most times

in my life, right?

Yeah, because like I used to like fucking play,

you know, when I left my consulting job, I played poker online for a few years, right?

And I'd always, I don't know, I'd stay up all night and then be like fucking famished in the afternoon.

And I live like equidistant in Chicago between like three Chipotles.

And so I would like diversify which of the three Chipotles I went to.

So it's like going there so often that it felt like a little bit, a little bit embarrassing.

All right.

So we went from Adams to our fast food ratings.

From our New England ratings to our fast food ratings.

So let's give Eric Adams a rating.

If you were a fast food chain, what would be

to wrap this up?

Like, what's, I mean, it'd be like a little, so here's the irony.

I don't think that New York City is doing so badly at all, really, right?

Our crime is lower than in comparable cities.

People have left.

That part's not great, but they've kind of left most of these cities.

We have

a couple of new airports that have come online.

We got our congestion pricing.

And a lot of this is not Adams' doing, right?

But, you know, property values are doing more than fine, right?

There are still housing shortages, but like,

yeah, if you ask people kind of how is New York doing, I mean, people are inherently grumpy in the United States, right?

But like, so if people are punishing him for the, for the corruption, yeah, as a mayor,

I don't know, seems okay,

right?

If people, people have trouble decoupling the personal stuff from like the legislation governance stuff.

Understandably.

All right, so in total then, what would he be?

Is he a McDonald's?

Is he a Wendy's?

Is he a Chipotle?

No, he's like a little

mom-and-pop Italian-American place where they're still, you know, they're not going to take credit cards still, Maria.

Why not?

Well, you know, maybe they're not paying their full allotment of taxes.

Yeah, they have loyal customers.

There's some special rooms in the back.

We're not quite sure what's going on there, right?

The food's pretty good.

You got to stick to the basics.

You got to stick to the chicken parm.

You got to get the fried meatballs and things like that, right?

You don't want to venture too far afield, but it's pretty good.

So if we were going chained, then he would be closest to like a Zabarro.

Oh my God.

I've never eaten a fucking Sabarro.

Well, but it's Italian.

Maria, I am a respecter of Italian-American.

cuisine.

Sabaro is not meaningfully Italian.

Okay, okay, fair enough.

All right.

Well, you heard it here first, guys.

Eric Adams, small mob and pop, Italian, definitely not Sabaro.

Sabaro?

Let us know what you think of the show.

Reach out to us at riskybusiness at pushkin.fm.

Risky Business is hosted by me, Maria Kanakova.

And by me, Nate Silver.

The show is a co-production of Pushkin Industries and iHeartMedia.

This episode was produced by Isaac Carter.

Our associate producer is Sonia Gerwit.

Lydia Jean Cott and Daphne Chen are our editors.

And our executive producer is Jacob Goldstein.

Mixing by Sarah Bruguer.

If you like the show, please rate and review us so other people can find us too.

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