POLITICS
What Eric Adams and AOC Have in Common
Experience, Not Ideology, Explains Who Won in New York City
The top four candidates in the Democratic primary for mayor of New York were the former City Department head who had never won elected office before, a test prep CEO who have never won elected office before, a nonprofit executive and TV commentator who had never won elected office before, and a retired police officer who had previously four elections to state Senate and two to Borough President.
Based on these quick biographical sketches, it should surprise nobody that the candidate who had won elective office before — Eric Adams — won his party’s nomination.
One of the most important and enduring findings of political science research on election is that experienced candidates — candidates who have previously won an election — do better in open seat races or when challenging an incumbent. These candidates raise more money and post higher vote shares than candidates who have not won elective office. While the first studies identified this pattern in contemporary US House elections, scholars have found that this pattern exists in US Senate, state legislative, state supreme court, 19th Century US House races, and in elections to municipal office.
Experienced candidates do better in large part because they are “strategic politicians” — choosing to run when their chances of winning are high enough to justify the costs of running for office and (in some circumstances) giving up their current elected office. But inside this broad pattern are the judgments of individual candidates, each of whom makes her own assessment about their likelihood of winning an election and her personal willingness to bear the costs of running for office. Some individuals have a greater tolerance for risk in campaigns than others, and some have greater levels of nascent ambition for higher political office.
In addition, running and winning office teaches candidates valuable skills about how to run for office. They develop deeper and stronger contacts with potential donors, party leaders, and key interest groups in their region. Good candidates iteratively sharpen the messages they communicate to voters, and learn better how to maximize their own time and the value of their campaign staff. In short, winning candidates learn lessons from one campaign that they can apply to a subsequent campaign.
From this perspective, one can see the advantages that Adams possessed over his main rivals in his run for mayor. While his past victories at the district and borough level honed his skills for a citywide campaign, his major opponents were doing all this on the fly.
A focus on candidate experience also suggests that the biggest moments of the New York City mayor’s elections were those that had to do with candidate entry and implosion.
In particular, the implosion of the campaign of City Comptroller Scott Stringer — the only other mayoral candidate to have won elective office. In April, Stringer was consolidating support among progressive politicians and interest groups and seemed to be emerging as the major contender against the moderate Adams and the media-driven Andrew Yang. Accusations of sexual assault against Stringer rocked the entire race and put his campaign on the defensive. Many of Stringer’s progressive supporters rescinded their endorsements of him, taking away his institutional legitimacy. Stringer finished fifth with a mere 6.0% of the first choice vote.
The collapse of Scott Stringer’s campaign after sexual assault allegations made Adams the only viable experienced candidate.
Adams also benefited from the fact that no other elected politicians in New York City chose to run for mayor. The race was limited to just two experienced politicians, and it looked for a moment like the end of the election would be essentially a one-on-one contest between the two. Stringer’s implosion left the City’s progressives looking for a new champion and Adams with a fractured field to beat.
A focus on candidate entry decisions also provides suggests that much of the national media commentary on the New York City mayor’s election, which has focused on the ideology of the candidates, is overstated.
National pundits focused on Adams’s “law and order appeal” and strategy of “staking out resolutely moderate positions that emphasized practical solutions over ideology” as part of a “theory that moderates are the future of the Democratic Party” as voters want “to break away from the most progressive candidates.” Political scientist Raymond La Raja wrote that Adams’s vote coalition “including lower-income voters of color and voters without college degrees — range from liberal to moderate, but more importantly, they are focused on the practicalities of daily life.”
But the focus of lower income voters on the practicalities of daily life suggests that these voters are not strict ideologues and would consider politicians of various ideological proclivities if they can talk convincingly to these voters. In fact, while the more moderate Adams won the Democratic mayoral primary, progressive candidates won nominations to New York’s two other citywide elected positions that same day.
Applying this standpoint to the choices of who runs raises the question of what would have happened if another progressive politician had run as the standard bearer of the left rather than the flawed Stringer.
In particular, one wonders what would have happened if New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez had run in this election. Ocasio-Cortez is stridently progressive, but also has succeeded politically because of her ability to discuss her political views and policy proposals in language that focuses on the “practicalities of daily life.”
Gaming out an AOC mayoral run in 2021 is essentially an exercise in fan fiction, but she certainly would have changed the ideological stakes and the nature of the media coverage of the race. But as an experienced politician, she would certainly have had an advantage over other the other progressive alternatives to Stringer in the race. This may be where the individual preferences of candidates matter most. Ocasio-Cortez may not want to be mayor of New York, but may prefer to be Governor, Senator, or just a long-time member of the US House, and those preferences undoubtedly affected her decision not to run.
Focusing on who runs does not dismiss questions about the failures of New York City progressives to win the election, but shifts the questions away from why they could not consolidate on a single candidate late in the election to why they were not able to identify a progressive champion to enter the race at the beginning, or if they had too many eggs in one basket.
Elections are important statements on the views of voters. But those views are filtered through the candidates that run for office. In the case of the Democratic primary for mayor of New York, the results reflect just as much the experience and campaign skill of the top candidate as much, if not more, than his ideology.
