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The Ezra Klein Show

Eric Adams Has a Message for the Democratic Party

The Ezra Klein Show

New York Times Opinion

Society & Culture, Government, News

4.611K Ratings

🗓️ 1 October 2021

⏱️ 49 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In July, Eric Adams narrowly won the Democratic nomination for mayor of New York, making him the odds-on favorite to win in November. And he won the nomination by running directly against the verities of today’s progressives: asserting that the police are the answer, not the problem; that “defund the police” misjudged what communities of color actually want; that Democrats had lost touch with the multiracial working-class voters they claim to represent. Adams won on that message. He won in deep-blue New York City. It’s made him a national figure, and he’s been emphatic on what that means. “I am the face of the new Democratic Party,” he said. And “if the Democratic Party fails to recognize what we did here in New York, they’re going to have a problem in the midterm elections and they’re going to have a problem in the presidential election.” When politicians become national stories, they often release, or rerelease, a book. Adams is no exception. But instead of a campaign manifesto or an autobiography, “Healthy at Last” is a book about the health benefits of plant-based eating. “Outspoken vegan” isn’t a political identity I tend to associate with ambitious politicians at odds with the progressive wing of the Democratic Party, but that’s Adams for you. He doesn’t shy away from a fight. In this conversation, Adams and I talk about the fights he is picking, or will have to pick, in the coming years: with progressives who he thinks have lost their way, with police unions he wants to reform, with wealthy communities where he wants to build more housing, with critics who think plant-based eating is a hobby for foodie elites and with voters who may not be willing to wait for Adams’s “upstream” approach to social problems to pay off. Book Recommendations: Healthy At Last by Eric Adams Breaking The Habit of Being Yourself by Joe Dispenza You Are The Placebo by Joe Dispenza Upstream by Dan Heath Atomic Habits by James Clear You can find transcripts (posted midday) and more episodes of "The Ezra Klein Show" at nytimes.com/ezra-klein-podcast, and you can find Ezra on Twitter @ezraklein. Book recommendations from our guests are listed at https://www.nytimes.com/article/ezra-klein-show-book-recs. Thoughts? Guest suggestions? Email us at [email protected]. “The Ezra Klein Show” is produced by Annie Galvin, Jeff Geld and Rogé Karma; fact-checking by Michelle Harris; original music by Isaac Jones; mixing by Jeff Geld, audience strategy by Shannon Busta. Special thanks to Kristin Lin.

Transcript

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0:00.0

I'm Mr. Client and this is the Ezra Clancho.

0:20.7

In July, Eric Adams triumphed over a crowded field to win democratic nomination for mayor of

0:26.5

New York City.

0:27.9

He's heavily, heavily favored now to win the general election too.

0:32.0

And that might sound like a New York only story to you.

0:35.2

But Adams campaign became this strange bellweather at a moment when the left seemed as a descendant

0:40.8

in the Democratic Party.

0:42.5

When DeFund the police was still a buzzing slogan and Biden's victory was considered the

0:48.6

last gasp of Obamaism, the kind of thing only Obama's vice president could pull off.

0:54.2

Adams campaign read and was framed by him as a challenge to the progressive politics

0:59.6

of the moment.

1:00.8

Here was a black former cop who said police were the answer, not just a problem.

1:05.5

He warned that the Democrats had lost touch with the working class voters of all races

1:09.6

who feared disorder in their cities.

1:12.4

And then he won.

1:13.4

He won with a working class multiracial coalition, the other Democrats promised they'd be the

1:19.8

ones to put together.

1:22.3

And politicians have a really fast rise in stature when they go from local to national

1:27.1

story.

1:28.1

They often publish or republish book.

1:30.9

And Adams is no different here.

1:32.9

But the book that's coming out now in paperback is it's not a biography, it's not a policy

...

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