Andrew Cuomo’s bid for New York City mayor endorsed by rival in surprise turn

Andrew Cuomo’s bid to become New York City’s mayor received a surprising boost on Friday when one of his rivals, the Queens state senator Jessica Ramos, endorsed the former governor after having previously questioned his mental acuity and describing him as a bully with a record of sexual misconduct allegations.

Ramos punctuated her stunning U-turn with a surprise appearance at a campaign rally in Manhattan, where she hugged Cuomo and said she believed he was “the one best positioned right now to protect this city”.

“We need someone in City Hall who knows how to hold the line and deliver under pressure,” Ramos said in a statement shared on Cuomo’s campaign website, just weeks after she claimed his “mental acuity is in decline”.

Ramos also said she had worked with Cuomo “to raise wages, protect immigrant workers, and pass major labor reforms”, and she added that she believed he could “go toe-to-toe” with the Donald Trump administration “when it counts”.

The endorsement from Ramos comes days after the first New York City Democratic mayoral primary debate, during which Cuomo faced attacks over his gubernatorial administration’s handling of nursing home deaths during the Covid-19 pandemic and sexual harassment allegations against him that prompted his resignation.

In 2021, Ramos was one of the first Democratic lawmakers to call for Cuomo to resign over those sexual harassment allegations, which he has denied. An investigation by the state attorney general found he sexually harassed nearly a dozen women – most of whom worked for him – and also retaliated after some made complaints.

Ramos in March accused Cuomo’s mayoral run of being a “vanity comeback tour”. She said Cuomo “brings nothing to this race but baggage”.

“Hard pass on Andrew,” she wrote. Also in March, she called Cuomo “a corrupt bully with a record of alleged sexual misconduct”.

As recently as Wednesday, Ramos said she wished she “lived in a city where voters cared about women getting harassed.

“We talk about it all the time, but I’m not running about Andrew Cuomo’s record,” she told Politico. “I’m running on my own record.”

Ramos’s allies on the progressive left greeted her endorsement of Cuomo with dismay – including several organizations that had backed her mayoral candidacy. The Working Families party said it was “sad and disappointed” by Ramos’s “desperate” decision.

The New York City council member Chi Ossé said he was “hurt” by Ramos’s announcement.

“I’ve always respected her for the work she’s done for our city and state,” Ossé wrote on X. “To see her throw all of her values away and betray the [New Yorkers] she’s been fighting for is heartbreaking and disgusting.”

The actor Cynthia Nixon, who ran and lost to Cuomo in the 2018 Democratic primary, said on X that she was “choosing to remember the Jessica Ramos” who “supported the women who were sexually harassed, remembered the people Cuomo sent to die in nursing homes [and] always called out Cuomo’s corruption, mismanagement [and] lies”.

“I’ll miss that Ramos,” Nixon added. “Where did she go?”

Ramos said her decision to back Cuomo was what is known as a cross-endorsement, for she does not intend to drop out of the race, which uses ranked-choice voting.

Cuomo, meanwhile, told reporters on Friday he would not be returning the favor and endorsing Ramos.

However, in a statement, Cuomo said: “Senator Ramos is a fighter for working New Yorkers, and we are all better off for her leadership.

“Senator Ramos and I are both … tough and protective of our families and neighbors, and by extension we are protective of all New Yorkers.”

The closely watched mayoral race in heavily Democratic New York City has largely settled into a two-way fight between Cuomo, the current frontrunner, and the democratic socialist candidate Zohran Mamdani.

The incumbent Eric Adams is running as an independent.

On Thursday, Mamdani received the prominent endorsement of US congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who told New York Times that Mamdani “demonstrated a real ability on the ground to put together a coalition of working-class New Yorkers that is strongest to lead the pack”.

Ocasio-Cortez ranked five candidates – but left Ramos off her slate.