NEW YORK (1010 WINS) – Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Saturday endorsed civil rights attorney Maya Wiley in the race for New York City mayor.
Ocasio-Cortez made the endorsement at a press conference outside City Hall, where she also endorsed City Council candidates.
“We have an option of a candidate who can center people, racial justice, economic justice, and climate justice—that didn’t just come up to run for mayor but has experience and has a lifetime of dedication to this. And that candidate is Maya Wiley,” Ocasio-Cortez said.
“Maya Wiley is our number one choice,” she said, referring to ranked choice voting. “I'm putting Maya No. 1.”
AOC retweeted a tweet from Wiley announcing the endorsement.
“Nobody says change like AOC,” Wiley tweeted. “And with AOC’s help we are going to win this race and bring the change we need to the city we love.”
The endorsement should help Wiley, a former legal counsel in the administration of Mayor Bill de Blasio, as she looks to boost her campaign and capture progressive votes with just weeks to go before the primary election.
Brooklyn borough president Eric Adams, entrepreneur and former presidential candidate Andrew Yang, and former city sanitation commissioner Kathryn Garcia have emerged as the apparent frontrunners in the Democratic race.
Adams released a statement following the endorsement: “Rep. Ocasio-Cortez and Maya Wiley want to slash the police department budget and shrink the police force at a time when Black and brown babies are being shot in our streets, hate crimes are terrorizing Asian and Jewish communities, and innocent New Yorkers are being stabbed and shot on their way to work.”
“They are putting slogans and politics in front of public safety and would endanger the lives of New Yorkers,” Adams said.
While the primary election is on June 22, early voting starts June 12 and runs through June 20.
For the first time, the city will be using ranked choice voting, which lets voters pick up to five candidates and rank them in order of preference. That means a candidate could still win even if trailing in an initial round, if enough people selected them as their second choice.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.