- Andrew Yang and Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams have attracted the financial backing of hedge fund billionaires for the New York City Mayoral race.
- The three billionaires have a “history of funding the most extremist, racist, and anti-democratic forces within the Republican Party,” said a progressive super PAC that opposes Yang and Adams.
- “They’re not satisfied with just owning one candidate — they want two,” warned City Comptroller Scott Stringer, a mayoral candidate running to the left of Yang and Adams.
Igor Derysh, Salon from Rawstory writes:
“General elections in New York City have become almost an afterthought, and nearly everyone assumes that the winner of this month’s Democratic primary will be elected the city’s mayor later this year. It appears that billionaire hedge fund managers who have previously donated millions to conservative Republicans are now using their wealth to try to shape that Democratic primary to their liking — specifically, by blocking a progressive Democrat from becoming mayor of the nation’s largest city.
Former presidential also-ran Andrew Yang and Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, widely seen as the two leading candidates in the crowded New York race, have sometimes tried to claim progressive credentials, something of a necessity in the city’s current political climate. (Although outgoing Mayor Bill de Blasio has become a highly controversial figure, he was handily elected twice while strongly aligned with the progressive movement.)
But Yang and Adams have also attracted the financial backing of hedge fund billionaire Ken Griffin, who spent more than $60 million to back Republicans in last year’s elections, and fellow hedge fund billionaire Dan Loeb, who has given tens of millions to Republican candidates and conservative PACs over the past decade. Yang has also gained the support of libertarian billionaire investor Jeff Yass, who has donated more than $25 million to Republicans and whose company was the main funder of a PAC that pushed the false claim that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from former President Donald Trump.
The three billionaires have a “history of funding the most extremist, racist, and anti-democratic forces within the Republican Party,” said a report from Our City, a progressive super PAC that opposes Yang and Adams.
The longtime investors appear to be hedging their bets in the city’s ranked-choice primary, where voters can rank up to five candidates in order of preference. But Yang and Adams’ progressive rivals, along with many activists, worry that the billionaire right-wingers are trying to buy power in a city where Republicans are virtually an endangered species.
“They’re not satisfied with just owning one candidate — they want two,” City Comptroller Scott Stringer, a mayoral candidate running to the left of Yang and Adams, warned last month…”
See full story here.
Economic Left 
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