NYC mayoral candidates decry Charlie Kirk’s assassination, including Mamdani at Jewish event

This piece first ran as part of The Countdown, our daily newsletter rounding up all the developments in the New York City mayor’s race. Sign up here to get it in your inbox. There are 54 days to the election.

🕯 Mamdani pays tribute to Charlie Kirk

• Our reporter Joseph Strauss caught Zohran Mamdani on Wednesday night night at the annual gala of Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, a left-wing, pro-Palestinian nonprofit. Ilana Glazer, a Jewish actor who joined a boycott of Israeli film institutions this week, introduced Mamdani and ally Brad Lander — the Jewish city comptroller who cross-endorsed him in the primary — as the night’s honorees.

• Mamdani opened his remarks with a tribute to conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who was fatally shot while speaking at Utah Valley University earlier in the day. “It cannot be a question of political agreement or alignment that allows us to mourn,” he said. “It must be the shared notion of humanity that binds us all.”

• Mamdani’s opponents Andrew Cuomo, Mayor Eric Adams and Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa also mourned Kirk’s death and the trend of political violence in the United States in statements.

• In Mamdani’s speech, he also said his primary victory “was a lesson that so many in this city are horrified by the genocide being perpetrated by the Israeli military in Gaza, by the violence being inflicted — using weapons paid for by our tax dollars as Americans — and the suffering that we see on a daily basis.”

• The event in the Sunset Park neighborhood of Brooklyn featured banners with messages including, “Jews say: No genocide, no deportations, no anti-trans hate” and “Arms embargo now.” Some attendees wore keffiyehs and shirts reading, “Not in our name.”

💰 Cuomo returns donation from a rabbi’s 5-year-old son

• Some of the campaign donations that allowed Cuomo to unlock public matching funds came from minors — including the 5-year-old son of Rabbi Marc Schneier, a close friend of Cuomo’s who regularly hosts him at his synagogue in the Hamptons.

• A donation of $250 in the boy’s name was made on March 6, allowing Cuomo to secure $2,000 in matching funds, according to records seen by the New York Daily News. A few days earlier, Schneier contributed the legal max of $2,100 to Cuomo’s campaign.

• Seeking matching funds on donations from anyone under 18 violates the Campaign Finance Board’s rules. Schneier said they recognized there was a mistake, adding that Cuomo “is like family to us” and “our son wanted to help out like mommy and daddy.”

• Cuomo’s spokesperson said the 5-year-old’s donation was being refunded and the related matching funds would also be deducted.

📊 Numbers to know

• Yet another poll yesterday showed Mamdani holding a wide lead. The Quinnipiac survey gave Mamdani 45% support among likely voters, followed by Cuomo with 23%, Sliwa with 15% and Adams with 12%.

• Quinnipiac’s results also appeared to suggest that Jewish voters strongly favor Adams. But the pollsters didn’t emphasize the finding, which would be starkly out of step with other polls of Jewish sentiment. We’re reaching out to understand better.

👀 Adams contemplates an out

• While Adams keeps saying in public that he won’t quit the race, he may be telling a different story behind closed doors.

• In a meeting with about 20 city leaders yesterday, he said he would conduct his own poll “to make a decision,” sources told NBC New York. (Eight weeks out from election day, Adams is the lowest-polling candidate in a string of surveys.)

• He also reiterated his dislike for Cuomo, whose associates have pressured Adams to drop out so that Cuomo has a better chance of beating Mamdani. But Adams told the room, “I love the city more than I dislike Andrew.”