| | | | |  | | By Irie Sentner, Madina Touré, Jeff Coltin and Nick Reisman | | Presented by |  | | | |  Hundreds of protesters drowned out the speaker’s remarks, shouting “Mike, you suck,” “Who are you people?” and “Free Palestine.” | Timothy A. Clary/AFP/Getty Images | NEW YORK MINUTE: President Joe Biden is coming to New York today with good news for upstate, but with a tumultuous time in New York City — the discord at Columbia University and his foe, former President Donald Trump, on trial. Biden will be in Syracuse to announce a $6.1 billion agreement that will fund workforce hubs in Upstate New York and Idaho through the CHIPS and Science Act. Then he’ll be going to a fundraiser in Westchester. — Katelyn Cordero BLASTING THE SPEAKER: House Speaker Mike Johnson stood on the steps of Columbia University’s Low Library Wednesday afternoon and, overlooking the school’s Gaza Solidarity Encampment, promised to demand Biden take action to clear it, including potentially calling in the National Guard. POLITICO has the story. Hundreds of protesters, who have refused to move for over a week, shouted back, drowning out the speaker’s remarks. “Mike, you suck!” and “who are you people?” they cried between chants of “free Palestine.” The encampment — whose demonstrators are calling on Columbia to divest from Israel and provide amnesty to students suspended for protest activity — has thrown the Ivy League school into turmoil this week. As critics have condemned it, solidarity encampments have popped up on dozens of other campuses nationwide. In the latest domestic flashpoint in the ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict, police in the past week have arrested over 100 protesters at Columbia, 120 at New York University and dozens at Yale University and the University of Texas at Austin. “This is dangerous. This is not the First Amendment, this is not free expression,” Johnson said, repeating his calls for Columbia’s embattled president, Minouche Shafik, to step down. Johnson, House Education Committee Chair Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) and GOP New York Reps. Mike Lawler, Anthony D'Esposito and Nicole Malliotakis met with Shafik and Jewish students at Columbia before the news conference. “After listening to her comments inside, it is clear she has no intention of getting this university under control,” Lawler said of Shafik, calling for her to “resign in disgrace.” Shafik testified before the House Education Committee last Wednesday. Although she initially appeared to handle the grilling better than her Harvard University and University of Pennsylvania peers who resigned last year, the surge in pro-Palestinian protests and some highly publicized antisemitic incidents at Columbia have prompted growing calls for her ouster. “I have a message for President Shafik and a message for you all too: The inmates are running the asylum,” said Foxx. Hundreds of demonstrators booed. Columbia spokesperson Ben Chang emphasized in a Zoom press briefing after the event that “the current protest is in violation of university rules, full stop,” and that officials were taking action to end it. Late Tuesday night, Shafik wrote in a universitywide email that she was negotiating with demonstrators. “I very much hope these discussions are successful,” Shafik wrote. “If they are not, we will have to consider alternative options for clearing the West Lawn and restoring calm to campus.” At 4:09 a.m. on Wednesday, the Office of the President wrote in another universitywide email that it would continue negotiations for 48 hours. The email added that demonstrators had already committed to “removing a significant number of tents,” ensuring non-affiliates leave the encampment, complying with FDNY rules and prohibiting “discriminatory or harassing language.” — Irie Sentner and Madina Touré HAPPY THURSDAY: Got news? Send it our way: Jeff Coltin, Emily Ngo and Nick Reisman.
| | | | A message from Uber: Drivers with Uber are leading EV adoption. Key fact to know this Earth Month: Drivers with Uber are switching to electric cars seven times faster than everyday drivers. That progress has multiplier impact because when one Uber driver starts using an EV, they deliver up to four times the emissions benefits compared to regular motorists. Learn more about this trend. | | | WHERE’S KATHY? In Syracuse greeting Biden at Hancock International Airport, then joining him and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to make a CHIPS announcement. WHERE’S ERIC? Appearing live on NY1’s “Mornings on 1,” PIX11’s “PIX11 Morning News,” CBS News New York’s streaming network, 1010 WINS’ “Morning Drive” and FOX5’s “Good Day New York,” traveling to Atlanta for the African American Mayors Association’s annual conference, calling in live on SiriusXM Urban View Channel 126’s “Keepin’ It Real With Rev. Al Sharpton” and attending the conference’s welcome luncheon, “Mayoral Strategies for Safer Cities” panel, legacy awards reception, legacy awards gala and other activities. QUOTE OF THE DAY: “It was pretty shocking to see it show up in the last couple hours of this fight,” Assemblymember Jessica González-Rojas, in POLITICO’s report on how the mayoral control deal got into the state budget.
|  | ABOVE THE FOLD | | | | 
The city's budget to build four borough-based jails to replace Rikers Island is now about double initial projections. | Bebeto Matthews/AP | CRIME DOESN’T PAY — WE DO: The city is now budgeting $16 billion to build the four new jails to replace Rikers Island — about double the initial projections. “The price tag, it has gone up in an unbelievable manner,” Adams said when asked about the new total, which was included in the city’s executive capital budget published Wednesday. He blamed it in part on delays and rising costs due to the COVID pandemic. Budget Director Jacques Jiha had cited the ballooning costs for the need to raise the city’s borrowing authority — which was granted in the state budget. Adams administration has recently been clear there’s no way they’re going to finish building the jails by the planned 2027 deadline. But the mayor is caught in a stalemate with the council, which doesn’t want to give an inch on closing the notoriously bad jails on Rikers Island. Adams added he met with Speaker Adrienne Adams and her team two weeks ago to talk about how the roughly 4,000 beds planned for the new jails aren’t enough. He insisted he was interested in cooperating with the council and the revived Lippman commission on coordinating a path forward. “The rising cost of the borough-based jails is worrying and concerning,” said Council Criminal Justice Chair Sandy Nurse. “This does not excuse the mayor from investing in the strategies that safely reduce the jail population.” — Jeff Coltin
| | | | THE GOLD STANDARD OF POLICY REPORTING & INTELLIGENCE: POLITICO has more than 500 journalists delivering unrivaled reporting and illuminating the policy and regulatory landscape for those who need to know what’s next. Throughout the election and the legislative and regulatory pushes that will follow, POLITICO Pro is indispensable to those who need to make informed decisions fast. The Pro platform dives deeper into critical and quickly evolving sectors and industries—finance, defense, technology, healthcare, energy—equipping policymakers and those who shape legislation and regulation with essential news and intelligence from the world’s best politics and policy journalists.
Our newsroom is deeper, more experienced, and better sourced than any other—with teams embedded in the world’s most active legislative and regulatory power centers. From Brussels to Washington, New York to London, Sacramento to Paris, we bring subscribers inside the conversations that determine policy outcomes and the future of industries, providing insight that cannot be found anywhere else. Get the premier news and policy intelligence service, SUBSCRIBE TO POLITICO PRO TODAY. | | | | | | | CITY HALL: THE LATEST | | | | 
Mayor Eric Adams has added $2.2 billion to his budget plan since January. | Michael Appleton/Mayoral Photography Office | HOW MUCH?: $2.2 billion more. That’s how much revenue Adams added to his budget plan between January and Wednesday’s executive budget announcement. And that increase is lower than some of the projections highlighted by Playbook Wednesday. Municipal bean counters are now anticipating $1.6 billion more in tax revenue will flow into the city’s coffers in the upcoming fiscal year, POLITICO reports. There’s also a previously announced $586 million reduction in planned spending on migrant services. But the Citizens Budget Commission was quick to remind us that Adams’ numbers don’t actually reflect reality. “While an expanding economy brightens the revenue outlook, low-balled expenditures still cloud the city’s fiscal picture,” CBC President Andrew Rein said. — Jeff Coltin & Joe Anuta INTO THE 21ST CENTURY: City employees have full access to their payroll website, a full month after it was taken partially offline to protect workers from a phishing scheme. More than 300,000 city employees who use the site and its straight-from-the–‘90s design to track their hours and check their paystubs. They got an email Tuesday that access on the internet had been restored — though they now needed two-step verification to log on. The city limited access to the site to only people on the city’s intranet without explanation last month, POLITICO first reported. – Jeff Coltin More from the city: — Months before CCRB Chair Arva Rice was pushed out the door, Deputy Mayor Phil Banks took a lead role in pressing for her removal. (Daily News) — The Correction Department reported just 246 allegations of sexual assault in one year under a federal mandate, even though detainees filed nearly 1,400 grievances. (Gothamist) — City public schools would see their budget shrink by 2.4 percent, or $808 million, next fiscal year under Adams’ executive budget. (Chalkbeat)
| | | | A message from Uber:   | | | | | NEW FROM PLANET ALBANY | | |  Local industrial development agencies have a “perverse incentive” to strike more abatement deals, watchdog groups say. | Matthew Brown/AP | A TAXING CONCERN: Local industrial development agencies are coming under scrutiny from two watchdog organizations. Reinvent Albany, a New York-based good-government group, and the nationally focused Good Jobs First is releasing a report today highlighting what they charge is the detrimental impact of IDAs on tax revenue for local governments and schools. IDAs are quasi-public entities that typically operate as facilitators for municipalities that want to attract new businesses. They offer tax incentives for companies that in turn bring jobs to an area. But the report takes aim at IDAs receiving much of their funding from “deal fees” they receive for abatements. Revenue from those fees, in turn, cover the agencies’ operating income like staff salaries and benefits as well as consultant costs. But the watchdog groups argue this creates what amounts to a “perverse incentive” of IDAs being driven to strike more abatement deals. And those tax breaks in New York can cost school districts big — at least $1.8 billion in 2021, the report found. “New York should take a hard look at IDAs and question why so much power is being delegated to unelected officials whose activities take place outside of the constitutional budget process and whose staff salaries depend upon giving away tax revenue,” Ron Deutsch, a senior policy fellow at Reinvent Albany, said. The report proposed direct funding for IDAs by local governments and also to block IDAs from offering abatements for property taxes – a major driver of revenue for schools in New York. “The power to abate taxes should always reside with people who can be held accountable at election time,” Greg LeRoy, the executive director of Good Jobs First. “And people negotiating tax abatements should never have an institutional or personal self-interest in undermining the tax base for basic public services that benefit all employers.” — Nick Reisman IVF PROTECTION: New York Attorney General Tish James wants federal action to guarantee access to in-vitro fertilization and other assisted reproductive technologies. James on Wednesday released a letter her office sent to key members of Congress to take “proactive steps” to ensure access to IVF and other procedures. Signing onto the letter included 21 of James’ fellow attorneys general from around the country. “Choosing to start or grow a family is a deeply personal and important decision,” she said in a statement. “Everyone should have the freedom to access the reproductive health care they need to make their dreams of building a family a reality.” The letter comes after an Alabama court earlier this year ruled frozen embryos are children, igniting a firestorm over the issue. — Nick Reisman More from Albany: — A private equity firm stands to benefit from the state’s cannabis sector, with the government taking on all the risk. (THE CITY) — The Building Trades Council has been largely silent since the housing package was approved. (City & State)
| | KEEPING UP WITH THE DELEGATION | | | 
Rep. Brandon Williams publicly pushed President Joe Biden to delay his visit to his district. | Alex Brandon/AP | LET’S NOT GO, BRANDON: Biden is in Rep. Brandon Williams’ district today, but the Republican won’t be joining, on principle. He publicly pushed Biden to delay the visit, arguing that local law enforcement officers were still recovering after two cops were shot and killed last week. “The grant he is coming to tout is worth celebrating,” he said in a statement, “but that must wait until the men and women of our local law enforcement have had time to properly mourn.” First in Playbook, Democratic super PAC Battleground New York said Williams shouldn’t be there anyway, since he’s “put his MAGA ideology ahead of the district.” “If Brandon Williams and his boss Mike Johnson had their way, none of the jobs, investment and opportunity that are being announced would have ever materialized and that’s why he’s going to lose in November.” Williams’ spokesperson scoffed, and said he’s fought like hell for Micron to get its piece of the pie, and would have been a rare Republican vote for the CHIPS and Science Act if he were in office at the time. — Jeff Coltin CRYPTO FOR KENNEDY: That would be state Sen. Tim Kennedy, the favored candidate to win Tuesday’s special election for a western New York House seat vacated by fellow Democratic Rep. Brian Higgins. Kennedy’s bid for the Buffalo seat is being aided by Protect Progress, one of three super PACs affiliated with the cryptocurrency industry. The group plans to spend $65,000 on a TV ad touting Kennedy’s record in Albany – which, though not in the ad, so happened to include voting against a cryptocurrency mining ban in 2022. — Joseph Spector More from Congress: — Republican Mike Sapraicone’s ties to two wrongful conviction cases could become campaign fodder for his opponents as he challenges U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand. (Newsday) — Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is emerging as a key surrogate for Biden’s reelection campaign for young people and progressives. (The Hill)
| | NEW YORK STATE OF MIND | | — Nearly 1,000 of New York City’s 8,500 sidewalk sheds have been in place for more than three years, city records show. (New York Times) — A state Senate candidate in Clay helped rescue a driver whose car had plunged into a pond. (CNY Central) — Clare Bronfman, a loyalist to Albany’s NXIVM cult, was denied her bid for a lighter sentence for pleading guilty to identity fraud and conspiring to conceal and harbor undocumented immigrants for financial gain. (Times Union)
| | | | A message from Uber: Uber Drivers Accelerate Electric Vehicle Shift
As Earth Month spotlights sustainability, a noteworthy trend emerges: Uber drivers are adopting electric vehicles seven times faster than the average driver. For every driver on the Uber platform who switches to an EV, the emissions savings are quadrupled compared to what typical drivers would achieve.
This shift didn’t just happen. It’s part of Uber’s commitment to ensuring that, by 2030, 100% of trips on its platform in the US are in zero-emission vehicles or through micromobility and public transport. Now drivers with Uber are leading the way in advancing clean energy transportation.
Discover more about how Uber is going green. | | | | | SOCIAL DATA | | Edited by Daniel Lippman SPOTTED: At Page Six gossip doyenne Cindy Adams’s 94th birthday party at her Park Avenue apartment, Per NY Mag’s Shawn McCreesh on X.: Hochul, Andrew Cuomo, Adams, Woody Allen and Soon-Yi Previn, Al Sharpton, Kellyanne Conway, Bill O’Reilly, Don Lemon, News Corp’s Robert Thomson and Post EIC Keith Poole. FOR SALE: Ex-Eric Adams aide Frank Carone lists Mill Basin mansion for $6.9M, The Real Deal reports. … Highlights of the seven-bedroom, waterfront pad include a wine cellar and “a dual-level backyard with a saltwater pool, cabana and wood-burning pizza oven.” MEDIAWATCH: CNN’s Gloria Pazmino, a former POLITICO New York reporter, has been promoted to network correspondent. MAKING MOVES — Keecha Gardner has been named the first chief advancement officer at the New York Climate Exchange. She most recently was SVP of development at the Environmental Defense Fund. HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Geoff Bennett … Patrick Mellody … Jaclyn Rothenberg
| | YOUR NEW YORK NUMBER OF THE DAY | | | | | | | | | DON’T MISS POLITICO’S ENERGY SUMMIT: The future of energy faces a crossroads in 2024 as policymakers and industry leaders shape new rules, investments and technologies. Join POLITICO’s Energy Summit on June 5 as we convene top voices to examine the shifting global policy environment in a year of major elections in the U.S. and around the world. POLITICO will examine how governments are writing and rewriting new rules for the energy future and America’s own role as a major exporter. REGISTER HERE. | | | | | | | | | Subscribe to the POLITICO Playbook family Playbook | Playbook PM | California Playbook | Florida Playbook | Illinois Playbook | Massachusetts Playbook | New Jersey Playbook | New York Playbook | Ottawa Playbook | Brussels Playbook | London Playbook View all our political and policy newsletters | | Follow us | | | | |
Comments
Post a Comment