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Eric Adams privately indicators he is open to working with Amazon if he turns into mayor

Eric Adams privately signals he's open to working with Amazon if he becomes mayor

Democratic mayoral nominee Eric Adams has privately signaled he’s open to strengthening New York’s relationship with Amazon and other tech giants if he wins election in November, according to people familiar with recent conversations he has had with business leaders.

Adams’ openness to fostering stronger ties with Amazon comes as the e-commerce giant looks to expand its footprint in New York after a deal for a headquarters in Queens was scrapped in 2019.

Adams is favored to win the mayor’s race over Republican Curtis Sliwa.

Amazon bolted on the plan to build in the Long Island City section of Queens after strong resistance from progressive lawmakers, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. Amazon had promised to create at least 25,000 jobs, but critics said the company was getting too many tax breaks and was not involving the local community.

Mayor Bill de Blasio, who was a proponent of the original deal, blasted Amazon after it pulled out, taking direct aim at its billionaire founder and then-CEO Jeff Bezos.

“The retail giant’s expansion in New York encountered opposition in no small part because of growing frustration with corporate America,” de Blasio wrote in a New York Times op-ed at the time. “For decades, wealth and power have concentrated at the very top. There’s no greater example of this than Amazon’s chief executive, Jeff Bezos — the richest man in the world.”

De Blasio and his team were approached in 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic by allies in the business community about resuming high level talks with Amazon, including potentially speaking with Bezos himself, according to a person briefed on the matter. De Blasio signaled he wasn’t interested, this person noted.

These people declined to be named in order to speak freely about private conversations. A spokesperson for de Blasio did not return requests for comment.

Even without the deal, the tech giant and others have found ways to expand in New York. Amazon’s spokesman said it has created more than 34,000 jobs in New York. Google says it plans to invest $250 million in New York with more jobs on the way. Facebook is leasing a ton of New York office space.

Amazon, though, appears to be ready to expand its presence even further. In an email, spokesman Zachary Goldsztejn said Amazon is looking to invest more in the Empire State and work with the local officials, including newly elected leaders. He noted that the company has created over 34,000 jobs in the state.

A spokesman for Adams did not deny that the Democratic nominee is hoping to work with Amazon and other tech behemoths but noted he’s only willing to engage with businesses that have the interests of New Yorkers in mind.

“Eric has made clear that he believes believes businesses of all sizes should be welcome here in New York as long as they have the interests of working people in mind,” Evan Thies, a spokesman for Adams, told CNBC in a statement. “As mayor, Eric will create the environment for business to grow and have a home in order to lift up the middle income and working class New Yorkers who need their economy to work for them.”

Adams himself said during the Democratic primary campaign that he would have supported a deal with Amazon in Long Island City, with certain provisions.

“I would’ve supported building the Amazon deal in Queens with modifications,” Adams told The New York Times at the time. “I would have allowed them [local residents] to be part of the community benefits agreement. Allowed them to be a part of the type of jobs, employments for the young people in that area, the retraining. I would have ensured that we would’ve have decent, prevailing wages, good benefits and New York could’ve led the way. And really, I believe, change the way Amazon’s method of doing business.”

Amazon could also be interested in working with a newly led City Hall for another reason. Its new CEO, Andy Jassy, was raised in suburban Scarsdale.

When he was running Amazon Web Services, Jassy in 2014 returned to the town where he graduated high school to address the community.

Asked who inspired him at the time, Jassy said: “My boss Jeff Bezos,” according to a local news report of the event. “He is the most brilliant thinker I know, he is unbelievably creative, has technical acumen and unusual empathy for the customer.”

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Politics

Might Ron DeSantis Be Trump’s G.O.P. Inheritor? He’s Actually Attempting.

Could Ron DeSantis Be Trump’s G.O.P. Heir? He’s Certainly Trying.

“We have too many people in this party who don’t fight back,” he told the gathering, according to the New York Times audio. “You can’t be afraid of the left, you can’t be afraid of the media, and you can’t be afraid of big tech.”

The governor has also taken steps to bolster his political standing in dealing with the pandemic, calling reporters to the State Capitol to blow it up Wednesday with a slideshow titled “FACTS VS. SMEARS ”- a report in CBS News’ 60 Minutes that contained insufficient evidence of a pay-to-play dynamic between Mr DeSantis’s government and the distribution of Covid-19 vaccines to white and wealthy Floridians.

His records of the virus are indeed mixed. By some standards, Florida has had average pandemic performance that is not over yet. However, his decisions helped ensure that hospitals were not overwhelmed with coronavirus patients. He emphasizes that he helped businesses survive and enabled children to go to school.

What his critics can’t forget, however, is how he defied some key public health guidelines. An article approving masks written under his name by his staff in mid-July was never approved for publication by the governor. The restrictions he is now dismissing as ineffective, such as local mask mandates and curfews that experts say actually worked, have, in most cases, been imposed by Democratic mayors he hardly speaks to.

However, given the way people admire or despise him, the nuances seem secondary.

He enrags passionate critics who believe he is acting wisely to look after his own interests. They fear that this approach has helped confuse public health messages, the preference for vaccines for the rich, and the deaths of some 34,000 Floridians. “DeathSantis” is what they call him. (Mr. DeSantis declined repeated interview requests for this article.)

But almost at every turn, Mr. DeSantis has used the criticism as an opportunity to become an avatar for national conservatives who enjoy the governor’s willingness to fight. He can score points that his potential Washington minority Republican rivals, including Rubio and Senator Rick Scott, his predecessor as governor, can’t.

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Business

He Redefined ‘Racist.’ Now He’s Attempting to Construct a Newsroom.

He Redefined ‘Racist.’ Now He’s Trying to Build a Newsroom.

Dr. Kendi’s book, a memorial argument that Americans of all races must face their role in a racist system, has drawn attention and controversy for pulling the word “racist” out of its current use as a cluttered word for the clearest of cases is reserved. He believes the word should be linked to actions, not people, and should be used to describe supportive guidelines – such as standardized tests – that lead to a racially unequal result. Focusing on the results helped Dr. Kendi came to the center of the long-standing argument about the roots of inequality. But when he published his book, he was prepared for left-wing criticism. It had become an axiom in some circles that black Americans, by definition, cannot be racist. Some of the people who commit racist acts in his book include President Barack Obama and Dr. Kendi himself.

And so, Dr. Kendi’s work influenced a growing debate in the newsroom about the descriptive use of the word as a claim about politics rather than a blurry, charged personal epithet. The 2019 book, and the intense focus on racism following the next year’s assassination of George Floyd, transformed Dr. Kendi also turned from a respected but reluctant academic networker into a mainstream best-selling author whose book sells at Logan’s Airport. He has become what one of his friends called “Captain Black America” ​​- a black academic or journalist who becomes the lightning rod of law and the object of white liberal worship, as Ta-Nehisi Coates wrote on his article on the 2014 Atlantic made reparation.

“If he didn’t exist, his critics would have to invent him because he’s a person to target,” said New York writer Jelani Cobb.

Self-promotion is for Dr. Kendi cannot be taken for granted. On his way home to put his daughter to bed on Thursday, he playfully underwent a brief interview in the lobby of a Boston University building that was double-masked and wore three layers of wool against the cold rain. While I waited, I read on Twitter about Alexi McCammond, a young black woman who had to step down as the new editor of Teen Vogue after a controversy over racist tweets about Asians sent as a teenager. I asked him how his view that “racist” is not a permanent label for individual places with an unforgiving social media culture and a growing corporate culture that has translated his work into formalized training – the subject of a recent critical statement in Globus .

Dr. Kendi said he would not “police” the way people use his work. “People should be held accountable for being racist, but I think people should be able to repair the damage,” he said. “I don’t see ‘racist’ as a fixed category.” He added that he did not believe that “if someone said something racist 20 years ago, or even two days ago, that right now, at this moment, they are racist too”.

That’s not how most Americans or reporters use the word. But it has a clarity and flexibility that make it valuable whether you choose Dr. Kendi’s broader worldview, which includes extensive criticism of American capitalism. And the emancipator is interesting in part because he offers the opportunity to translate his ideas into journalistic practice.