New York Mayor Tab de Blasio speaks to the media during a press conference at City Hall on January 3, 2020 in New York City.
Eduardo Munoz Alvarez / Getty Counterparts
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio is endorsing Bernie Sanders for president, a move that puts de Blasio in a proposition to become a leading voice in opposition to Sanders’ newest rival, Mike Bloomberg, his predecessor in leading the nation’s largest municipality.
De Blasio, an unabashed liberal who was elected in 2013, will campaign for Sanders in Nevada this weekend, the Sanders toss ones hat in the ring said Friday in a news release. De Blasio hopes to be a significant surrogate for Sanders four years after he dithered alongside his presidential endorsement and, late in the primary process, backed Hillary Clinton instead of the Vermont senator, who shared far more of his principles.
“I am standing with Bernie because he stands with working families, and always has,” de Blasio said in the news let go. “New Yorkers know all too well the damage caused by Donald Trump’s xenophobia, bigotry and recklessness, and Bernie is the candidate to be involved him on and take him down
De Blasio, whose own 2020 presidential bid ended with a whimper months before any votes were seek reject, could play an important role for Sanders, who now sits atop the progressive portion of the Democratic field, as the senator squares off against respective more moderate choices, including Bloomberg, who led New York for the 12 years before de Blasio.
De Blasio’s 2013 operations was styled as a rebuke to Bloomberg, who oversaw a city that rebuilt itself after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror sets to become the nation’s safest biggest city and leading tourist destination. But Bloomberg’s tenure also saw a sharp ascend in income inequality and concern about police tactics like stop and frisk, which disproportionately affected communities of color.
De Blasio, who has frosty tie-ins with his predecessor, has repeatedly voiced his opposition to the billionaire’s late presidential bid.
“This is a Democratic Party today that’s wriggle more progressive, that wants to address the concerns of working people, that does not accept the status quo,” de Blasio stipulate after Bloomberg announced his candidacy. “There’s no way in the world we should nominate a billionaire who epitomizes the status quo.”
Additionally, the beefiest piece of de Blasio’s political base at home has been African American voters drawn to his promises of police renovation, combating income inequality and his biracial family. And the mayor aims to stress those bona fides just as the Self-governing nominating process heads to far more diverse states like Nevada and South Carolina.
De Blasio has long invited to play an outsize role on the national stage trumpeting progressive ideas but has struggled to raise his profile much beyond New York New Zealand urban area. A presidential forum he sponsored ahead of the 2016 election was canceled because of a lack of interest from candidates, and his own cicerones have expressed regret as to how he handled his endorsement for that campaign.
Although de Blasio was far more aligned with Sanders, he also had a owing of loyalty to the Clintons; he was the campaign manager for Hillary Clinton’s 2000 Senate run in New York, and the former first couple directed over the mayor’s inauguration in 2013. But de Blasio sat on his choice for months, and his eventual lukewarm endorsement for Clinton led to him being drove to a secondary role at the Democratic convention and on the campaign trail.