Source: Politics<\/p>\n
NEW YORK \u2014 Andrew Yang\u2019s opponents on the left have pledged to start dragging down the popular frontrunner. This week, they launched a potent new line of attack: Yang wants to crack down on street vendors.<\/p>\n
Yang has been taking hits from rival candidates for weeks as he continues to lead in the polls for the June Democratic primary for mayor. But progressives \u2014 slow to respond in unison to Yang\u2019s ascent \u2014 have now begun painting the former presidential candidate as too conservative for city politics and out of touch with liberal values.<\/p>\n
After a weekend of attacks over remarks he made last year about abortion, Yang drew heavy fire Sunday and Monday for tweeting<\/a>: \u201cYou know what I hear over and over again – that NYC is not enforcing rules against unlicensed street vendors.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNo one is saying this but you,\u201d the NYC chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America, which has not endorsed in the race, tweeted Sunday.<\/a> \u201cWe don\u2019t need more cops arresting street vendors.\u201d<\/p>\n The fight over street vendors in New York City encompasses multiple hot debates \u2014 from aggressive policing of women selling churros<\/a> in subways, to the onerous fees lunch cart operators, often immigrants, pay to permit holders. Food trucks and carts are primary sources of income for many immigrants, and granting more permits to halal carts, hot dog stands and churros vendors has long been a fraught political battle \u2014 more so now as brick-and-mortar restaurants struggle to come back from the pandemic.<\/p>\n City Comptroller Scott Stringer, whose mayoral campaign so far has been lagging in the polls, headed to Queens Monday with leading Latina supporters to denounce Yang\u2019s support for more enforcement.<\/p>\n \u201cHe wants to start a crackdown on vendors and send enforcement after the immigrant communities that powered us through the pandemic,\u201d Stringer, a career politician running as a progressive, said at Corona Plaza, a popular spot in Queens for Latin American food vendors.<\/p>\n \u201cHow can you claim to love New York City and want to throw hardworking New Yorkers who make a living in jail? What is that about? Maybe he just wants to take their carts away, send them home with $10,000 fines they can never pay off,” he said. “This is a criminalization of poverty.\u201d<\/p>\n He was joined by state Sen. Jessica Ramos and Assemblymember Catalina Cruz, two politicians popular with progressives who have endorsed his campaign.<\/p>\n Ramos (D-Queens) said she was \u201churt\u201d and \u201coffended\u201d by Yang\u2019s comments. \u201cYou can\u2019t be mayor of the city of New York if you don\u2019t know how the city of New York works,\u201d she said. \u201cIt is not that [vendors] do not want a permit, it is that they can\u2019t obtain a permit because there is a BS cap on the limited number of vending permits that are given out.\u201d<\/p>\n Yang said Monday he regretted the tweet and his intent was not to antagonize street vendors.<\/p>\n \u201cI love street vendors as many New Yorkers do. And I’m supportive of the measures to try and increase the number of licenses,\u201d he said when asked to respond to the criticism at an unrelated campaign event. \u201cI think we’re all actually aligned on the policy side. And I regret that I took on such a frankly complicated and nuanced issue on that medium. It wasn’t the right medium for it.\u201d<\/p>\n The street vendor flap followed an onslaught of criticism Friday and Saturday,<\/a> when a clip from a February 2020 interview surfaced on Twitter showing the former presidential candidate saying, Democrats shouldn\u2019t be \u201ccelebrating an abortion at any point in the pregnancy.\u201d<\/p>\n The clip did not include the question Yang was responding to, which was how he would win more political support for reproductive rights.<\/p>\n Much of the heat against Yang has come from rival campaigns. But POLITICO reported Monday<\/a> that Gabe Tobias, head of the progressive political action committee, Our City, wants to “make sure that no voters go in voting for a conservative, nonprogressive candidate and that\u2019s definitely Andrew Yang.”<\/p>\n Yang and Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams have come in first and second respectively in early polls. Both are running on a platform that appeals to more moderate Democrats.<\/p>\n In Adams\u2019 case, the former NYPD captain is emphasizing the importance of public safety and has rejected calls to defund the police. Yang has appealed to the private sector, specifically small businesses, and cautioned against raising taxes further on the city\u2019s highest earners.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are more concerned about progressives voting for Andrew Yang than we are about them voting for Eric Adams,\u201d Tobias said.<\/p>\n The street vendor issue is made more complex by brick-and-mortar restaurants and retailers devastated by the pandemic as city tourism dried up.<\/p>\n “The political commentators can dissect the Twitter debate but the fact is the vending system is broken and it comes at the expense of vendors, brick-and-mortar businesses and the public,\u201d said Andrew Rigie, head of the NYC Hospitality Alliance which lobbies for restaurants. \u201cThe city recently passed a law increasing the number of vendor permits and creating a dedicated enforcement and support office, but we cannot debate the fact that the public deserves to expect safe food no matter where it is sold or by whom.”<\/p>\n