I thought of Boorstin on a Thursday afternoon early this month, as City Hall reporters trooped into the Blue Room, the traditional site of mayoral press conferences. Half the room’s seats had been cordoned off. A staffer directed members of the press to the right, then clarified—“Stage right,” i.e., the left. At the front of the room, next to the main lectern, stood a second lectern approximately half as high. We waited for an unseen curtain to rise.
The Mayor’s public schedule had promised a “child care announcement” with the New York City Public Schools chancellor, Kamar Samuels. The announcement turned out to be that the city was releasing an R.F.I. “Like so many of you, the first time I saw it, I said, ‘What is an R.F.I.?’ ” Samuels told the assembled press. “Well, it is a request for information.” The city was putting out a call for providers interested in participating in its new 2-K and established 3-K programs, something that, in the case of the latter, had not happened in the past five years. (“Today, we say, ‘No more,’ ” Mamdani said.) This worthy, if dry, news offered a pretext for the afternoon’s real show: watching as the Mayor joshed amiably with his other guests, four pre-K students from District Two.
Julian Shapiro-Barnum, who runs a web series called “Recess Therapy,” on which he interviews small children for his 3.2 million followers on Instagram, was seated in the front row of the press area. Reporters were instructed to confine themselves to on-topic questions, but Shapiro-Barnum was allowed to interpret this expansively. “Do any of you have a favorite farm animal, or aquarium animal?” he asked the intermittently on-message group gathered around the short lectern.
“My favorite one is a gold snake that can move and it has gold eyes and it has a long tail, a super, super-duper tail, and it can snap cars and crash the cars,” a boy with shaggy blond hair said.
“And, Mr. Mamdani—”
“It’s also the golden snake,” the Mayor said. He then delivered a précis on the 3-K and pre-K application process and encouraged parents to submit applications by February 27th.
Shapiro-Barnum posted a video of the exchange two days later, followed by a companion video a few days after that, reminding parents about the deadline. If different in form, these were not far removed in tone from the videos the Mayor’s office itself releases, bouncy and uncowed by any risk of sounding corny. For a spot promoting public bathroom access, Mamdani washed his hands in a Harlem park men’s room; for a video about municipal finance, he explained the rudiments of the city’s “incredibly confusing” budget process. (“What can I say? We’re perfectionists. And bound by the reforms of the nineteen-seventies fiscal crisis.”) His droll explanatory mode calls to mind the “Hamilton” era of educational entertainment for adults—a twenty-tens wave of earnest pop-culture optimism that New York magazine once termed “Obamacore.” But if do-gooder didacticism has worn thin in the context of, say, a streaming series (think of Aziz Ansari diligently explaining why sexism is bad on “Master of None”), it has now found a more appropriate home. If anyone’s entitled to a cheerful, dorky P.S.A., surely it’s the city government.
Mamdani’s approach seems intended to project a new relationship between New Yorkers and City Hall, one that relies on insistently personal terms and emphasizes care and communication. (In the time since the new administration took over the official mayoral social-media channels, Instagram posts regularly inspire engagement orders of magnitude greater than they did under Eric Adams, despite the former mayor’s rivetingly weird presence.) The P.S.A.s, the social-media posts, and the special guest appearances constitute a parasocial civic bond—and, maybe, something more. In a culture even more media-saturated than the one Boorstin described, I have at times wondered whether such pseudo-events might come back around to being real. Creating wide awareness and participation is essential to a universal program like 3-K; if an onslaught of cute videos inspires sufficient public engagement, will it be fair to say that cute videos were instrumental to that program’s success? After all, before “performative” became a buzzword meaning “only doing something for show,” it meant, essentially, the opposite: saying or doing something that actually changes reality.
In August of 2023, Zohran Mamdani launched his reëlection campaign for State Assembly at Sac’s Place, a pizza place in Astoria. Beneath bistro lights strung above the restaurant’s back patio, he gave a speech to a crowd so small that his address almost became a conversation.
“So,” Mamdani began, “I wanted to start us off by asking the question, What does a working person deserve?”
“Everything!” one listener piped up.
“Now you’re gonna ruin the whole speech,” Mamdani replied, genially chagrined. “That’s where I’m headed!” He was rumpled in the summer heat and wearing a collarless white shirt. Watching nearby were a state senator, Jabari Brisport, in a red Democratic Socialists of America T-shirt, and Diana Moreno, the D.S.A. activist whom Mamdani would eventually endorse to succeed him in his Queens Assembly seat. The event was one of the minor but revealing moments that might have been forgotten, if not for the presence, at Mamdani’s shoulder, of Julia Bacha, a documentarian who had just begun following him.
There was no press on hand that day—“not a single other camera,” Bacha recalled recently, while showing me the rough footage in Adobe Premiere. That was often the case, in the two and a half years Bacha spent with Mamdani. She has just begun editing some two hundred hours of material, a process she expects to last for the next four or five months. The result will be her next film: the story of a little-known state assemblyman’s path to becoming New York City’s mayor.
This was not what she had imagined when she first approached Mamdani. Bacha is a New York-based filmmaker whose work, which includes the films “Budrus” and “Naila and the Uprising,” has earned a Peabody and a Guggenheim; she is the creative director of Just Vision, a nonprofit dedicated to storytelling about Israel-Palestine. (“We highlight the efforts of Palestinian and Israeli civilians who are working to end the occupation and secure a free, equal and safe future for all through unarmed means,” the group explains on its website, adding that it does not advocate a specific policy solution to the conflict.) After growing up in Brazil, Bacha went to college at Columbia; she was a student in New York on September 11th, and became interested in Middle Eastern history and politics in its wake. “There was a lot of sympathy for the United States in the immediate aftermath,” she told me. “That was so quickly squandered by the politicians of this country by going into a march of revenge and war.”
Bacha’s last film, “Boycott,” from 2021, tracked three Americans who brought suits to challenge state laws restricting the right to protest Israel. “It was a film about defending the right to speak,” she said—an important subject, but also somewhat abstract. “I wanted the next film to be more of a proactive story.” What did it look like when a person with some power—an elected official, for example—used their right to speak on behalf of Palestinians? What would the public response be? Bacha had seen attitudes shift in the two decades that she’d been making documentaries about the Middle East; in early 2023, for the first time, more Democrats told Gallup that they sympathized with Palestinians than with Israelis. It seemed to her that there was a gap between the way politicians acted and what many constituents wanted. What would happen if someone recognized it?
Zohran Mamdani and Rama Duwaji canvassing for the reëlection of State Assembly member Sarahana Shreshta in the Hudson Valley, June, 2024.
Photograph by Talal Jabari
As Bacha contemplated her next project, she started hearing about a group of New York organizers who wanted to stop charities from using tax-deductible donations to fund Israeli settlements. “I learned that they had found, in Zohran Mamdani, someone who was willing to actually introduce legislation,” she told me. The proposed Not on Our Dime! act was greeted with an immediate letter of condemnation from twenty-five of Mamdani’s fellow Assembly members, who called the bill “a ploy to demonize Jewish charities with connections to Israel.” In her documentary, Bacha wanted to ask whether Mamdani and his co-sponsors could hold on to their seats in the next election. When she approached him that summer, he was “very open and interested,” she recalled, and he seemed to respect the demands of her process, including her need for independence. “He’s the son of a filmmaker,” she said. “He’s also a very disciplined person, so I think he felt pretty confident that he could have a camera around.”
Such visions play a role in any administration, but there’s also the work of actual city governance. When Mamdani and Bloomberg met in September, for a conversation that the longtime Bloomberg aide Howard Wolfson called “definitely cordial,” they reportedly spoke about hiring and retaining talent. Mamdani, like Bloomberg before him, arrives at City Hall relatively unencumbered by the tangle of obligations and relationships that accumulate over a long career in public service. Like Bloomberg, he is poised to hire with commitments beyond political favor-trading. “Mike was talent, talent, talent,” Bradley Tusk, who served in Bloomberg’s administration and managed his 2009 campaign, told me. “The thing he did best by far was convince a lot of talented people to come work in city government.” Mamdani’s appointment to his transition team of the former Federal Trade Commission head Lina Khan, a bugbear of business élites, suggests a flair for attracting eye-catching national figures (even if what role such a figure might play in his actual administration remains undetermined). In late November, Mamdani’s team reported that more than seventy thousand people had submitted online applications for jobs in his administration; his first deputy mayor, Dean Fuleihan, has expressed interest in improving the city’s civil-service hiring process.
Bloomberg had a reputation for endowing appointees with remarkable independence: when Elizabeth Kolbert profiled the then mayor for this magazine, in 2002, one commissioner told her that Bloomberg’s instructions upon giving him the office amounted to “It’s your agency—don’t screw it up.” It isn’t impossible to imagine that Mamdani’s clear need for expertise, and his campaign-trail discipline in discussing only a select handful of policy proposals, might lead him to empower his own administrators with meaningful autonomy. What will it actually take to make those city buses fast and free? And what’s the plan for schools? “Someone described Zohran to me as a socialist technocrat,” Tusk recalled, adding that, when it came to city government, he didn’t see much difference between a capitalist technocrat and a socialist one. “If he’s a technocrat like Mike was, he’ll be a good mayor.” Of course, not all Bloomberg associates agree. “The key to Mike’s success as mayor was world-class management,” Wolfson told me. “He knew how to attract and retain talent and how to meet a bottom line because he had been doing those things for years. I’m not sure what the appropriate comparison would be here.”
The 2025 mayoral race was, among other things, a battle between money and attention. Cuomo received $28.4 million from Super PACs in the general election—“the most money ever spent to support a single candidate in New York City by Super PACs,” as the good-government group Citizens Union wrote in a report last month. “In fact,” they added, “the only comparison we can make is to Michael Bloomberg’s self-financed, dollar-busting mayoral campaigns in the 2000s.” Money has been Bloomberg’s defining feature for as long as he’s been in public life: money made him mayor, money shaped his mayoralty, and money continues to announce his political will. But, if Bloomberg commands capital, Mamdani—with his eleven million Instagram followers and reliable virality—commands attention, a variety of capital whose political potency Donald Trump has proven in the course of the past decade. And, in this mayoral election, attention came out the undisputed winner.
In the wake of Mamdani’s success, it has sometimes seemed as though the only lesson that would be learned is that more candidates should get better at making short-form videos. But this undersells Mamdani’s achievement, and the qualities of his that enabled it—including a capacity for connection that feels far more natural and less sweaty than what often passes for personal appeal among politicians. The Bloomberg model of intimate engagement with the city was counting pieces of trash outside the window of his chauffeured car. So far, Mamdani has cultivated a more hands-on ideal of participation, both for himself and for his supporters. Attention, after all, is not strictly a matter of passive digital consumption; it can also be deployed actively. The experience of volunteering for Mamdani attracted young New Yorkers in search of connection, one of whom told the Times, “The people I go to dinner with, the folks I go to concerts with—my day to day is organized around Mamdani.”
A lot of people, even those who will not vote for Sliwa, do seem to find his campaign charming and disarming. Mamdani supporters have asked him to appoint Sliwa as “cat czar.” He has spent so long wearing a red beret that he has a visible tan line along his forehead. (Sliwa has vowed to keep the beret off, if elected.) While campaigning, Sliwa has spoken positively of the former Black Panther Assata Shakur, and said that a socialist elected official was both nothing new and nothing to fear. Asad Dandia, a local historian who is a friend and early supporter of Mamdani’s, posted on X, “After the election is over, I genuinely want to chop it up with Curtis Sliwa.”
“If everybody that says ‘I love you, Curtis,’ ‘You did something for me, Curtis,’ had voted, he would have got double the amount of votes that Eric Adams got,” Bruno told me. “When you do campaigning, you try to target your base,” he continued. “Try to figure out Curtis’s base.” I was stumped. “It’s called New York City,” he said.
In Bay Ridge, I tagged along with Steve, a volunteer campaigner, to watch the Sliwa ground game in action. Steve, a retired L.A.P.D officer, wore a “SLIWA FOR MAYOR” baseball cap. He was on his way to drop off some yard signs at a neighborhood barbershop and then to talk to voters who were waiting for the bus. A few blocks from the campaign office, he ran into an acquaintance, Patrick Doyle, who was walking his dog, a two-year-old black pitbull called Buddy. They almost immediately started to argue. “My heart’s with Curtis, but it’s not looking good,” Doyle told Steve. “No, no,” Steve said, “it is looking good.”
“Curtis can guarantee Cuomo,” Doyle said. “If Curtis drops out, Cuomo is in.” Steve shook his head, telling Doyle, “You believe in the polls and that’s a mistake.”
“It’s gonna hurt us in the end,” Doyle said, of people who refuse to vote for Cuomo. Buddy strained against his leash and seemed to cough a little.
“I would never vote for Cuomo,” Steve replied. “It’s a matter of conscience and morality.”
A large part of why Sliwa supporters are so stubborn may be that they hate Andrew Cuomo. “I call him Killer Cuomo,” Steve told me, referring to Cuomo’s handling of COVID in nursing homes. Pabon, the federal worker—who’s unvaccinated—told me he didn’t respect Cuomo’s lack of conviction on whether he would rehire anti-vaxxers like him. “He’s dead silent on that for months,” Pabon said. “One thing I’ll give Mamdani, he straight out said, ‘Nope, I will not hire you.’ ” After the second debate, I spoke briefly to Joe Tumsci, a union electrician, who was rallying for Cuomo. “Why are they still campaigning? I have no idea,” Tumsci said, of the Sliwa group. “We should join together and defeat Mamdani. The Mamdani campaign enjoys the division.” I asked if he had ever spoken to any Sliwa supporters to try to persuade them. “I haven’t,” he said, “but the girl in the red jacket over there is really cute.” He pointed to a blond middle-aged woman. “Go tell her I said so.”
Back on the street in Bay Ridge, Steve approached his canvassing point. “We have to surge. This is the time to surge,” he muttered. Steve speaks fluent Mandarin—he previously lived and studied in Beijing and Taiwan—and he had tremendous success at a line for the S79 bus, where he chatted in Mandarin to an older Chinese man and a woman in a pink jacket. (“If you see me start to speak Chinese, I don’t want to surprise you,” he told me earlier.)
But, at a second line, an elderly man with an Eastern European accent, wearing a green corduroy jacket, accosted him. “He’s a nice guy, but everybody has a ceiling, O.K.?” the man said. “If he would not run, Cuomo would win.”
“Don’t believe that,” Steve said. “You’re going by polls.” The man started saying that Sliwa was being egotistical. “I believe I should run, also. I’m an American citizen,” he said. “How can he win from twelve per cent? I also can win—why not? He’s stupid, O.K.?” I asked the man if he thought Mamdani would win as a result of the Sliwa campaign. “Hundred per cent,” he said, and pointed at Steve. “Because of him.” (The man said he was voting for Cuomo. I asked if he liked Cuomo. He said, “No.”)
Andrew Cuomo likes to make a big deal about the age and inexperience of the likely next mayor of New York City, Zohran Mamdani, but the former governor himself got an early start in politics. Cuomo was nineteen when he helped manage his father’s doomed mayoral campaign against Ed Koch, in 1977. He was not yet forty when Bill Clinton named him the Secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, in 1997. When Cuomo was elected governor, in 2010, all of this early experience helped him consolidate his power and rule New York, for eleven years, as one of the most consequential governors in state history. By the time he resigned, in 2021, amid credible and documented accusations of sexual harassment and abuse of power, he had been inflicting his forceful, recalcitrant politicking upon New York for nearly half a century.
In his run for mayor this year, Cuomo’s line has been that Mamdani, a thirty-four-year-old socialist who is running fourteen points ahead of him, “hasn’t accomplished anything.” “He’s never had a real job,” Cuomo shouted repeatedly on Wednesday night, at the final mayoral debate. During his six months of campaigning, Cuomo has tried to hold himself forward as an exemplar of battle-tested leadership. In truth, he has looked fed up and exhausted, the deepening lines on his face tensing with old resentments and bad impulses. He garbles Mamdani’s name in debates and interviews. He is dismissive and evasive when asked about the women who accused him of harassment. He has resorted to increasingly baroque lines of attack against his opponent. “Why won’t you say B.D.S. against Uganda?” Cuomo barked at Mamdani at one particularly incoherent moment on Wednesday.
Despite Cuomo seemingly having every kind of advantage—name recognition, Democratic Party support, the backing of many of the city’s most influential and wealthy residents—Mamdani trounced him in the June primary. That night, Cuomo called Mamdani early to concede, and Mamdani has said that the disgraced and beaten old pol was nothing but courteous. Since then, however, Cuomo has mounted a scorched-earth Independent campaign for the general, which has appeared mostly designed to damage Mamdani’s new public prominence. At one point during the most recent debate, Cuomo said that he believed Mamdani was trying to “stoke the flames of hatred against Jewish people”—a smear that is about as vile as anything that Donald Trump has said about an opponent.
Mamdani believes that Israel is an apartheid state, that the war in Gaza is a genocide, and that the American government has been complicit in the Israeli government’s violations of international laws. These are views that he hasn’t departed from in the course of his campaign, and which Cuomo assumed would tank his standing with Jewish New Yorkers. Yet Cuomo’s overt pandering to the city’s conservative and alarmed Jewish residents hasn’t worked as designed—Mamdani did fine among Jewish voters in the primary, and one poll this summer showed him winning by seventeen points among Jews in the general, with more than sixty-per-cent support among Jews under forty-four years old. His campaign was built, in part, on alliances between Jewish and Muslim progressives. Plus, for a supposed antisemite, his primary campaign was staffed by a nontrivial number of nice Jewish boys.
Despite all the insults, Cuomo’s general-election strategy has been, in some ways, an acknowledgment that Mamdani has figured something out. Since June, Cuomo has retooled his pitch to voters, emphasizing affordability; simulating relatability in short-form social-media videos; and making overtures to the city’s burgeoning Hindu communities—all tactics cribbed from Mamdani’s primary run, during which he courted Muslim and South Asian voters in the city as no mayoral candidate had before. Cuomo has even softened the emphasis on Israel, and acknowledged that there are “two sides” to the issue. “I didn’t see the anti-Israel anger,” he said candidly last week, during an appearance on “Morning Joe.” “I didn’t see how that was going to motivate people in a mayor’s race.” In his attempts to compete with Mamdani, Cuomo has also proposed a series of shoot-from-the-hip policy changes that are as untested and disruptive as anything the socialist has proposed, including an idea to introduce means testing to the city’s rent-stabilized housing units. His candidacy has helped obscure, rather than bring forward, real questions about whether Mamdani can govern the city.
The previous tenant paid nine hundred and three dollars a month. (A steal!) On the free market, the unit could fetch three thousand, easy. (Lee said he had to call it a “de-facto” two-bed, because legally, a living room has to have windows.) But he estimated that it would cost him a hundred and twenty thousand dollars to make the place livable, and, under the current rent-stabilization laws, the most he could charge would be twelve hundred a month—which he said just about covers the operating cost of the apartment but not the renovations.
We continued the tour. “I’ll probably get rid of this,” Lee said, waving at the paint around some windows, “because this is all lead.” Given how much lead he was pointing out, I asked Lee if it was safe for us to even be there. “That’s a good question,” he said. “I think it’s O.K. It’s not really chipped off or anything like that.” He peered at a wall. “I don’t know if you have an actual monitor to see if there’s any dust?” he asked. I told him I didn’t. “This is par for the course for Chinatown tenement buildings,” he said. “There are some buildings that have the toilet in the hallway.” I asked him about the children’s scooter on the ground. “I don’t know how that got there,” he said.
Under current laws, landlords can raise the rent if they make improvements to a vacant apartment, but the amount is capped at fifty thousand dollars, spread out over fifteen years. (Before 2019, a landlord could charge a twenty-per-cent vacancy rise when a tenant moved out, and there was no fifty-thousand-dollar cap.) When I asked Lee why he hadn’t renovated the apartment earlier, he said that it was because of the previous tenant. “You have to put them up—if you take them out to renovate,” he said. But the apartment had now been vacant for three years. Why was it still unrenovated and unrentable? “There’s no incentive economically,” he said. “You lose money.”
Approximately a million apartments in New York are rent-regulated, and living in one is sort of the dream. The rules are often arcane and not necessarily understood by the people who live in these places. (One renter in Harlem recently discovered, after twenty years of paying market rents, that his apartment was rent-stabilized.)
There are two kinds of rent-regulated apartments: rent-controlled and rent-stabilized. The popular conception of a rent-regulated apartment—a walkup in Manhattan, somehow still leasing at decades-old prices—is most likely a rent-controlled one. (On “Sex and the City,” Carrie Bradshaw’s fictional one-bedroom is seven hundred and fifty dollars a month and rent-controlled; in “And Just Like That . . .” the new tenant puts in a dividing wall so she can split it with a roommate.) But rent control was phased out in 1971, and now there are only twenty-four thousand rent-controlled apartments in the city. (These units can be passed down to family members, but generally when a rent-controlled tenant moves out, the apartment becomes rent-stabilized or hits the free market.) Meanwhile, there are 996,600 rent-stabilized apartments, whose rents are dictated by the nine-person Rent Guidelines Board. Under de Blasio, rents were frozen three times, and no single-year increase was above 1.5 per cent; under Adams, they rose 3.25 per cent in 2022, three per cent in 2023, 2.75 per cent in 2024, and will rise three per cent again this year.
Lee’s building has eight apartments that more or less tell the story of rent regulation across the years. One is rent-stabilized but vacant; six are rent-stabilized and occupied; and one, on the second floor, is market rate. That apartment, he told me, used to look like his vacant one—tub in the kitchen, lead in the walls. In 2017, Lee spent more than a hundred thousand dollars to renovate it, which allowed him, under previous laws, to destabilize it. It’s now renting out for thirty-five hundred dollars a month, as a two-bed, to a couple of Wall Street guys who moved from California. (“Very reasonable for Manhattan,” Lee said.) His other rent-stabilized apartments, which are similar in size, go for around a thousand dollars or less. He’s done some minor renovations—“I put the shower, the bathroom, and sink together, nothing dramatic”—but decided to keep them rent-stabilized. Lee opposes Mamdani and the proposed rent freeze, but he said he doesn’t oppose rent-stabilization over all. He was born in New York and grew up in the Two Bridges neighborhood. He told me, “I wanted to keep a lot of the Chinatown tenants, the working families, here.”
“I am the poster child of missteps,” Eric Adams told the Times, reflecting on the trajectory of his life, in 2021, when he was running for New York City mayor. Adams, who grew up in South Jamaica, Queens, in the nineteen-seventies and eighties, has long aspired to be regarded as a role model for working-class kids from the outer boroughs, particularly for Black youth. In time, though, his flaws became what he was known for. “I’m perfectly imperfect,” he has said on many occasions, when caught in the little lies, contradictions, and conflicts of interest that have shaped his political reputation. On Sunday, in a rambling eight-minute-and-forty-six-second video posted on X, Adams announced that he would no longer actively seek reëlection, making official what has been expected for quite a while—that, come January 1st, he will no longer be mayor—and cementing his latest and greatest missteps as his legacy.
The roster of forgettable, failed, crooked, and compromised New York City mayors is a long one, and yet, even in that unproud tradition, Adams will stand out for some time. What began as “swagger”—a mayor out on the town, in ways not seen in decades—advanced to a blatant, unscrupulous disregard for the corruption and inside dealings of his friends, allies, and advisers. Despite overseeing a City Hall that pushed ahead major initiatives in housing and zoning, that provided temporary housing and other services to hundreds of thousands of migrants, and that containerized the city’s trash, among other accomplishments, Adams should perhaps be best remembered for the moment, in fall of 2023, when he surrendered his iPhone to the F.B.I. during a federal investigation into his campaign fund-raising, and the Mayor, ludicrously, claimed to have forgotten the passcode. The feds never did access the contents of that mobile device. Before the criminal-corruption case against Adams could proceed to trial, Donald Trump won the 2024 Presidential election, and Adams ended up cutting a deal with the Trump Administration to escape the charges. The price was coöperation—or at least silence—as the feds embarked on their immigration crackdown in New York. “If he doesn’t come through, I’ll be back in New York City,” Tom Homan, Trump’s border czar, said, during a joint appearance with Adams on Fox News, after the deal was done. “I’ll be in his office, up his butt, saying, ‘Where the hell is the agreement we came to?’ ”
In the video announcing his dropout on Sunday, Adams, in a crisp white shirt, with his sleeves rolled up, descends a carpeted staircase in Gracie Mansion and perches a large photograph of his late mother, Dorothy Mae Adams-Streeter, next to him on the steps. Once again, he refuses to take responsibility for making himself not just a legal and political liability for the city but a laughingstock as well. “I was wrongfully charged because I fought for this city, and, if I had to do it again, I would fight for New York again,” he says to the camera. His deal with Trump may have kept him out of prison, but it was obvious afterward, from the way his poll numbers dropped and his staff and allies fled, that his political career was over. That Adams remained mayor and kept his reëlection bid going, despite being so visibly and deeply compromised, belied his pledges, which he repeated again on Sunday, that “this campaign was never about me.”
As he watched his support and funding dry up, the sixty-five-year-old Adams recently let his younger aides go wild online, posting cracked meme content in the hope of attracting the YOLO vote, but it was futile. Polls showed him consistently trailing not just Zohran Mamdani, the young socialist upstart that shocked the world by winning the Democratic primary in June, and Andrew Cuomo, the disgraced former governor who has mounted a scorched-earth Independent bid after getting rinsed by Mamdani in the primary; he also slipped behind Curtis Sliwa, a red-beret-wearing former street vigilante and political gadfly who will appear on the Republican line. On Sunday, Adams acknowledged reality. “The constant media speculation about my future and the Campaign Finance Board’s decision to withhold millions of dollars have undermined my ability to raise the funds needed for a serious campaign,” he said. Shortly after, a spokesperson sent out a statement indicating that Adams planned to serve out the rest of his term but that “he will not be doing one-on-one interviews and appreciates the understanding of the press and the public,” as if Adams were a celebrity in the midst of a high-profile divorce.
Months ago, it was Adams who predicted that this year’s mayoral campaign would have “so many twists and turns,” and would wind up being “one of the most exciting races we had in the history of this city.” It’s unclear what effect his exit will have, though. The persistent rumor in recent weeks has been that the Trump Administration is sizing him up for a job, perhaps in the Department of Housing and Urban Development, or as the Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, or some other equally absurd position. His withdrawal will please Mamdani’s powerful and deep-pocketed opponents, who have been trying to consolidate the field against the young candidate before November. Mamdani has a healthy lead in every poll, though, and has already beaten Cuomo badly once this year. In his exit video, Adams offered an implicit critique of Mamdani, warning that “our children are being radicalized,” and he has recently called Cuomo a “snake” and a “liar”—it is hard to see him getting behind either candidate in the campaign’s closing weeks, though Adams has been right about the twists and turns. A few days ago, when reports suggested that he was leaving the race, Adams angrily denied it numerous times. Why he decided to bow out now, as opposed to six days ago, or three months ago, or the moment the F.B.I. asked him for his iPhone, may go down as yet another inscrutable mystery in a political career whose passcode was forgotten a long time ago. Another misstep from a master of them. ♦
Back during Michelle Wu’s first run for mayor of Boston, in 2021, I joined a Zoom call to help boost support for her strong climate policies. During the pandemic years, Zoom calls were politics, but I still often find myself on them, in the process meeting candidates for local offices around the country. It’s a good analgesic for the wearying cynicism that is the hallmark of the moment, since these people are often idealistic, enthusiastic, and smart. But, once in a while, you encounter true political talent—something that is as rare but as obvious as, say, great athletic prowess or a deep musical gift. That was Wu. Even with the awkwardness of Zoom—“Unmute!”—she seemed able to project both intelligence and, for lack of a better word, kindness: not an emotional Bill Clinton I-feel-your-pain response, but a sense that she was concerned with the problems presented and had the wherewithal to take them on.
I know people who insist that when they first heard Barack Obama’s keynote speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, in Boston, they knew he would one day be President, and I confess that I had the same feeling when I first heard Wu. Bostonians picked her from a crowded field in that first run, and two weeks ago she essentially won a second term eight weeks before the election, beating the Democrat Josh Kraft, the second-place challenger in the city’s nonpartisan primary, seventy-two per cent to twenty-three. Given Boston’s top-two system, Kraft, who is the son of the billionaire owner of the Patriots, could have stayed in the race until November, but he decided on a graceful exit. If there’s an election at all, Wu will be the only name on the ballot.
Much has been made recently of the plight of the congressional Democratic Party, as it struggles to find a response to President Donald Trump’s unprecedented assault on our system of government—a bumbling that has resulted in record-low approval ratings. And much has been made of Zohran Mamdani’s rapid rise in the world’s media center, as he came out of the general vicinity of nowhere to clobber Andrew Cuomo in New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary. Both are important stories, but I think they may be caught up in a larger one: it’s possible that the Democrats are assembling a new way of governing, not at the federal level but at the municipal one. Three candidates for election in major cities this fall exemplify that possibility: Wu, in Boston; Mamdani, lucky in his choice of opponents and now far ahead in the polls; and Katie Wilson, in Seattle, who came through her primary nearly ten points in front of the incumbent Democrat, Bruce Harrell, whom she will face again in November. (Seattle’s system is similar to Boston’s.) They’re all relatively young and “progressive,” and they all, crucially, seem to be avoiding many of the well-worn grooves of American political fights by figuring out ways to talk about things that actually matter to the diverse pool of voters who will inevitably make up more and more of the electorate. That is, they don’t just make affordability or crime or livability a “theme” in their campaigns and hit up millionaires to make ads about them; they take it for granted that those are the daily struggles of many of their constituents and make those issues their focus, suggesting new ways to take them on. In the process, they each appear to be short-circuiting the cynicism I described before: voters seem won over not because they’re necessarily convinced that these politicians can solve all their city’s troubles but because these candidates seem likely to at least try.
Wilson, for instance, entered politics by founding Seattle’s Transit Riders Union, which won free bus rides for young people across the city. As an activist, she helped write the JumpStart tax bill, which raises taxes not on employees but on the corporations that pay the heftiest salaries. In February, Mayor Harrell, at the behest of local heavies such as Amazon and Microsoft, led the opposition to a referendum on another tax on those companies which would help pay for public, mixed-income housing in a city that desperately needs it. The law passed in a landslide, which seemed to confirm the idea that he was an old-school Dem, opening the door for Wilson’s challenge.
Wu—the first woman of color elected mayor of a city that has held a reputation for racism—has gained national attention this year for standing up to Trump on immigration. (Wearing an Ash Wednesday smudge on her forehead, she faced down with aplomb a congressional panel investigating her “sanctuary city”; it followed a few weeks after the border czar, Tom Homan, said that he would be “bringing hell” to Boston.) But she won all twenty-two of the city’s wards in this month’s primary because she has paved streets, dealt with subway crises, and turned Boston into an almost unbelievably safe city. Last year, the city saw just twenty-four homicides.
As for Mamdani, the forces of Cuomo, Trump, and Rupert Murdoch have all tried to paint him as a dangerous radical who will fuel antisemitism across the five boroughs, even as, by passing higher taxes on the wealthy, he will drive the city’s billionaires to Florida. In response, Mamdani focussed on such things as the Thirty-fourth Street busway. The manner in which he addressed it, of course, is telling—alongside his former primary opponent the city comptroller Brad Lander (the city’s highest-ranking elected Jewish progressive, whose support has helped undercut the antisemitism angle), Mamdani demonstrated that he could walk across town faster than the bus could move through traffic.
Mamdani clearly knows how to communicate ebullience, a talent that is all the more potent for its scarcity in current political life. (Where Republicans now specialize in rage, Democrats tend toward the anodyne—think Chuck Schumer and his “very strong” letters to Trump.) He also shows a deep knowledge of the city’s history—witness his recent video, about the nineteenth-century investigative reporter Nellie Bly, which he used to introduce his proposals for addressing the issue of mentally ill people on the streets. And, unlike many politicians who play up urban troubles the better to cast themselves as savior, Mamdani seems to truly love the town where he lives. Usually clad in a white shirt and skinny tie, he’s somehow reminiscent of J.F.K., who campaigned with a twinkle in his eye. Fiorello La Guardia, New York’s three-term progressive mayor, also had that gift, and so does A.O.C., who won her House seat on the strength of her bartender and “Congresswomen-dance-too!” spirit as much as on her policy positions. In an Insta age, that kind of joie de vivre is remarkably effective.
The Eric Adams era in New York City began with questions about whether the avowedly vegan mayor was ordering the branzino at a midtown Italian restaurant run by a couple of felonious old friends, and the food-related questions really never stopped. The “night-life mayor,” an ex-cop, insisted that everything he did was kosher, yet he and his associates were repeatedly caught in outrageous, petty, and asinine acts of snack-adjacent graft. He had a police commissioner resign after his twin brother was accused of shaking down bars and restaurants. A senior aide and old cop buddy of Adams’s, put in charge of migrant-shelter contracts, was, according to a lawsuit, known as Crumbs by subordinates, because he’d once said, “I have to get mine.” Another top aide, Ingrid Lewis-Martin, has faced a ream of corruption charges, including accepting money from a businessman who helped her son start a Chick-fil-A franchise. Adams himself was indicted last fall for accepting meals and other freebies arranged by a representative of the Turkish government, in exchange for fast-tracking building permits. (Each has denied wrongdoing, comestible or otherwise.) On Wednesday, the trail of treats, upgrades, and little favors appeared to reach its flavor-dusted peak, when a close adviser to the Mayor apparently attempted to pay off a reporter with cash stuffed into an open pouch of Herr’s sour-cream-and-onion potato chips.
The incident took place in Harlem. Katie Honan, a hard-nosed City Hall reporter for the nonprofit newsroom The City, was there to cover the opening of a new campaign office for Adams’s independent, desperate, long-shot bid to win reëlection. For the past four years, Honan has been a worm in Adams’s apple, scoring scoop after scoop about the dramas, inanities, and intrigues of his administration. Her handheld videos of Adams entering and leaving City Hall, while refusing to answer her questions, will be one of the enduring artifacts of this era of city politics. “Have you made attempts to try to remember it?” Honan asked Adams at a press conference in 2024, after the Mayor had his phone seized by the F.B.I. and claimed to have forgotten the passcode. “Is it someone’s birthday?”
During the office opening, Honan spotted Winnie Greco, a longtime Adams fund-raiser who has served as a paid liaison to the city’s Chinese American communities, and who briefly disappeared from Adams’s side last year after she came under scrutiny by federal investigators. (Among other questionable arrangements, Greco reportedly lived for nearly a year in a suite in a Queens hotel that had a city contract to house formerly incarcerated individuals.) According to Honan, Greco texted her after the event and asked to meet across the street from the new campaign office. The pair walked into the Whole Foods on 125th Street. Greco handed Honan an open bag of chips with the top crumpled. “Honan, thinking it was an offer of a light snack, told Greco more than once she could not accept the chips, but Greco insisted that she keep them,” Honan’s colleagues at The City wrote in an article published on Wednesday evening.
Greco left, and, when Honan looked inside the bag, she found a red envelope filled with money. “I can’t take this, when can I give it back to you?” Honan texted Greco. Greco initially said they could meet, but then stopped responding. Honan went to her office, where she handed the bag over to her editors. They contacted the city’s Department of Investigation. “Anticipating possible law enforcement investigations, THE CITY did not open the envelope or count the money inside,” Honan’s colleagues reported, though they spotted “at least one $100 bill and several $20 bills.” An investigator from the Brooklyn U.S. Attorney’s office soon came by to seize the bag, but not before The City’s editors immortalized it in a mug shot. Honan’s colleagues called Greco, who begged them to “forget about this” and call her lawyer. “I make a mistake,” she said. “I’m so sorry. It’s a culture thing. I don’t know. I don’t understand. I’m so sorry. I feel so bad right now. I’m so sorry, honey.” Greco’s lawyer took a similar tack. “I can see how this looks strange,” he told The City. “But I assure you that Winnie’s intent was purely innocent. In the Chinese culture, money is often given to others in a gesture of friendship and gratitude.”
Earlier this year, Adams cut a deal with the Trump Administration to get out from under federal corruption charges. He insisted there was nothing wrong with his actions, either as alleged in the indictment (the favors from the Turkish government) or in his new kinship with the President (he made an implicit promise to coöperate with ICE’s mass-deportation campaign). But Adams has barely attempted to account for the actions of his many aides who have faced their own investigations. Just this morning, Lewis-Martin was handed four new bribery charges, including one related to thousands of dollars in catering for events at Gracie Mansion, the Mayor’s residence. (She has pleaded not guilty.) The investigations into Greco and others, including former senior officials at the N.Y.P.D., are still presumably somewhere in the bowels of the federal bureaucracy. Time and again, when presented with the misdeeds of his friends, allies, subordinates, and appointees, Adams has feigned, at most, mild surprise. “We are shocked by these reports,” a spokesman for the Mayor’s reëlection campaign told The City on Wednesday, in response to the tale of the cash in the chip bag. “He has always demanded the highest ethical and legal standards, and his sole focus remains on serving the people of New York City with integrity.”
This kind of boilerplate has been intolerable all along, and is only more absurd now as Adams puts the city through the farce of seeking a second term, claiming that Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic nominee, is somehow unqualified to hold the office that he has repeatedly turned into a national joke. From the start, Adams has insisted that the media is out to get him—at his weekly press conferences, which he’s lately suspended, he often reserved a special contemptuous smile for Honan—but, if anything, he’s been given leeway. He has surrounded himself with clowns, grifters, and obvious bad news, and asked the public to swallow it. He’s tried to live down the sketchy airline upgrades, the straw donors, the late nights at clubs and restaurants run by his buddies, the self-dealing of his associates, his alliance with Trump. In the end, the bag of chips might sum him up. He’s kettle-cooked. ♦
TAIPEI — 2024 will be a bumper year of elections around the world, but one of the first votes on the calendar will also be one of the most hotly contested and consequential: Taiwan, where there are vital strategic interests at play for both the U.S. and China on January 13.
If the campaign started with expectations in the U.S. that the ruling, pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), whose top brass are frequent and welcome guests in Washington, would stroll to victory, the final stages of the presidential and legislative race have turned into a nail-biter.
Chinese President’s Xi Jinping’s Communist Party leadership, increasingly assertive in its claim that democratic Taiwan is part of China and keen to see the ruling party in Taipei ousted, is trying to swing the election through a disinformation campaign of hoaxes and outlandish claims on social media.
And the tactics may be working. The latest polls for the first-past-the-post presidential race on the My Formosa portal have DPP leader William Lai on 35.2 percent, only just keeping his nose out in front of his main challenger from the Beijing-friendly Kuomintang (KMT), Hou Yu-ih,on 30.6 percent. On Tuesday, the Beijing-leaning United Daily News put both candidates on 31 percent.
“This is not a walk in the park,” admitted Vincent Chao, a city councillor and prominent DPP personality, speaking to POLITICO’s Power Play podcast at a campaign event in New Taipei, a municipality surrounding the capital.
It could hardly be a more febrile period in terms of security fears over the Taiwan Strait, where insistent Chinese maneuvering has been matched by a high-stakes U.S.-backed boost to the island’s defenses. Only on December 15, the U.S. approved another $300 million of spending on defense kit, sparking a retort from China that the expenditure would harm “security interests and threaten peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait.”
Lai’s opponents are playing hard on these security implications of the vote, and are accusing him of bringing the island closer to conflict because of his past comments in favor of the island’s independence. China has, after all, continually warned that independence “means war” and Xi has said Beijing is willing to use “all necessary measures” to secure unification. Lai has hit back that his rivals “are parroting the [Chinese Communist Party line] as propaganda to score electoral benefits.”
For the global economy, open war over Taiwan would be a disaster, perhaps even outstripping the shock of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, due in particular to the island’s critical role in microchip supplies.
Head-to-head race
The specter of a DPP defeat has raised the temperature of the fevered last few weeks of the campaign.
Chao, the DPP councillor and a former political secretary in Taiwan’s Washington representation, admitted that the DPP ends the year in “a head-to-head race” in the final stretch. “I mean, it’s democracy and the party has been in power for eight years. Anything could change,” he said.
Wearing a jaunty white and green “Team Taiwan” tracksuit, the party’s signature colors, he talks above the backstage din of an evening event, held among the tower block estates of New Taipei. Volunteers hand out pork dumplings, the outgoing president Tsai Ing-wen gives a rousing speech about freedom and security, and there are ballads of national loyalty and singalong love songs. It feels heartfelt, but also very Taiwanese in its orderliness, the crowd sitting on stools in the evening heat, waving small flags in unison.
Chao is candid about the scale of China’s social media offensive.
The specter of a DPP defeat has raised the temperature of the fevered last few weeks of the campaign | Annabelle Chih/Getty Images
“What we’re seeing is a much more sophisticated China,” Chao reflected. “They’ve grown much more confident in their abilities to influence our elections, not through military coercion or other overt means, but through disinformation, through influencing public opinion, through controlling the information that people see … through social media organizations like TikTok.”
One of the many unfounded stories that gained currency on social posts was a claim the U.S. had asked Taiwan to develop biological weapons research, a rumor aimed at raising anxiety about an arms race. Another accused the DPP of covert surveillance of its rivals.
Trade and business links are another lever. According to Japan’s Nikkei newspaper, some 300 executives from big Taiwanese businesses operating China were called to a meeting by by China’s Taiwan Affairs Office Director Song Tao, a close ally of China’s President Xi, in early December and roundly encouraged to fly home to Taiwan support a pro-Beijing outcome in January.
A third concern is an international system buckling under new conflicts and crises, with less time to devote to Taiwan’s freedoms, all compounded by an uncertain outcome in the upcoming U.S. election. In the wake of Beijing’s ’s clampdown on freedoms in Hong Kong and with the backwash of the Ukraine crisis, anxieties run high among DPP supporters about Taiwan’s outlook and the need for high levels of deterrence.
“We really do not want to be the next Ukraine,” Chao added, with feeling.
Bending with Beijing
Opinion is strongly divided about the smartest tactical response toward China’s muscle flexing.
Opinion is strongly divided about the smartest tactical response toward China’s muscle flexing. | Annabelle Chih/Getty Images
Across town, at one of the opposition’s bases, where campaigners wear tracksuits in the white and blue of the Kuomintang party, International Relations Director Alexander Huang said his political troops were “within touching distance” of a possible victory.
Keen to shake off a reputation of being reflexively pro-China, as opposed to merely cautious about riling its powerful neighbour, the KMT hosted cocktails for foreign journalists in a trendy, Christmas-decorated bar, bringing together Chinese news-agency writers with Western reporters covering the election.
Huang, who hails from a military intelligence background and studied Chinese military and security doctrine in Washington, argued renewed Western support and commitments of defence expenditure by the U.S. administration increased the risk of something backfiring over Taiwan’s security. “We are under a great military threat [from China],” he told Power Play. “Our position is deterrence without provocation: assurance without appeasement.”
He also reckoned the current chilly relations between the governing DPP party and Beijing were widening distrust. “Our current government has no direct communication with the other side. If you are not able to communicate your view to your adversary, how can you change that?”
It’s less clear what reassurances the KMT expects from Beijing in return for a more accommodating relationship. Huang cites a possible decrease in trade tensions, which can hit Taiwanese agriculture and fishing when Beijing turns the screws, and further action on climate change and pollution (Taiwan is downwind of China’s emissions).
Colorful cast
The race certainly does not lack for colorful personalities.
The DPP’s presidential candidate, Lai, is a doctor and parliamentarian, while his KMT rival Hou is a former policeman and mayor in New Taipei. Mindful that the mood has become cynical about political elites, both sides have chosen frontmen who can claim humble roots: Hou hails from a family that scratched a living as food market traders, while Lai, the epitome of a slick Taiwanese professional, grew up with a widowed mother after his father died in a mining accident.
Hou is a former policeman and mayor in New Taipei | Annabelle Chih/Getty Images
The “Veep” contenders are flashier than the main candidates and more media-friendly. Hsiao Bi-khim, educated in the U.S. and until recently ambassador to Washington, is a pet-lover who styles herself as an agile “cat warrior” in stark contrast to China’s pugnacious “wolf-warrior” diplomats. Her KMT opponent is Jaw Shaw-kong, a formidable, populist-tinged debater and TV personality, who channels overt pro-Beijing sentiment, recently calling for more alignment in military planning with China’s leadership.
The billionaire Foxconn founder Terry Gou, who had run as a maverick, wafting pets as incentives to couples to have more babies to combat a worryingly low birthrate, quit the race after China’s tax authorities launched punitive investigations into his company, the builder of iPhones.
Russell Hsiao of the Global Taiwan Institute, a non-partisan research organization, reckoned that even if the DPP wins, its mandate will be less compelling than in the glory days of 2020, when it surged to a record level.
The guessing game of how likely an intervention — or even invasion — by China is helps explain the nervy tenor of this race.
The KMT’s Huang thought a “full-scale, kinetic invasion” is unlikely in the immediate future. How long does he think that guarantee would hold? “I would say not for the next five years, if we get our policy right.”
Hardly the most durable time-frame.
Taipei politics being a small world, Huang is a longstanding frenemy of the DPP’s Chao, who counters that Taiwan urgently needs to retain its defiant stance and deepen its strategic alliances with the West. They just disagree widely on the means to secure its future.
“The aim of [Beijing’s] engagements is unification … by force if necessary. Democracy, freedom, they are not just words. They represent what our people sincerely believe and hope to uphold.”
Stuart Lau contributed reporting.
Anne McElvoy is host of POLITICO’s weekly Power Play interview podcast, whose latest episode comes from the Taiwan election campaign.
BRUSSELS — Jacques Delors, who headed the European Commission between 1985 and 1995 and is seen as one of the most important architects of a European internal market and single currency, died on Wednesday, aged 98.
A pivotal figure in reanimating the pursuit of a united Europe after World War II, Delors is best known for presiding over the Single European Act of 1987, which set Europe on a course toward borderless economic integration, and the Maastricht Treaty of 1993 that created the European Union and charted a path for countries to join the euro currency.
Perhaps most significantly in forging the concept of a united European democracy, the Maastricht Treaty also created EU citizens, who would take part in European Parliament elections.
Born in Paris in 1925, Delors worked at the Banque de France until 1962. A committed Christian and active in the trade union confederation, he entered politics as a member of the Socialist Party in 1974 and was appointed as finance minister by President François Mitterrand in 1981. Faced with a recession, he started off by delivering the traditional medicine of increased spending, but ultimately convinced Mitterrand to switch tack to greater alignment with market economics.
The Jacques Delors Institute said his name would be associated with many of the most fundamental binding structures of the European project in addition to the single market and the euro: the Schengen passport-free travel area, enlargement, Erasmus student exchanges and cohesion funds to help development in poorer countries.
French President Emmanuel Macron was quick to pay tribute.
“Statesman of French destiny. Inexhaustible craftsman of our Europe. Fighter for human justice. Jacques Delors was all of that. His commitment, his ideals and his righteousness will always inspire us. I salute his work and his memory and share the pain of his loved ones,” the French president said in a statement on X.
Delors’ death was confirmed by his daughter, Martine Aubry. “He died this morning at his home in Paris in his sleep,” said Aubry, the socialist mayor of the French city of Lille, according to French media.
His current successor as European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, called Delors “a visionary who made our Europe stronger.”
European Council President Charles Michel added: “Jacques Delors led the transformation of the European Economic Community towards a true Union, based on humanist values and supported by a single market and a single currency, the euro. He was a passionate and concrete defender of it until his last days. A great Frenchman and great European, he went down in history as one of the builders of our Europe.”
EU chief diplomat Josep Borrell said: “Europe has just lost one of its giants.”
In Britain, Delors was sometimes viewed with more hostile eyes, particularly when he ran up against figures such as Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, who were more skeptical of deeper European integration.
Notoriously, one of the most famous front pages of the Sun tabloid greeted Delors’ moves toward currency union with two raised fingers and the headline “Up Yours, Delors.”
Despite these run-ins with the British, Delors himself was opposed to Brexit and said U.K. membership of the bloc benefited both parties.
Ultimately, his old sparring partner, the Sun, acknowledged on Wednesday that he “was respected as a passionate and hardworking politician.”
Russia battered Kyiv and Kharkiv with missiles and drones overnight, killing at least four people and injuring 92 more, after President Vladimir Putin said he was “seething” and would “intensify attacks” on Ukraine.
“As a result of such a massive missile attack in the capital, unfortunately, there is destruction of residential buildings, damage to infrastructure. There are victims,” said Serhiy Popko, head of the Kyiv military administration.
“Since December 31st, Russian monsters have already fired 170 ‘Shahed’ drones and dozens of missiles of various types” at Ukraine, the country’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a post on social media. “The absolute majority of them targeted civilian infrastructure. I am grateful to all of our partners who are helping us strengthen our air shield.”
Putin said on Monday that he was “seething” at strikes on the Russian city of Belgorod over the weekend that the Kremlin blamed on Kyiv, and vowed to “intensify strikes” on Ukraine.
“They want to a) intimidate us and b) create instability in our country,” Putin said during a New Year’s Day visit to a military hospital, according to the Kremlin’s readout of the president’s comments. “We will intensify the strikes,” he added, saying that “no crime — and this [the attack on Belgorod] is certainly a crime against the civilian population — will go unpunished.”
Russia blames Kyiv for the air attack on Belgorod, which killed at least 25 people and wounded more than 100, according to the Kremlin.
Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said one woman from Kyiv’s Solom’yans’kyi district died and dozens more were injured.
In Ukraine’s northeastern city of Kharkiv, strikes killed at least one person and damaged civilian infrastructure.
The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said its air defenses had shot down all 35 of the Iranian-made drones Russia launched against several cities on Tuesday. But debris from the missiles hit several civilian facilities across the area, damaging gas pipelines and cutting off water and electricity in some areas, Klitschko said.
“It’s probably the biggest attack on Kyiv & [Ukraine] as a whole since the start of full-scale invasion. Urgent action in providing additional air defense capabilities needed,” said Ukrainian MP Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze in a post on social media.
BRUSSELS — Western leaders are grappling with how to handle two era-defining wars in the Middle East and in Ukraine. But there’s another issue, one far closer to home, that’s derailing governments in Europe and America: migration.
In recent days, U.S. President Joe Biden, his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron, and British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak all hit trouble amid intense domestic pressure to tackle immigration; all three emerged weakened as a result. The stakes are high as American, British and European voters head to the polls in 2024.
“There is a temptation to hunt for quick fixes,” said Rashmin Sagoo, director of the international law program at the Chatham House think tank in London. “But irregular migration is a hugely challenging issue. And solving it requires long-term policy thinking beyond national boundaries.”
With election campaigning already under way, long-term plans may be hard to find. Far-right, anti-migrant populists promising sharp answers are gaining support in many Western democracies, leaving mainstream parties to count the costs. Less than a month ago in the Netherlands, pragmatic Dutch centrists lost to an anti-migrant radical.
Who will be next?
Rishi Sunak, United Kingdom
In Britain, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is under pressure from members of his own ruling Conservative party who fear voters will punish them over the government’s failure to get a grip on migration.
U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak speaks during a press conference in Dover on June 5, 2023 in Dover, England | Pool photo by Yui Mok/WPA via Getty Images
Seven years ago, voters backed Brexit because euroskeptic campaigners promised to “Take Back Control” of the U.K.’s borders. Instead, the picture is now more chaotic than ever. The U.K. chalked up record net migration figures last month, and the government has failed so far to stop small boats packed with asylum seekers crossing the English Channel.
Sunak is now in the firing line. He made a pledge to “Stop the Boats” central to his premiership. In the process, he ignited a war in his already divided party about just how far Britain should go.
Under Sunak’s deal with Rwanda, the central African nation agreed to resettle asylum seekers who arrived on British shores in small boats. The PM says the policy will deter migrants from making sea crossings to the U.K. in the first place. But the plan was struck down by the Supreme Court in London, and Sunak’s Tories now can’t agree on what to do next.
Having survived what threatened to be a catastrophic rebellion in parliament on Tuesday, the British premier still faces a brutal battle in the legislature over his proposed Rwanda law early next year.
Time is running out for Sunak to find a fix. An election is expected next fall.
Emmanuel Macron, France
The French president suffered an unexpected body blow when the lower house of parliament rejected his flagship immigration bill this week.
French President Emmanuel Macron at the Elysee Palace in Paris, on June 21, 2023 | Ludovic Marin/AFP via Getty Images
After losing parliamentary elections last year, getting legislation through the National Assembly has been a fraught process for Macron. He has been forced to rely on votes from the right-wing Les Républicains party on more than one occasion.
Macron’s draft law on immigration was meant to please both the conservatives and the center-left with a carefully designed mix of repressive and liberal measures. But in a dramatic upset, the National Assembly, which is split between centrists, the left and the far right, voted against the legislation on day one of debates.
Now Macron is searching for a compromise. The government has tasked a joint committee of senators and MPs with seeking a deal. But it’s likely their text will be harsher than the initial draft, given that the Senate is dominated by the centre right — and this will be a problem for Macron’s left-leaning lawmakers.
If a compromise is not found, Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally will be able to capitalize on Macron’s failure ahead of the European Parliament elections next June.
But even if the French president does manage to muddle through, the episode is likely to mark the end of his “neither left nor right” political offer. It also raises serious doubts about his ability to legislate on controversial topics.
Joe Biden, United States
The immigration crisis is one of the most vexing and longest-running domestic challenges for President Joe Biden. He came into office vowing to reverse the policies of his predecessor, Donald Trump, and build a “fair and humane” system, only to see Congress sit on his plan for comprehensive immigration reform.
U.S. President Joe Biden pauses as he gives a speech in Des Moines, Iowa on July 15, 2019 | Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
The White House has seen a deluge of migrants at the nation’s southern border, strained by a decades-old system unable to handle modern migration patterns.
Ahead of next year’s presidential election, Republicans have seized on the issue. GOP state leaders have filed lawsuits against the administration and sent busloads of migrants to Democrat-led cities, while in Washington, Republicans in Congress have tied foreign aid to sweeping changes to border policy, putting the White House in a tight spot as Biden officials now consider a slate of policies they once forcefully rejected.
The political pressure has spilled into the other aisle. States and cities, particularly ones led by Democrats, are pressuring Washington leaders to do more in terms of providing additional federal aid and revamping southern border policies to limit the flow of asylum seekers into the United States.
New York City has had more than 150,000 new arrivals over the past year and a half — forcing cuts to new police recruits, cutting library hours and limiting sanitation duties. Similar problems are playing out in cities like Chicago, which had migrants sleeping in buses or police stations.
The pressure from Democrats is straining their relationship with the White House. New York City Mayor Eric Adams runs the largest city in the nation, but hasn’t spoken with Biden in nearly a year. “We just need help, and we’re not getting that help,” Adams told reporters Tuesday.
Olaf Scholz, Germany
Migration has been at the top of the political agenda in Germany for months, with asylum applications rising to their highest levels since the 2015 refugee crisis triggered by Syria’s civil war.
The latest influx has posed a daunting challenge to national and local governments alike, which have struggled to find housing and other services for the migrants, not to mention the necessary funds.
The inability to limit the number of refugees has put German Chancellor Olaf Scholz under immense pressure | Michele Tantussi/Getty Images
The inability — in a country that ranks among the most coveted destinations for asylum seekers — to limit the number of refugees has put German Chancellor Olaf Scholz under immense pressure. In the hope of stemming the flow, Germany recently reinstated border checks with Poland, the Czech Republic and Switzerland, hoping to turn back the refugees before they hit German soil.
Even with border controls, refugee numbers remain high, which has been a boon to the far right. Germany’s anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany party has reached record support in national polls.
Since overtaking Scholz’s Social Democrats in June, the AfD has widened its lead further, recording 22 percent in recent polls, second only to the center-right Christian Democrats.
The AfD is expected to sweep three state elections next September in eastern Germany, where support for the party and its reactionary anti-foreigner policies is particularly strong.
The center-right, meanwhile, is hardening its position on migration and turning its back on the open-border policies championed by former Chancellor Angela Merkel. Among the new priorities is a plan to follow the U.K.’s Rwanda model for processing refugees in third countries.
Karl Nehammer, Austria
Like Scholz, the Austrian leader’s approval ratings have taken a nosedive thanks to concerns over migration. Austria has taken steps to tighten controls at its southern and eastern borders.
Though the tactic has led to a drop in arrivals by asylum seekers, it also means Austria has effectively suspended the EU’s borderless travel regime, which has been a boon to the regional economy for decades.
Austria has effectively suspended the EU’s borderless travel regime, which has been a boon to the regional economy for decades | Thomas Kronsteiner/Getty Images
The far-right Freedom Party has had a commanding lead for more than a year, topping the ruling center-right in polls by 10 points. That puts the party in a position to win national elections scheduled for next fall, which would mark an unprecedented rightward tilt in a country whose politics have been dominated by the center since World War II.
Giorgia Meloni, Italy
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni made her name in opposition, campaigning on a radical far-right agenda. Since winning power in last year’s election, she has shifted to more moderate positions on Ukraine and Europe.
Meloni now needs to appease her base on migration, a topic that has dominated Italian debate for years. Instead, however, she has been forced to grant visas to hundreds of thousands of legal migrants to cover labor shortages. Complicating matters, boat landings in Italy are up by about 50 per cent year-on-year despite some headline-grabbling policies and deals to stop arrivals.
While Meloni has ordered the construction of detention centers where migrants will be held pending repatriation, in reality local conditions in African countries and a lack of repatriation agreements present serious impediments.
Italy’s Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni at a press conference on March 9, 2023 | Tiziana Fabi/AFP via Getty Images
Although she won the support of Commission President Ursula von der Leyen for her cause, a potential EU naval mission to block departures from Africa would risk breaching international law.
Meloni has tried other options, including a deal with Tunisia to help stop migrant smuggling, but the plan fell apart before it began. A deal with Albania to offshore some migrant detention centers also ran into trouble.
Now Meloni is in a bind. The migration issue has brought her into conflict with France and Germany as she attempts to create a reputation as a moderate conservative.
If she fails to get to grips with the issue, she is likely to lose political ground. Her coalition partner Matteo Salvini is known as a hardliner on migration, and while they’re officially allies for now, they will be rivals again later.
Geert Wilders, the Netherlands
The government of long-serving Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte was toppled over migration talks in July, after which he announced his exit from politics. In subsequent elections, in which different parties vied to fill Rutte’s void, far-right firebrand Geert Wilders secured a shock win. On election night he promised to curb the “asylum tsunami.”
Wilders is now seeking to prop up a center-right coalition with three other parties that have urged getting migration under control. One of them is Rutte’s old group, now led by Dilan Yeşilgöz.
Geert Wilders attends a meeting in the Dutch parliament with party leaders to discuss the formation of a coalition government, on November 24, 2023 | Carl Court/Getty Images
A former refugee, Yeşilgöz turned migration into one of the main topics of her campaign. She was criticized after the elections for paving the way for Wilders to win — not only by focusing on migration, but also by opening the door to potentially governing with Wilders.
Now, though, coalition talks are stuck, and it could take months to form a new cabinet. If Wilders, who clearly has a mandate from voters, can stitch a coalition together, the political trajectory of the Netherlands — generally known as a pragmatic nation — will shift significantly to the right. A crackdown on migration is as certain as anything can be.
Leo Varadkar, Ireland
Even in Ireland, an economically open country long used to exporting its own people worldwide, an immigration-friendly and pro-business government has been forced by rising anti-foreigner sentiment to introduce new migration deterrence measures that would have been unthinkable even a year ago.
Ireland’s hardening policies reflect both a chronic housing crisis and the growing reluctance of some property owners to keep providing state-funded emergency shelter in the wake of November riots in Dublin triggered by a North African immigrant’s stabbing of young schoolchildren.
A nation already housing more than 100,000 newcomers, mostly from Ukraine, Ireland has stopped guaranteeing housing to new asylum seekers if they are single men, chiefly from Nigeria, Algeria, Afghanistan, Georgia and Somalia, according to the most recent Department of Integration statistics.
Ireland has stopped guaranteeing housing to new asylum seekers if they are single men, chiefly from Nigeria, Algeria, Afghanistan, Georgia and Somalia | Jorge Guerrero/AFP via Getty Images
Even newly arrived families face an increasing risk of being kept in military-style tents despite winter temperatures.
Ukrainians, who since Russia’s 2022 invasion of their country have received much stronger welfare support than other refugees, will see that welcome mat partially retracted in draft legislation approved this week by the three-party coalition government of Prime Minister Leo Varadkar.
Once enacted by parliament next month, the law will limit new Ukrainian arrivals to three months of state-paid housing, while welfare payments – currently among the most generous in Europe for people fleeing Russia’s war – will be slashed for all those in state-paid housing.
Justin Trudeau, Canada
A pessimistic public mood dragged down by cost-of-living woes has made immigration a multidimensional challenge for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
A housing crunch felt across the country has cooled support for immigration, with people looking for scapegoats for affordability pains. The situation has fueled antipathy for Trudeau and his re-election campaign.
Trudeau has treated immigration as a multipurpose solution for Canada’s aging population and slowing economy. And while today’s record-high population growth reflects well on Canada’s reputation as a desirable place to relocate, political challenges linked to migration have arisen in unpredictable ways for Trudeau’s Liberals.
Political challenges linked to migration have arisen in unpredictable ways for Trudeau’s Liberals | Andrej Ivanov/AFP
Since Trudeau came to power eight years ago, at least 1.3 million people have immigrated to Canada, mostly from India, the Philippines, China and Syria. Handling diaspora politics — and foreign interference — has become more consequential, as seen by Trudeau’s clash with India and Canada’s recent break with Israel.
Canada will double its 40 million population in 25 years if the current growth rate holds, enlarging the political challenges of leading what Trudeau calls the world’s “first postnational state”.
Pedro Sánchez, Spain
Spain’s autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla, in Northern Africa, are favored by migrants seeking to enter Europe from the south: Once they make it across the land border, the Continent can easily be accessed by ferry.
Transit via the land border that separates the European territory from Morocco is normally kept in check with security measures like high, razor-topped fences, with border control officers from both countries working together to keep undocumented migrants out.
Spain’s autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla, in Northern Africa, are favored by migrants seeking to enter Europe | Pierre-Philippe Marcou/AFP
But in recent years authorities in Morocco have expressed displeasure with their Spanish counterparts by standing down their officers and allowing hundreds of migrants to pass, overwhelming border stations and forcing Spanish officers to repel the migrants, with scores dying in the process.
The headaches caused by these incidents are believed to be a major factor in Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s decision to change the Spanish government’s position on the disputed Western Sahara territory and express support for Rabat’s plan to formalize its nearly 50-year occupation of the area.
The pivot angered Sánchez’s leftist allies and worsened Spain’s relationship with Algeria, a long-standing champion of Western Saharan independence. But the measures have stopped the flow of migrants — for now.
Kyriakos Mitsotakis, Greece
Greece has been at the forefront of Europe’s migration crisis since 2015, when hundreds of thousands of people entered Europe via the Aegean islands. Migration and border security have been key issues in the country’s political debate.
Human rights organizations, as well as the European Parliament and the European Commission, have accused the Greek conservative government of Kyriakos Mitsotakis of illegal “pushbacks” of migrants who have made it to Greek territory — and of deporting migrants without due process. Greece’s government denies those accusations, arguing that independent investigations haven’t found any proof.
Mitsotakis insists that Greece follows a “tough but fair” policy, but the numerous in-depth investigations belie the moderate profile the conservative leader wants to maintain.
In June, a migrant boat sank in what some called “the worst tragedy ever” in the Mediterranean Sea. Hundreds lost their lives, refocusing Europe’s attention on the issue. Official investigations have yet to discover whether failures by Greek authorities contributed to the shipwreck, according to Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.
In the meantime, Greece is in desperate need of thousands of workers to buttress the country’s understaffed agriculture, tourism and construction sectors. Despite pledges by the migration and agriculture ministers of imminent legislation bringing migrants to tackle the labor shortage, the government was forced to retreat amid pressure from within its own ranks.
Nikos Christodoulides, Cyprus
Cyprus is braced for an increase in migrant arrivals on its shores amid renewed conflict in the Middle East. Earlier in December, Greece sent humanitarian aid to the island to deal with an anticipated increase in flows.
Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides has called for extra EU funding for migration management, and is contending with a surge in violence against migrants in Cyprus. Analysts blame xenophobia, which has become mainstream in Cypriot politics and media, as well as state mismanagement of migration flows. Last year the country recorded the EU’s highest proportion of first-time asylum seekers relative to its population.
Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides has called for extra EU funding for migration management | Ludovic Marin/AFP via Getty Images
Legal and staffing challenges have delayed efforts to create a deputy ministry for migration, deemed an important step in helping Cyprus to deal with the surge in arrivals.
The island’s geography — it’s close to both Lebanon and Turkey — makes it a prime target for migrants wanting to enter EU territory from the Middle East. Its complex history as a divided country also makes it harder to regulate migrant inflows.
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Tim Ross, Annabelle Dickson, Clea Caulcutt, Myah Ward, Matthew Karnitschnig, Hannah Roberts, Pieter Haeck, Shawn Pogatchnik, Zi-Ann Lum, Aitor Hernández-Morales and Nektaria Stamouli
SARCELLES, France — In the usually lively “Little Jerusalem” neighborhood of Sarcelles, the only people loitering are gun-toting French soldiers on patrol.
Since Hamas’ deadly assault against Israel on October 7, this largely Jewish enclave in the northern suburbs of Paris has gone eerily quiet, with locals keeping their movements to a minimum, and with restaurants and cafés bereft of their regular clientele — fearing an increasing number of antisemitic attacks across France.
“People are afraid, in a state of shock, they’ve lost their love for life” said Alexis Timsit, manager of a kosher pizzeria. “My business is down 50 percent, there’s no bustle in the street, nobody taking a stroll,” he said in front of a large screen broadcasting round-the-clock coverage of the war.
France has seen more antisemitic incidents in the last three weeks than over the past year: 501 offenses ranging from verbal abuse and antisemitic graffiti, to death threats and physical assaults have been reported. Antisemitic acts under investigation include groups gathering in front of synagogues shouting threats and graffiti such as the words “killing Jews is a duty” sprayed outside a stadium in Carcassonne in the southwest. The interior minister has deployed extra police and soldiers at Jewish schools, places of worship and community centers since the attacks, and in Sarcelles that means soldiers guard school pick-ups and drop-offs.
“I try not to show my daughter that I’m afraid,” said Suedu Avner, who hopes the conflict won’t last too long. But a certain panic has taken hold in the community in the wake of the Hamas attacks, in some cases spreading like wildfire on WhatsApp groups. On one particularly tense day, parents even pulled their children out of school.
France is home to the largest Jewish community outside Israel and the U.S., estimated at about 500,000, and one of the largest Muslim communities in Europe. Safety concerns aren’t new to France’s Jewish community, as to some degree, it has remained on alert amid a string of terror attacks on French soil by Islamists over the last decade.
Israel’s war against Hamas is now threatening the fragile peace in places like Sarcelles, one of the poorest cities in France, where thousands of Jews live alongside mostly Muslim neighbors of North African origin, from immigrant backgrounds, and in low-income housing estates.
Authorities meanwhile are often torn by conflicting imperatives — between the Jews, who are fearful for their safety, and the Muslims, who feel an affinity for the Palestinian cause. During his visit to Israel and the Palestinian Territories, French President Emmanuel Macron himself struggled to strike a difficult balance between supporting Israel in its fight against Hamas, and calling for the preservation of Palestinian lives.
A community under threat
For Timsit, the threat is very real. His pizzeria was ransacked by rioters a couple of months ago, when the fatal shooting of a teenager by a police officer in a Paris suburb caused unrest in poor housing estates across France.
The attack was not antisemitic, he said, but was a violent reminder. In 2014, a pro-Palestinian demonstration protesting Israel’s ground offensive against Gaza degenerated into an antisemitic riot against Jewish shops. “All you need is a spark to set it off again,” said Timsit.
France’s Jews have seen an increase in antisemitic attacks since the early 2000s, a reality that cuts deep into the national psyche given the memories of France’s collaboration with Nazi Germany in the Second World War.
“The fear of violence [in France] appeared with the Second Intifada,” said Marc Hecker, a specialist on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with IFRI think tank, with reference to the uprising against Israeli occupation in Palestinian Territories.
Patrick Haddad, the mayor of Sarcelles, is working to keep the communities together | Clea Caulcutt/POLITICO
“Every time the situation in the Near East flares up, there’s an increase in antisemitic offenses in France,” he added. The threat of antisemitic attacks has led to increased security at Jewish schools and synagogues, and has discouraged many French Jews from wearing their kippahs in some areas, according to Jewish organizations.
In addition to low-level attacks, French Jews are also a prime target for Islamists as France battles a wave of terrorist attacks that have hit schools, bars and public buildings, among other targets, in the last decade. In 2012, three children and a rabbi were shot dead at a Jewish school in Toulouse at point-blank range by Mohamed Merah, a gunman who had claimed allegiance to al-Qaida. In 2015, four people were killed at a kosher supermarket near Paris.
While Hamas, al-Qaida and ISIS networks are separate, Hecker warned that the scale of Hamas’s attack against Israel has “galvanized” Islamists across the board, once again sparking deep fears among France’s Jews.
Delicate local balance
Many of Sarcelles’ Jews are Sephardic — that is, of Spanish descent — and ended up in North Africa when Spain expelled its Jewish population in the Middle Ages. Most came to France after having lived in the former French colonies of Algeria and Tunisia. Sarcelles’ Muslim population therefore shares a cultural and linguistic history with its Jewish community, and the two groups have lived together in relative harmony for decades.
In his office, the mayor of Sarcelles, Patrick Haddad, stands under the twin gazes of Nelson Mandela and Marianne, the symbol of French republicanism, with pictures of both adorning his wall, as he reflects on the thus-far peaceful coexistence among the local population.
“There’s been not a single antisemitic attack in Sarcelles since the attacks … It’s been over two weeks, and we are holding things together,” he said, smiling despite the noticeable strain. Relations between the city’s Muslims and Jews are amicable, said Haddad, and locals on the streets are proud of their friendship with people of a different religion.
Israel’s war on Hamas is testing relations in Sarcelles, one of France’s poorest cities | Clea Caulcutt/POLITICO and Bertrand Guay/AFP via Getty Images
“Relations are easy, we share a similar culture, a lot of the Jews are originally from Tunisia, Algeria, they even speak some Arabic,” said Naima, a Muslim retiree who did not want to give her surname to protect her privacy. “My family, my husband and my children respect the Jews, but I know many who are angry with Israel,” said Naima, who moved to France from Algeria as a young adult.
“I’ve got Muslim friends, we get along fine, we don’t go around punching each other,” said Avner.
But for many, politics — and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — is off-limits, and communities live relatively separate lives, with most Jewish pupils enrolled in religious schools. Many Jews from Sarcelles have also chosen to emigrate to Israel in recent years.
But Israel’s image as the ultimate, secure sanctuary for Jews has been shattered after Hamas killed more than 1,400 Israelis in horrific attacks, said Haddad.
“Where are [Jews] going to go if they are not safe in Israel? People’s fears have been magnified, they fear what is happening here, and they are anguished about what is happening in the ‘sanctuary state’ for Jews,” he said.
In a twist of the many tragic reversals of Jewish history, several French families have returned from Israel since the Hamas attacks to find temporary shelter in the relative peace of Sarcelles.
It’s as if one front in the Israel-Hamas war is playing out on the streets of Berlin.
The main battleground has been an avenue lined with chicken and kebab restaurants in Neukölln, a neighborhood in the south-east of the city that’s home to many Middle Eastern immigrants. Some pro-Palestinian activists have called for demonstrators to turn out almost nightly, and, as one post put it, turn the area “into Gaza.”
On October 18, hundreds of people, many of them teenagers, answered the call.
“From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” chanted many in the crowd as a phalanx of riot police closed in on them. Berlin public prosecutors say the slogan is a call for the erasure of Israel, and have moved to make its utterance a criminal offense.
While similar scenes have played out across much of the world, for Germany’s leaders, they are profoundly embarrassing and strike at the heart of the nation’s identity, on account of the country’s Nazi past.
Germany’s “history and our responsibility arising from the Holocaust make it our duty to stand up for the existence and security of the State of Israel,” Chancellor Olaf Scholz said during a visit to Israel on October 17 intended to illustrate Germany’s solidarity.
The difficulty for Scholz is that far from everyone in Germany sees it his way.
German leaders across the political spectrum expressed outrage when, after the Hamas’ October 7 terrorist attack on Israeli civilians, dozens of people assembled in Neukölln to celebrate. One 23-year-old man, a Palestinian flag draped over his shoulders, handed out sweets.
A community on edge
Since then, tensions in Berlin and in other German cities have rapidly escalated. A surge in antisemitic incidents has left many in the country’s Jewish community on edge and German police have stepped up security at cultural institutions and houses of worship.
At the same time, German police have moved to ban many pro-Palestinian demonstrations, saying there is a high risk of “incitement to hatred” and a threat to public safety. Demonstrators have come out anyway, leading to violent clashes with police.
Some in Germany, particularly on the political left, have questioned whether the bans on pro-Palestinian protests are an overreach of the state, arguing that they stifle legitimate concerns about civilian casualties in Gaza stemming from Israel’s retaliatory strikes.
But Berlin authorities say, based on past experience, the likelihood of antisemitic rhetoric — even violence — at prohibited pro-Palestinian demonstrations is too high.
Protesters demanding a peaceful resolution to the current conflict in Israel and Gaza demonstrate under the slogan “Not in my name!” in Berlin | Maja Hitij/Getty Images
Many on the far-left have joined those protests that do take place.
On Wednesday night, around the same time demonstrators assembled in Neukölln, a group of a few hundred leftist activists showed up at a planned vigil for peace outside the foreign ministry.
“Free Palestine from German guilt,” they chanted in English. Germany, the argument went, should get over its Holocaust history, at least when it comes to support for Israel. The irony is that there is much sympathy for this view on the far right.
One recent poll showed that 78 percent of supporters of the far-right Alternative for Germany disagreed with the idea that the country has a “special obligation towards Israel.” Extreme-right politicians have also called on Germany to get over its “cult of guilt.”
For many in the country’s Jewish community — which in recent years has grown to an estimated 200,000 people, including many Israelis — the conflagration in the Middle East has made fear part of daily life.
Molotov cocktails
In the pre-dawn hours on Wednesday, two people wearing masks threw Molotov cocktails at a Berlin Jewish community hub that houses a synagogue. The incendiary devices hit the sidewalk, and no one was hurt. But the attack stoked profound alarm.
“Hamas’ ideology of extermination against everything Jewish is also having an effect in Germany,” said the Central Council of Jews in Germany, the country’s largest umbrella Jewish organization.
Since the Israel-Hamas war broke out, several homes in Berlin where Jews are thought to live have been marked with the Star of David.
“My first thought was: ‘It’s like the Nazi time,’” said Sigmount Königsberg, the antisemitism commissioner for Berlin’s Jewish Community, an organization that oversees local synagogues and other parts of Jewish life in the city. “Many Jews are hiding their Jewishness,” he added — in other words, concealing skullcaps or religious insignia out of fear of being attacked.
It remains unclear who perpetrated the firebombing attack and Star of David graffiti. But historical data shows a clear correlation between upsurges in Middle East violence and increased antisemitic incidents in Europe, according to academic researchers.
In the eight days following Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel, there were 202 antisemitic incidents connected to the war, mostly motivated by “anti-Israel activism,” according to data compiled by the Anti-Semitism Research and Information Center.
Fears within the Jewish community were particularly prevalent after a former Hamas leader called for worldwide demonstrations in a “day of rage.” Many students at a Jewish school in Berlin stayed home. Two teachers wrote a letter to Berlin’s mayor to express their dismay that, as they put it, the school was nearly empty.
A pro-Palestinian demonstrator displays a placard during a protest against the bombing in Gaza outside the Foreign Ministry in Berlin on October 18, 2023 | John Macdougall/AFP via Getty Images
“This means de facto that Jew-haters have usurped the decision-making authority over Jewish life in Berlin,” they wrote. The teachers then blamed Germany’s willingness to take in refugees from war-torn places like Syria and Lebanon. “Germany has taken in and continues to take in hundreds of thousands of people whose socialization includes antisemitism and hatred of Israel,” they wrote.
Day of rage
Surveys show that Muslims in Germany are more likely to hold antisemitic views than the general population. Politicians often refer this phenomenon as “imported antisemitism,” brought into the country through immigration from Muslim-majority nations.
At the same time, it was a far-right attacker who perpetrated some of the worst antisemitic violence in Germany’s recent history. That came in 2019, when a gunmen tried to massacre 51 people celebrating Yom Kippur, the holiest day in Judaism, in a synagogue in the eastern German city of Halle. Two people were killed.
German neo-Nazis have praised Hamas’s October 7 attacks in Israel. One group calling itself the “Young Nationalists” posted a picture of a bloodstained Star of David on social media next to the slogan “Israel murders and the world watches.”
During the Neukölln demonstration, officers arrested individual protestors one by one, picking them out from the crowd and dragging them off by force.
The atmosphere grew increasingly tense. Demonstrators lobbed fireworks and bottles at the police. Dumpsters and tires were set alight. By the end of the night, police made 174 arrests, including 29 minors. Police said 65 officers were injured in the clashes.
At one point amid the chaos, a 15-year-old girl with a Palestinian keffiyeh — a black and white scarf — wrapped around most of her face emerged amid the smoke and explosions to pose for a selfie in front of a row of riot police.
She said she was there to demonstrate for “peace.” When asked how peace would be achieved, she replied: “When the Israeli side pisses off our land, there will be peace. Won’t there?”
French Health Minister Aurélien Rousseau wants the public to stay calm over bedbugs in Paris.
In an interview with France Inter on Tuesday, Rousseau reassured citizens that there is “no reason for a general panic” and that France has not been “invaded by bedbugs.”
The tiny insects have been spotted on public transport in the French capital over the past few weeks, raising alarm among residents and public officials.
Last week, Paris Deputy Mayor Emmanuel Grégoire asked the government to take action to fight the “scourge” of bedbugs ahead of the 2024 Olympics, set to take place in the city next summer and bring a huge influx of tourists.
Despite inviting the public to relax, Rousseau did add Tuesday that “when you have bedbugs, it’s hell.”
In recent weeks, videos of bedbugs in trains and on the Paris metro have circulated on the internet. According to French news, bedbugs disappeared from France around 1950 before making a comeback in the 1990s due to increased international travel.
France might not be the only country set for a bedbug battle: Belgian pest-control companies have reported a spike in calls about infestations in recent months.
BERLIN — The political maneuver shaking Germany’s postwar democratic order involves a piece of legislation that is about as mundane as it gets.
Center-right legislators in the eastern German state of Thuringia wanted to cut a local property tax by a small amount — and did so with the support of the far-right Alternative for Germany, or AfD.
The move broke with years of tradition in which mainstream parties have vowed to maintain a Brandmauer, or firewall, between themselves and the AfD, a party many in a country alert to the legacy of Nazism see as a dire threat to democracy. Even accepting the party’s support, the thinking goes, would legitimize far-right forces or make them salonfähig — socially acceptable.
And so, when parliamentarians from the conservative Christian Democratic Union, or CDU, passed the tax reduction on a late afternoon in September with AfD votes, it sent tremors across the country’s political landscape that still are reverberating.
“For me, a taboo has been broken,” Katrin Göring-Eckardt, a leader of the Greens who hails from Thuringia, said after the vote. “It shows me not only that the firewall is gone, but that there is open collaboration.”
For mainstream parties, and the CDU in particular, the question of how to handle the growing presence of far-right radicals in governing bodies from federal and state parliaments to local councils is likely to grow only more vexing.
That especially is the case in the states of the former East Germany, where the AfD now leads in polls at around 28 percent. Next year, the eastern states of Thuringia, Saxony and Brandenburg will all hold parliamentary elections. Polls show the party leading in all three states.
The AfD is likely to expand its presence in the parliaments of Bavaria and Hesse when those states vote on Sunday. In Hesse, the AfD is coming close to overtaking German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s center-left Social Democratic Party, according to the latest polls.
The dilemma facing mainstream parties is clear. To work with the AfD means to normalize a party that many believe seeks to subvert the republic from within. But to ostracize the party only alienates its many voters.
The firewall also serves as an unintended political gift, allowing the AfD to depict itself — at a time of high dissatisfaction with mainstream parties — as the clear choice for those who want to send a burn-it-down message to the country’s political establishment.
At the same time, the controversy over the latest vote in Thuringia seems to have played into the AfD’s hands, allowing the party to depict itself as seeking to uphold rather than undermine democracy.
The “‘firewall’ is history — and Thuringia is just the beginning,” AfD party leader Alice Weidel posted on X, formerly Twitter, after the vote. “It’s time to respond to the democratic will of citizens everywhere in Germany.”
Historic fears
Germany’s political leaders are all too aware that the Nazi seizure of power began with democratic electoral success. In fact, it was in Thuringia where, in 1930, the Nazi party first took real governing power in coalition with conservative parties.
The “‘firewall’ is history — and Thuringia is just the beginning,” AfD party leader Alice Weidel posted on X, formerly Twitter, after the vote. “It’s time to respond to the democratic will of citizens everywhere in Germany” | Christof Stache/AFP via Getty Images
That fact was not lost on the CDU’s opponents.
“German conservatism has already been a stirrup holder of fascism,” Janine Wissler, a head of the Left party, told the German Press Agency after the vote. “Back then, too, it started in Thuringia,” she added. “Instead of having learned from that, the CDU is going down a path that’s as dangerous as fire.”
CDU leaders in Thuringia deny the vote on the tax reduction means the firewall is crumbling. They say there was no cooperation with the AfD ahead of the vote (though AfD members say there were discussions between lawmakers).
“I cannot make good, important decisions for the state that provide relief for families and the economy dependent on the fact that the wrong people might agree,” Mario Voigt, the head of the CDU in Thuringia said after the vote.
Friedrich Merz, the national leader of the CDU, has sent mixed signals on the firewall — or at least on what exactly the firewall means. Merz says the CDU will not form coalitions with the AfD but he’s been less clear on whether the CDU will work with the party in other ways.
In a television interview over the summer, he seemed to suggest working with the AfD on the local level was all but inevitable.
Friedrich Merz, the national leader of the CDU, has sent mixed signals on the firewall | Tobias Schwarz/AFP via Getty Images
“We are of course obliged to accept democratic elections,” he said. “And if a district administrator, a mayor is elected there who belongs to the AfD, it’s natural that you look for ways to then continue to work in this city.”
After an uproar ensued, Merz walked back the comment. “There will be no cooperation between the CDU and the AfD at the municipal level either,” he posted on X, formerly Twitter.
After the vote in Thuringia, Merz stood by the CDU leadership of the state. “We don’t go by who agrees, we go by what we think is right in the matter,” he said on German television.
Even some within his own party do not see things that way. Daniel Günther, the CDU premier of the northern state of Schleswig-Holstein, sharply criticized his party colleagues in Thuringia. “As a conservative, I must be able to say plainly and simply the sentence, ‘I do not form majorities with extremists,’” Günther said.
‘Cordon sanitaire’
It’s not the first time Thuringia has been at the center of a controversy over the firewall. In 2020, a little-known politician in the pro-business Free Democratic Party, Thomas Kemmerich, was elected state premier with the support of the CDU and AfD. Then-Chancellor Angela Merkel weighed in to call the vote “unforgivable.”
In the furor that followed, Kemmerich resigned as did the then-head of the CDU faction in the state. But given the AfD’s large presence in the local parliament, the issue was bound to resurface.
It’s not the first time Thuringia has been at the center of a controversy over the firewall | Christof Stache/AFP via Getty Images
The problem is far from Germany’s alone. Mainstream parties are under growing pressure due to the rise of the radical right across Europe.
In France, parties from across the political spectrum have formed a cordon sanitaire, or sanitary cordon, to keep Marine Le Pen, a leader of the far-right National Rally, out of the presidency. But with Le Pen’s party now the biggest opposition group in the National Assembly, the cordon is getting harder to maintain.
In the European Parliament, where a similar cordon has been erected, the center-right European People’s Party has been openly courting the European Conservatives and Reformists, home to Poland’s nationalist Law and Justice party and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s far-right Brothers of Italy party.
In Thuringia, the stakes are even higher as the local branch of the AfD contains some of the party’s most extreme members. State-level intelligence authorities tasked with surveilling anti-constitutional groups have characterized the party’s local branch as extremist.
The leader of the AfD in Thuringia is Björn Höcke, who is set to face trial for using banned Nazi rhetoric. (In 2021, he closed a speech with the phrase “Alles für Deutschland!” or “Everything for Germany!” — a slogan used by Nazi stormtroopers.)
Höcke railed against Holocaust remembrance in Germany and warned of “Volkstod,” the death of the Volk, through “population replacement.” For such views, German courts have ruled that Höcke could justifiably be referred to as a fascist or Nazi.
GERMANY NATIONAL PARLIAMENT ELECTION POLL OF POLLS
Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson announced Friday that he is switching parties and will serve as a Republican-affiliated mayor of the blue-leaning city.
While the Dallas mayoral office is nonpartisan, Johnson previously served as a Democrat in the Texas legislature. He slammed his former party in an op-ed for Wall Street Journal published Friday, blaming Democratic policies for “exacerbated crime and homelessness.”
“The future of America’s great urban centers depends on the willingness of the nation’s mayors to champion law and order and practice fiscal conservatism,” Johnson wrote. “Our cities desperately need the genuine commitment to these principles (as opposed to the inconsistent, poll-driven commitment of many Democrats) that has long been a defining characteristic of the GOP.”
He added: “In other words, American cities need Republicans—and Republicans need American cities.”
Johnson’s announcement makes him the only Republican among the mayors of the 10 most populous cities in the US.
The Texas Democratic Party issued a scathing statement Friday, accusing Johnson of being dishonest with Dallas voters.
“[T]he voters of Dallas deserved to know where he stood before he ran for reelection as Mayor,” the chair and vice-chair of the party said. “He wasn’t honest with his constituents, and knew he would lose to a Democrat if he flipped before the election.”
“This feeble excuse for democratic representation will fit right in with Republicans — and we are grateful that he can no longer tarnish the brand and values of the Texas Democratic Party,” they added.
On the other hand, Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott welcomed Johnson’s new party affiliation.
“Texas is getting more Red every day,” Abbott said in a post on X, the platform previously known as Twitter. “He’s pro law enforcement & won’t tolerate leftist agendas.”
Russia said it shot down three Ukrainian drones flying toward Moscow and its surrounding regions on Wednesday, in the sixth consecutive day of attacks on the capital region.
In the early hours of Wednesday morning, Russian air defense systems shot down two drones over the Mozhaisk and Khimki districts, the country’s defense ministry said on Telegram. A third drone was jammed with electronic warfare and lost control, hitting a building under construction in the Moscow City district. According to the ministry, there were no casualties.
“City emergency services are inspecting the area in the perimeter of the City for the consequences of the strike,” Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said on his Telegram channel. “Several windows in two neighboring five-story buildings were blown out.”
Russian state-owned media outlet RIA Novosti reported that the third drone damaged the glazing of a Moscow tower and windows on two floors of a residential building. Wreckage of the drone that fell over the Khimki region also caused minor damage to a private house and a non-residential building.
Russia accused Kyiv of attempting to carry out a “terrorist attack,” but Ukraine did not immediately comment on the attacks or claim responsibility.
RIA also reported that air traffic at Moscow’s Vnukovo, Domodedovo and Sheremetyevo airports was disrupted, with several delays and cancelations. Air traffic later returned to normal, according to Russia’s Federal Air Transport Agency.
A separate drone attack in Russia’s Belgorod region near the Ukrainian border killed three people on Wednesday, the governor of the region said.
These are the latest in a series of drone attacks that have increasingly targeted Russian territory, including its capital in recent weeks. Wednesday’s strike was the sixth straight night of aerial attacks on the Moscow region, according to AFP.
On Wednesday, a spokesperson from the U.S. State Department said the United States does not encourage attacks inside Russian territory, but that it is Ukraine’s choice how it defends itself from Russia.
PARIS — France is slowly catching its breath after days of large-scale urban unrest but a greater challenge looms for President Emmanuel Macron: How to tackle the root problems the riots have exposed.
Macron has walked a thin line between showing empathy and sending out a message of toughness after a police officer shot and killed teenager Nahel M. last week, leading to days of riots. He flooded the streets with police officers in an effort to contain the violence.
This weekend there were fewer arrests than on previous nights and the unrest appears to be waning, at least temporarily.
But the series of incidents have fanned the flames around police brutality and the treatment of racial minorities into a broader, violent rejection of French institutions.
Overnight on Saturday, attackers rammed a car into the house of the local mayor in L’Haÿ-les-Roses,a suburb south of Paris, injuring the official’s wife as she tried to flee with her young children.
Elsewhere in France, the violence triggered by the teenager’s death has targeted many symbols of the French Republic: schools, police stations, libraries and other public buildings.
“An unprecedented movement has hit territories that were not previously affected [by violence]. Public buildings were damaged which was not the case during the last wave of protests in 2005,” said a French government official, who was granted anonymity to discuss sensitive issues more openly, referring to an outbreak of violencethat rocked France’s banlieues for weeks in 2005.
Over the past few days, Macron has sought to strike a delicate balance between showing compassion and resolve. He has described the shooting of 17-year-old Nahel M. as he was fleeing the police last week as “inexcusable” and “inexplicable.” But Macron has slammed the riots as “the unacceptable manipulation of a death of a teenager,” as well.
On Tuesday, he is expected to meet mayors from more than 200 towns and cities hit by violence. The aim of the meeting is to gather first-hand accounts from local officials, work on solutions and relay that the government is backing local officials.
“The president wants to listen,” the French official said.
After cutting short his visit to a European summit last week, Macron tried to show he is at the helm of the country, regularly calling crisis cabinet meetings, and issuing orders to his prime minister and ministers. On Saturday, he called off a long-planned state visit to Germany.
Permanently in crisis mode
The roster of meetings at the Elysée Palace is a familiar sight and a sign that the government is in crisis mode — once again.
The French president has barely emerged from a deep political crisis over pension reforms this spring and his government now is faced with more turmoil. Macron’s first term was equally rocky, as he faced Yellow Jackets protests, the COVID-19 pandemic and the ever-present threat of terrorism in France.
Macron has accumulated “difficult, painful crisis situations” that have “perplexed” the outside world, said Bruno Cautrès, a politics researcher with the Sciences Po institute.
“It’s as if France was a pressure cooker, [each crisis] reveals tensions, a conflict in society, tensions over the respect owed to our institutions … Our country is constantly invoking Republican values, but it appears entire segments of the population don’t feel this matters to them,” he said.
The outpouring of shock and anger over the death of Nahel M., who was of North African descent, has also forced many in France to do some soul-searching over issues of discrimination, integration, and crime in immigrant-heavy suburbs around French cities.
Public pressure to more closely examine French policing practices and allegations of racism in the security forces beyond re-examining rules of engagement is mounting. In 2017, for example, police officers were given the right to shoot in several hypothetical scenarios, including when a driver refuses to stop and is deemed a risk to life.
Beyond alleged discrimination by the police, fixing the growing rift between the suburbs’ disadvantaged youth and French institutions will likely require more money forpolicies aimed at addressing root causes and reducing social inequalities in areas such as education and social housing.
But addressing issues in the banlieues is difficult at a time when the government is attempting to reduce spending. After resisting calls to back down in the face of peaceful protests over his flagship pensions reforms, Macron reaching for the checkbook shortly after the recent days’ protests might be seen as rewarding rioters.
The need to reconcile the country and embody law and order at a time when his margins for maneuver are limited after losing a parliamentary majority last year is no small task for Macron.
He will have to keep a sharp eye on opposition parties as crime, identity and immigration — long issues the far-right has campaigned on — take center stage. If far-right leader Marine Le Pen has held back from fueling a backlash against rioters, sticking to her strategy of embracing mainstream politics, her trusted lieutenant Jordan Bardella has led the charge against “criminals” who owe “everything to the Republic.”
The recent unrest had exposed “frailties” that could “encourage a populist discourse,” the same government official admitted.
“[Our] political response must be a reasonable one, that addresses the reality and daily lives of the French,” he added. That’s easier said than done.
