What can our mayoral hopefuls learn from the club-hopping, crystal-hugging mayor of NYC?
Comparing Mayors with Anne Kadet of CAFÉ ANNE
On 2 May next year, over a million of us will go to the polls to elect a London mayor for just the seventh time.
Only three people (all men) have been mayor of London since Tony Blair created the post at the turn of the millennium. Ken Livingstone held the position for two terms, then Boris Johnson came along on his way to No. 10, to be followed of course, by Sadiq Khan, who will be aiming for a record third term next year.
As the Tories have been deciding who to put up against Khan, there have been a lot of column inches dedicated to what makes a good mayoral candidate. Should it be a celebrity? A loyal, experienced MP? A criminal barrister? Or just someone called Susan?
And even more ink has been spilled discussing the perceived frailties of Sadiq Khan, particularly the potential for the ULEZ to ‘take him down’.
But the truth is, we don’t know what makes a good mayor yet. We’ve only had three of them and the previous two didn’t exactly cover themselves in glory. So, to try and get a bit of perspective on things, we thought it might be useful a speak to someone from a city that has had over 100 mayors and which has just elected a highly charismatic and - we think it’s fair to say - unusual person into the job.
is a journalist based in Brooklyn, NY. She’s a former Wall Street Journal columnist who now writes the brilliant CAFÉ ANNE newsletter, which highlights the more unusual sides of NYC, from examining photos of ‘strange sidewalk trash piles’ sent in by readers, to Q&A-style interviews with the city’s pigeons.
She also has a regular part of her newsletter, dedicated to “the weird doings of the most idiosyncratic mayor in NYC history,” one Eric Adams.
A 62-year-old former police officer, Adams was voted in as the 110th mayor of New York City last year. Since then he’s made a bit of a name for himself for being tough-on-crime, but an even bigger name for himself by being what Politico described as a “time-bending, crime-fighting, club-hopping, veggie-munching” mayor.
We spoke to Anne from her apartment in Brooklyn, to talk about personality politics post-Trump, whether you'd rather get bitten by a rat or a fox, and why being ‘weird’ is a great quality for a New York mayor.
LiB: Hi Anne! You are a self-confessed Eric Adams obsessive, and you regularly use your newsletter to talk about what he’s been up to, whether it’s eating french fries out of baby’s hands or releasing robot police dogs onto the streets. But the big question is: Do you think he’s a good mayor (and what would you say actually constitutes a ‘good’ mayor?).
AK: I didn’t actually vote for Adams, because he struck me as being quite an angry person and I don't like angry politicians. I think they create a lot of division, and tend to blame others for their problems and I don't think that's ever helpful.
But once he got into office, he seemed to be a much happier person. He looked to be having a good time and I think that’s really important, because New York was going through such a difficult time post-Covid, we needed someone who was a bit of a cheerleader. Someone to say ‘It's okay, go enjoy yourself’. It was almost like him having a good time gave other people permission to do the same thing. That was important, because New York City does need to feel good about itself.
LiB: Do you think that’s a big part of the NYC mayor’s job description? To be a personal cheerleader for the city?
AK: Well, one of the reasons people stay in New York City is to prove they can do it! You get to feel a little bit superior because you managed to make it. It’s so hard that, if you don’t get to feel good about living in the city, why else would you stay here? So, I feel like we needed to have some of our pride restored to us recently, and I don't think people give Eric Adams enough credit for actually having done that or how important it is to the city.
LiB: That’s interesting, because our mayor obviously has a part to play in promoting London and making it seem like an attractive place to live, work and do business, but all of that is farmed out to a PR company really. A couple of years ago, as lockdown ended, Sadiq Khan went for brunch with a contestant from Drag Race and people pretty much lost their minds! That’s how rarely stuff like that happens here
AK: It’s not easy. Every time Eric Adams would post a goofy video of himself jet skiing or dancing, there would be 300 comments saying things like ‘Stop wasting our time and showing off. Get back to work!’. As a result he doesn’t create those kinds of posts as much as he used to. I think maybe he’s had to balance things out a bit.
I don’t really follow approval ratings, but I was curious before I spoke to you, so I had a look. In the spring they were around 33% and now they’re up to 50%, which is pretty good for a New York mayor. New Yorkers love to hate their mayor, no matter what he’s doing. So 50% is pretty good.
Part of that comes from Adams making some hard decisions on crime. Post-pandemic there seemed to be a lot of disorder and getting on the subway was a very strange experience. A lot of people just didn't want to take the subway anymore. The city can’t function like that. Transit crime is down now, and I’ve personally seen things get better in my neighbourhood. I think people have noticed that and they appreciate the mayor took a difficult and maybe controversial stance on the police and on crime.
LiB: Do you think maybe a mayor gets more leeway to make those big tough decisions, if he’s also wearing cool outfits and out drinking and partying every night?
AK: Well, I imagine on a very basic level, that if people like you then they’re more likely to go along with what you do. So there might be some method to his madness.
LiB: Or he could just be a very unusual person?
AK: Well, beyond wearing interesting outfits and partying, he’s also said that he believes Gracie Mansion is haunted, that New York City is built atop of a giant crystal, he’s a big meditator and he believes that God told him to be the mayor. These are not normal ways of thinking about things!
Having said that, I’m a Buddhist and don’t even believe in God, so in terms of there being some force out there that thought Eric Adams might be a great mayor for New York City right now… Why not?
Getting back to policies for a second: Can you explain the rat thing for us British people?
AK: Okay, so Eric Adams used to be the Brooklyn Borough President, and he was talking about rats back then. He even tried to introduce this weird rat trap which featured a bucket full of acid. The rat would climb in and drown in the acid bath. He actually had a press conference where he produced one of these buckets that had a dead, acid-corroded rat in it.
It turned out he had bought a property in Brooklyn that was ran infested, and that seems to have scarred him. But he talked about rats so much that it started to become kind of a meme, because New Yorkers have always had a thing about rats. Remember pizza rat?
It’s always been a bit ‘us against the rats’. They’re an enemy we can all unite against, and I think the mayor, by being so over the top about the rats, has made the whole thing funny. He started having these entire press conferences about ‘the war on rats’ and then he hired a ‘rat czar’.
I have not noticed any reduction whatsoever in the number of rats in the city!
LiB: We have rats, but I guess the equivalent for us here in London would be urban foxes…
AK: What? They sound so cute!
LiB: Well, they are quit cute until they come into your house and start biting your children.
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