| | | | |  | | By Jeff Coltin, Nick Reisman and Emily Ngo | With help from Irie Sentner
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A form New York City electeds must fill out to reach agency staff is potentially illegal, charged Council Member Governmental Operations Chair Lincoln Restler. | Mark Lennihan/AP | The “engagement request form” that electeds have to fill out to reach New York City agency staff isn’t just annoying — it might be illegal. Amid an already brewing battle over the appointment of Randy Mastro as the city’s top lawyer, one of Mayor Eric Adams’ least favorite council members laid the groundwork for another legal fight. “What legal authority does the mayor have to interfere with mayoral agencies’ ability to advise and assist the City Council and other elected officials as is guaranteed in the City Charter?” Council Governmental Operations Chair Lincoln Restler asked in an oversight hearing on the form Wednesday. Agency heads work for the whole city, not just the mayor, so bottlenecking and controlling access to them through a Google form could violate that principle, he argued. “We’re evaluating potential legislation and consulting with legal experts on their analysis of the Charter,” Restler told Playbook after the hearing, not ruling out a lawsuit. “We firmly disagree with your interpretation of this,” responded Adams’ Director of Intergovernmental and External Affairs Tiffany Raspberry, who was grilled by the council for well over an hour Wednesday. “We see agencies and commissioners not as separate entities, but extensions of City Hall and as full partners of the Adams administration,” Raspberry added. So of course they can impose the policy, which, by the way, is “aimed at efficient and equitable engagement,” so that all elected officials can get through to agency heads, not just those that have been around city government for a long time, and have built up contacts, like Restler. There have already been 182 requests submitted through the form, including 51 requests from 23 council offices, Raspberry said — despite some electeds across the political spectrum saying they’d boycott it. Restler’s oversight hearing featured theatrical flourishes, and aggressive questioning, and came at a moment of heightened tension between the Council and City Hall. (Yes, it feels like tensions somehow get heightened more every month.) The council is standing firm in opposition to Mastro, Adams’ favored choice for corporation counsel. He could, in theory, represent the mayor’s office if the council sued over the form. But Restler didn’t think Mastro would get past council approval. “Every time the mayor and the speaker have been in conflict, the speaker has won,” he said. “I wouldn’t bet against Adrienne Adams.” — Jeff Coltin HAPPY THURSDAY: Got news? Send it our way: Jeff Coltin, Emily Ngo and Nick Reisman.
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|  | ABOVE THE FOLD | | | 
Campus protests have exploded at the end of the academic year as activists make a final push for their universities to divest from Israel before the fall term. | Madina Touré/POLITICO | MAYDAY MAY DAY: From Fordham to Foley Square, pro-Palestinian protesters Wednesday sent an unequivocal message, POLITICO reports: Demonstrations would not be subdued by mass arrests. Campus protests have exploded at the end of the academic year, after viral images of law enforcement’s forceful responses and students’ resistance circulated on social media, inspiring activists to make a final push for their universities to divest from Israel before the fall term. In New York, that included Columbia, City College and Fordham, where an indoor encampment that protesters set up earlier in the morning had, by 6 p.m. been shut down, with 15 people arrested. “This isn’t about Columbia or CUNY students,” said a pro-Palestinian protester at Fordham, who declined to give their name. “This is about what’s happening in Gaza. This is about the genocide, and we’re bringing awareness to the fact that universities are profiting off of the genocide.” Adams agreed it wasn’t all about the students. He continued to insist that “outside agitators” were responsible for escalating demonstrations at Columbia, POLITICO reports. He declined to provide much evidence to support their claim, but it has twin political benefits: justifying mass arrests on campus and providing cover to the embattled university president who asked police to stay through graduation. People who weren’t students did join, of course — like Manolo De Los Santos, executive director of The People’s Forum, a leftist organization, who protested at Fordham. But he brushed off the mayor’s words. “It’s like a McCarthyite gimmick, ‘outside agitators,’” he said. “The students organized this themselves. They called the community to respond. And we’ve responded.” — Jeff Coltin, Madina Touré and Irie Sentner NIGHTMARE ON 116TH STREET: Don’t miss POLITICO New York intern Irie Sentner’s writing on being a Columbia senior, reporting on the demonstrations, caught in the campus crossfire.
| | CITY HALL: THE LATEST | | | | 
City Hall is looking into ways to decrease warehouse emissions. | POLITICO | NYC EYES WAREHOUSE EMISSIONS: The Adams administration is mulling more ways to tackle warehouse emissions, Playbook has learned. The C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, Inc., a network of mayors working on tackling climate challenges, is commissioning a study of the potential impact of an “indirect source rule” on health-harming pollution from trucks traveling to and from warehouses in New York City, which are disproportionately likely to impact Black, Hispanic and low-income families. "This is early days — we are just beginning to explore what Indirect Source Rule could do for our city. But one thing is certain — climate change is this generation's most urgent fight which requires all of us,” said Deputy Mayor for Operations Meera Joshi in a statement. “This study will help us understand the potential impacts on communities that have historically borne the brunt of pollution, as well as the private sector." Queens state Sen. Mike Gianaris, a Democrat, has pushed state legislation to institute indirect source rules that force warehouse operators, including e-commerce giants like Amazon, to take responsibility for the emissions from delivery vehicles. The concept has backing from groups including the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance. — Marie J. French FLAG ON THE PLAY: If there’s one man in New York City who loves raising other countries’ flags, it’s Adams. So it’s hard to imagine even he agreed with himself Wednesday in a desperate defense of the NYPD’s bravado around taking down a Palestinian flag put up by protesters at CCNY and replacing it with an American flag. “It's despicable that schools will allow another country’s flag to fly in our country. So blame me for being proud to be an American,” he said at a press conference. “We’re not surrendering our way of life to anyone.” A City Hall spokesperson defended the situation as totally different than Adams’ near-weekly flag raisings and cultural events where he celebrates and waves other nation’s flags. And it is. But his actual words were roundly criticized online for seeming to betray New York City’s spirit of cultural celebration — not to mention its status as the home of the United Nations. His flag-hugging comment was, unsurprisingly played to praise on Fox News. — Jeff Coltin More from the city: — Lawyers for the city teacher’s union have ripped the decision by the MTA to set a June 30 date for the start of $15 congestion pricing. (NY Post) — A Manhattan landlord jailed for repeatedly blowing off court-ordered repairs has been charged separately for harassing tenants through “dangerous and dilapidated conditions.” (Gothamist) — The 63-year-old career activist among the protesters at Columbia. (The New York Times)
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Gov. Kathy Hochul's campaign urged supporters to give donations that would be split between her 2026 reelection effort and the Democratic Party of Florida. | Hans Pennink/AP | HOCHUL FOR FLORIDA DEMS: Gov. Kathy Hochul’s campaign is seizing on the six-week abortion ban that took effect in Florida on Wednesday — and helping Democrats there in the process. The New York governor’s campaign released a fundraising email that urged supporters to give donations that would be split between Hochul’s 2026 reelection effort and the Democratic Party of Florida. “We need to do everything we can to fight back against extreme abortion bans,” Hochul’s campaign wrote in the email. Democrats across the country and in New York expect to run on an abortion-rights platform this election season. And they plan to drive up turnout in New York with a proposed equal rights amendment that is meant to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution. — Nick Reisman FUTURE-PROOF BUDGET: The new $237 billion budget tries to have some control over the future of the state’s finances: There’s a plan to assess how schools are funded, plus a temporary rate increase for Medicaid with the hope of the federal government approving a tax on managed-care organizations. Then there’s the outcome of the presidential election that could upend a lot of careful planning. Still, the governor’s top budget advisor Blake Washington insisted former President Donald Trump’s potential return to the White House wouldn’t put a wrench in the state’s longer-term financial plans. “We know how to walk and chew gum, and we’ll be making every single pitch to make sure the state of New York is treated fairly,” Washington told Playbook. Pivoting to Trump proved a challenge for then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who crafted different ways of appealing to a mercurial president to get, for example, funding for major infrastructure projects in the state. Hochul has had a publicly good relationship with the Biden administration, which has worked with her on issues like the migrant crisis facing New York. Trump 2.0 would likely change that calculus. And Hochul may have to lean even more on the congressional delegation led by New Yorkers: Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. “That’s always been a concern, and it’s something we’re very, very mindful of,” Washington said of the potential changes in the White House. “We just hope that working with our congressional delegation, that whatever the case may be, we get the best possible deal for New York.” — Nick Reisman More from Albany: — Campaigns for state offices are about to rake in $100 million from the public financing system. (The City) — Hochul urged colleges to hold their graduations in person despite ongoing protests. (Gothamist) — Yet another legal challenge has been filed against New York’s cannabis regulators. (Times Union)
| | NEW YORK STATE OF MIND | | — Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand and her Republican challenger will avoid party primaries. (POLITICO Pro) — Nearly 15 percent of the ballots cast in the New York Democratic presidential primary went unrecorded, a potential barometer for dissatisfaction with the war in Gaza. (City & State) — Columbia, like other universities, is calling in the police while also openly advertising and celebrating its history of student activism. (Mother Jones)
| | SOCIAL DATA | | Edited by Daniel Lippman HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Mika Brzezinski … MSNBC’s Jesse Rodriguez … Poppy Harlow … former Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker … former Rep. Robert Turner (R-N.Y.) … Emily Tisch Sussman … Rick Stengel … Julianna Goldman … C.J. Amirat … Jake Stevens … Leo Cendrowicz … (WAS WEDNESDAY): Tish James’ communications director Delaney Kempner … Rina F. Chessin
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