Carlina Rivera, second from left, is a favorite to be the next speaker of New York’s City Council. Photo-Illustration: Intelligencer; Photo: Rob Kim/GC Images
It’s a great mystery — and to some, a source of anger — that New York has never elected a Latino candidate to citywide or statewide office. In the next few weeks, we’ll discover whether New York’s Democratic leaders will help address the problem by coalescing around one of three Latino candidates for the potent position of City Council Speaker.
It’s been done before: Puerto Rican–born Melissa Mark-Viverito was elevated to Speaker in 2014 with help from newly elected Mayor Bill de Blasio. While it’s only the 51 members of the council who select the speaker, a wide range of special interests will help shape the choice. Party insiders are being explicitly asked to do something similar to make up for the lack of Latino representation at the highest levels of government.
On one level, special political assistance should not be necessary: There’s no shortage of raw political talent in New York’s Latino community. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is one of the best-known members of Congress in America and the youngest woman ever elected to the body. She serves alongside other pioneers: Nydia Velasquez, the first Puerto Rican woman ever elected to Congress; Adriana Espaillat, the first member of Congress to have once been an undocumented immigrant; and Ritchie Torres, who last year became the first openly gay Latino congressman.
That’s not all. In recent years, Mark-Viverito painstakingly helped mastermind the unprecedented election of 31 women to the council, making women legislators a majority for the first time. Antonio Reynoso was just elected as Brooklyn’s first Latino borough president, and Eric Gonzalez easily won re-election as Brooklyn district attorney.
Even with all this ability, no experienced Latino officeholder tried to swing for the fences by running citywide for mayor, comptroller, or public advocate. Ruben Diaz Jr., the Bronx borough president, would have been a front-runner but decided not to enter the contest — and announced he is leaving electoral politics altogether.
The community’s only mayoral candidate in this cycle, Afro-Latina Dianne Morales, had never run before, and in the end got less than 3 percent of the vote in the Democratic primary, finishing sixth in the early rounds of ranked-choice voting.
“It’s a problem because we are not putting things on the agenda that should be put,” says Eli Valentin, an adjunct professor at Union Theological Seminary who is a shrewd observer of Latino politics. “Political participation, which means potentially political power, proper political representation — that stuff is missing.”
The city’s fast-growing Latino population currently makes up 28.3 percent of the overall population and is soon expected to surpass the proportion of white New Yorkers (who are currently 30.9 percent of the city but growing at a much slower rate). If the city’s roughly 2.5 million Latino residents were a single borough, it would be New York’s largest — and the fourth-biggest city in America.
This exploding population has high levels of need. More than half live in poverty, according to city numbers, compared with a third of non-Latinos. Sixty percent of Dominicans and Mexicans — more than one million New Yorkers — live below 200 percent of the federal poverty level, which translates into an annual income of less than $48,500 a year for a family of four.
Latinos make up a disproportionate share of low-wage essential workers, like the deliveristas who bring New Yorkers our food and the carwasheros who scrub vehicles for tips. They have higher-than-average rates of chronic diseases like diabetes. And recent climate catastrophes Superstorm Sandy and Hurricane Ida struck especially hard in Latino communities like Sunset Park, Red Hook, and the Lower East Side.
The combination of high needs and low representation were the subject of the recent Somos el Futuro political conference in Puerto Rico, attended by everyone from Governor Hochul and Mayor-elect Eric Adams to newly elected City Council members, along with an army of donors, party leaders, lobbyists and strategists.
“Hunger, health care, education, housing — those have been the topics of discussion,” Councilwoman Carlina Rivera told me in an interview from San Juan. “There is a brand new class of City Council members that are incoming. So we want to make sure they understand the issues that are affecting the Latino population and, of course, make sure we have equity in representation.”
The City Council speakership — a powerful post with citywide influence — has emerged as a central concern of Latino politicians. Rivera is considered a leading contender for the job, as are councilman Franciso Moya of Queens and Diana Ayala, whose district includes East Harlem and part of the South Bronx.
Each of the three has unique strengths. Rivera, backed by Representative Velasquez, is a progressive who has spent time building relationships with newly-elected left-leaning council members, including at a reception she sponsored for them in Puerto Rico. Moya, who served in the state assembly, is considered close to Adams. And Ayala, a former aide to Mark-Vivierito, is supported by Representative Adriano Espaillat and has a compelling personal story.
“I bring 11 years of legislative experience, both at the state and city level, that can really help drive our economy back and really work with my colleagues to really get our folks back to work,” Moya told me. “I represent the district that was the epicenter of COVID throughout the last 18 months. We’ve seen the clear disparities in our communities, and we need to have someone who can really fight to build a robust budget that is reflective of all New Yorkers, so that we don’t have to go through the same thing that we went through in the last 18 months.”
Ayala’s tough upbringing gives her a special insight into how city agencies work — or don’t — for poor New Yorkers.
“I share the same story as many New Yorkers, unfortunately. I’ve been food insecure, I’ve been homeless twice. I was a teenage parent; my son’s father was shot and killed when I was three months pregnant, the night before my 16th birthday. I dropped out of school, I’ve lost other family members to gun violence,” she told me. “You can check it off — pretty much every social-justice issue that we fight for has been mine. I understand the nuances and government, how social-service programs operate, where they are effective and where we have loopholes. And I think that allows me a distinct voice in this race.”
Three talented contenders who have paid their political dues and represent communities in need. Is there room for one of them at the table of power in progressive New York?
Quebec legislature member Youri Chassin has announced he’s leaving the Coalition Avenir Québec government to sit as an Independent.
He announced the decision shortly after writing an open letter criticizing Premier François Legault’s government for abandoning its principles of smaller government.
In the letter published in Le Journal de Montréal and Le Journal de Québec, Chassin accused the party of falling back on what he called the old formula of throwing money at problems instead of looking to do things differently.
Chassin says public services are more fragile than ever, despite rising spending that pushed the province to a record $11-billion deficit projected in the last budget.
He is the second CAQ member to leave the party in a little more than one week, after economy and energy minister Pierre Fitzgibbon announced Sept. 4 he would leave because he lost motivation to do his job.
Chassin says he has no intention of joining another party and will instead sit as an Independent until the end of his term.
He has represented the Saint-Jérôme riding since the CAQ rose to power in 2018, but has not served in cabinet.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
MONTREAL – NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh says he will not be taking advice from Pierre Poilievre after the Conservative leader challenged him to bring down government.
“I say directly to Pierre Poilievre: I’m not going to listen to you,” said Singh on Wednesday, accusing Poilievre of wanting to take away dental-care coverage from Canadians, among other things.
“I’m not going to listen to your advice. You want to destroy people’s lives, I want to build up a brighter future.”
Earlier in the day, Poilievre challenged Singh to commit to voting non-confidence in the government, saying his party will force a vote in the House of Commons “at the earliest possibly opportunity.”
“I’m asking Jagmeet Singh and the NDP to commit unequivocally before Monday’s byelections: will they vote non-confidence to bring down the costly coalition and trigger a carbon tax election, or will Jagmeet Singh sell out Canadians again?” Poilievre said.
“It’s put up or shut up time for the NDP.”
While Singh rejected the idea he would ever listen to Poilievre, he did not say how the NDP would vote on a non-confidence motion.
“I’ve said on any vote, we’re going to look at the vote and we’ll make our decision. I’m not going to say our decision ahead of time,” he said.
Singh’s top adviser said on Tuesday the NDP leader is not particularly eager to trigger an election, even as the Conservatives challenge him to do just that.
Anne McGrath, Singh’s principal secretary, says there will be more volatility in Parliament and the odds of an early election have risen.
“I don’t think he is anxious to launch one, or chomping at the bit to have one, but it can happen,” she said in an interview.
New Democrat MPs are in a second day of meetings in Montreal as they nail down a plan for how to navigate the minority Parliament this fall.
The caucus retreat comes one week after Singh announced the party has left the supply-and-confidence agreement with the governing Liberals.
It’s also taking place in the very city where New Democrats are hoping to pick up a seat on Monday, when voters go to the polls in Montreal’s LaSalle—Émard—Verdun. A second byelection is being held that day in the Winnipeg riding of Elmwood—Transcona, where the NDP is hoping to hold onto a seat the Conservatives are also vying for.
While New Democrats are seeking to distance themselves from the Liberals, they don’t appear ready to trigger a general election.
Singh signalled on Tuesday that he will have more to say Wednesday about the party’s strategy for the upcoming sitting.
He is hoping to convince Canadians that his party can defeat the federal Conservatives, who have been riding high in the polls over the last year.
Singh has attacked Poilievre as someone who would bring back Harper-style cuts to programs that Canadians rely on, including the national dental-care program that was part of the supply-and-confidence agreement.
The Canadian Press has asked Poilievre’s office whether the Conservative leader intends to keep the program in place, if he forms government after the next election.
With the return of Parliament just days away, the NDP is also keeping in mind how other parties will look to capitalize on the new makeup of the House of Commons.
The Bloc Québécois has already indicated that it’s written up a list of demands for the Liberals in exchange for support on votes.
The next federal election must take place by October 2025 at the latest.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante is defending her decision to turn off comments on her social media accounts — with an announcement on social media.
She posted screenshots to X this morning of vulgar names she’s been called on the platform, and says comments on her posts for months have been dominated by insults, to the point that she decided to block them.
Montreal’s Opposition leader and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association have criticized Plante for limiting freedom of expression by restricting comments on her X and Instagram accounts.
They say elected officials who use social media should be willing to hear from constituents on those platforms.
However, Plante says some people may believe there is a fundamental right to call someone offensive names and to normalize violence online, but she disagrees.
Her statement on X is closed to comments.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
