What NYC's Most Powerful CEOs Think About Zohran Mamdani

SPEAKER_2 (0:02)

Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, Radio, News.

Joe Weisenthal (0:18)

Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Odd Lots podcast. I'm Joe Weisenthal.

Tracy Alloway (0:23)

And I'm Tracy Alloway.

Joe Weisenthal (0:25)

Former Odd Lots guest is very likely to be the next mayor of New York City.

Tracy Alloway (0:29)

That's right. So we interviewed Zohran Mamdani. I think it was in early May, and right after that, I'm not saying, I'm not gonna take credit for this, but right after that, he really started to surge in the polls, and he went on to win the Democratic nomination.

Joe Weisenthal (0:44)

I think we get very, very minor credit for that.

Tracy Alloway (0:47)

I'm sure it was a coincidence.

Joe Weisenthal (0:48)

The thing, actually, that struck me after that episode was hearing from a lot of people who were basically like, I don't like any of his ideas at all, but I still like the guy, and I still found him impressive and intelligent and very strong understanding of policy. And look, I don't think his victory is attributable to us, but I did think that was telling in the sense that a lot of people who may be on paper shouldn't or wouldn't really like some of his views didn't seem particularly threatened by him, which I thought was really interesting and may have contributed to his extraordinary margin, his extraordinary victory.

Tracy Alloway (1:29)

I do think what's interesting about this whole story is the tension between New York City as this hub of capitalism, this hub of business. You have a lot of money here, a lot of billionaires, obviously, with their own interests, and now you have this Democratic Socialist candidate who's proposing something a little bit new, although some people would say we had something more similar to that in, say, the 1950s, 1960s New York. But that tension is what I find really fascinating right now.

Joe Weisenthal (1:57)

Yeah, so we have to learn more. I mean, again, in the run up to the election, what are New York City's business, financial elites thinking right now? What do they think of a possible Mamdani mayoralty? What do they think about New York City in general? All of this stuff, there's a lot to learn. This is going to be a rich vein of interesting stuff for us for a while.

Tracy Alloway (2:19)

We're going all New York local politics, I guess. But I do think it has national consequences.

Joe Weisenthal (2:24)

International.

Tracy Alloway (2:24)

So we should talk about it.

Joe Weisenthal (2:25)

We should definitely talk about it. Anyway, I'm really excited. We do have, indeed, the perfect guest to talk about how the city's business, elite, billionaires, et cetera, are thinking about the city, think about the election, the possibility of Mamdani being the mayor. We're going to be speaking with Kathy Wylde. She's the president and CEO of the Partnership for New York City, which is an organization, a business leadership organization here, all kinds of major employers. If you read any article about Kathy in the media, describe this one of the ultimate power brokers of New York City.

Tracy Alloway (3:02)

Yeah. Words like power brokers, power player comes up a lot.

Joe Weisenthal (3:06)

In every single one, and so truly the perfect guess. So, Kathy, thank you so much for coming on Odd Lots.

Kathy Wylde (3:11)

Thank you for having me, Joe and Tracy.

Joe Weisenthal (3:12)

Absolutely. We're really excited. Why don't you, just before we move on, describe what the Partnership for New York City is and what you basically do there.

Kathy Wylde (3:21)

The Partnership is business working in the interests of the city. It's not a chamber of commerce. It was organized after the city's 1975 physical crisis by David Rockefeller, who was then the chair of Chase Bank, and other CEOs of the major corporations that were not just businesses headquartered in New York, but were real citizens of New York, and trustees of its hospitals and museums, and real contributors to the city as philanthropists. So it is very much a business organization that is designed to tap the expertise and the influence of the business community to support New York City, and to maintain it as the city of great economic opportunity.

Tracy Alloway (4:09)

What's the partnerships relationship like typically with the mayoral administration? And are there examples where you've worked together to effectively do something, or maybe change the path of policy?

Kathy Wylde (4:22)

Well, absolutely. The partnerships relationship to government is really as an intermediary between business and government. As I said, to provide expertise, to provide advice, to give feedback, really to be a resource more than an adversary of with the local government in particular, local, state government, and to some extent the federal government when there are overriding issues that make a big impact on New York that are being considered in Washington.