With help from Amira McKee

đ¨ đ¨ â âTrump Weighs Getting Involved in New York City Mayor Race,â by NYTâs Nicholas Fandos, Jeremy W. Peters, Maggie Haberman and Katherine Rosman: âPresident Trump may have moved out of New York City, but he has privately discussed whether to intercede in its fractious race for mayor to try to stop Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic nominee, according to eight people briefed on the discussions.â (More below)
ââCRY ME A RIVER: Even as Gov. Kathy Hochul doubles down on her Democratic gerrymandering plan, she said sheâs feeling overcome with despondency for New York Republicans who could lose their seats when she tries to redraw New Yorkâs maps to boost her party.
âI feel really sad,â Hochul said today, when asked if she had a message for any GOP reps who might see their seat erased if she pushes through a full-fledged gerrymander.
Hochul and California Gov. Gavin Newsom sprinted to the front lines of the mucky redistricting war and have vowed to redraw their own maps to add more Democratic seats ever since President Donald Trump called on Texas to abruptly redraw its Congressional maps to add 5 more GOP seats.
Luckily, Hochul noted, thereâs a way out.
His name is Republican Rep. Mike Lawler, and, she said, he has the political power and sway in Washington to end partisan gerrymandering with his forthcoming federal bill that would ban the practice nationwide.
âHe has so much enormous power in Washington,â Hochul said of Lawler.
Sike! She was kidding. She doesnât feel sad. She doesnât think Lawler has any juice in D.C. and she definitely doesnât seem to be slowing down her push to gerrymander the hell out of New York in what she says is a response to Texasâ efforts.
On Tuesday, Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin indicated heâs encouraging other Democratic governors to consider redrawing their maps too. And the red state of Missouri, which has two GOP House seats, could be Republicansâ next gerrymandering target.
As the redistricting war looks to be going nuclear, Hochul is daring Republicans like Lawler to loudly call for an end to their partyâs redistricting effort in Texas.
âTell them to call the president of their own party and say, âStand down in the war with New York and California and other Democratic states,ââ Hochul said. âIf you want to stop what youâre doing in Texas, I'll stand down. You started it. You end it.â
âThis is a guy whoâs now saying, âIâm going to introduce a bill to get it changed,ââ she said. âThe same guy who promised a full restoration of the state and local tax deduction comes back far short from that and spins it as a win that everybody's buying. He has no power. He won't get it done. And I'm not sympathetic because he was silent.â
Lawlerâs office noted that the increases in state and local tax deductions he fought with Trump for during the creation of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act provides relief for most of his district, with only the top 10 percent of taxpayers not getting a tax cut.
âKathy Hochul is not just the worst Governor in America, sheâs also the dumbest,â Lawler said in a statement. âAfter years of calling for the SALT cap to be fixed, sheâs now attacking the solution because Democrats werenât the ones to get it done, my New York GOP colleagues and I were. No one believes a word she says. Her own colleagues in the State Legislature mock her at every turn. What a pathetic excuse for a leader of New York State.â â Jason Beeferman

TRUMP EYES NYC MAYORâS RACE: Trump is âvery interestedâ in the New York City mayoral race, said Republican billionaire John Catsimatidis, who is friendly with both Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Eric Adams. Catsimatidis said he dined Friday with Trump.
âHeâs a New York guy, he grew up in New York,â Catsimatidis told Playbook. âHe loves New York. He wants to make sure thereâs proper accounting in New York, that the quality of life goes on in New York and that we donât lose any more population.â
Trump hasnât committed to a role in the race, though, and Catsimatidis said he wants the president to hold off â for now.
âI asked him to put off decisions on anything until September,â Catsimatidis said.
The New York Times reported on the presidentâs interest earlier today.
The Times also reported that during a closed-door meeting with Lawler last month in the White House, Trump discussed the mayorâs race with the Hudson Valley congressman.
A person familiar with the meeting told Playbook that Trump did not express a specific preference for any of the mayoral candidates, but rather was interested in who has the best shot at winning.
Trumpâs involvement would come as Cuomoâs pushing for the field to coalesce around the strongest challenger to Mamdani by mid-September â a dynamic that currently favors the former governor, according to most polls.
âThe president runs the country and what is said to him at the dinner party is, âWe saved America, we saved the free world, now itâs time to save New York," Catsimatidis said. "Iâm pretty sure he agreed with it.â â Nick Reisman and Jason Beeferman

ANDREW CUOMO, THE REPLY GUY: If you havenât been on X in the last 24 hours (lucky you) youâve missed Cuomoâs furious â and curious â barrage of posts and replies.
Since Monday, Cuomo has expressed gratitude to someone with the username âAndrew Cuomo is a Sex Pest.â He called on Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani to âBoycott, Divest, and Sanctionâ his property in Uganda â a country, he noted, âthat murders LGBTQIA+ people.â And the former governor even responded earnestly to someone else who told him to âGive it up grandpa.â
âNo grandkids yet- but I've got the experience and the ability to get things done,â Cuomo wrote.
The mayoral hopeful and failed primary candidate has posted over 35 times on X over the past two days, mostly with a new, direct tone that wouldâve been unbecoming of the highly-coordinated primary campaign he was running just two months ago.
Itâs a new social media approach from the 67-year-old and his campaign after his millennial foe Mamdani successfully utilized the medium to handily beat him in the Democratic primary and surge the under-30 turnout.
So is Andrew himself behind the account?
âWe hired this really smart kid named A.J. Parkinson,â Rich Azzopardi told Playbook, an apparent tongue-in-cheek reference to a fictitious character Cuomoâs father first brought to life and quoted frequently in the early â80s.
Coincidentally, Parkinson emerged around the same time Cuomo took his last nap â a fact we now know because he told us so in one of his many replies on X this afternoon.
MAGA influencer Laura Loomer loves it.
âW,â she wrote in response to Cuomoâs call for a Uganda-centric BDS movement.
Mamdaniâs campaign did not comment on Cuomoâs new online approach. â Jason Beeferman
NO MATCHING FUNDS FOR ADAMS: The New York City Campaign Finance Board denied Adams millions of dollars in matching funds for the tenth time this morning â and suggested in a strongly worded statement that Adams will not be getting a penny anytime soon, POLITICO reported today.
The regulatory body denied Adams the public funding heâs seeking for his general election bid on two grounds: His campaign has not submitted required paperwork, and the board has reason to believe the campaign violated the law.
The boardâs decision escalates a long-simmering standoff with the incumbent and hobbles Adamsâ ability to compete at a time when he is already at a severe disadvantage. The mayor dropped out of the Democratic primary after the controversial dismissal of a federal bribery case against him. He is now running in the crowded general election as an independent.
Fellow independents Cuomo and Jim Walden are hoping to take down Mamdani, a democratic socialist who has solidly staked out the left lane in the general election. So is GOP nominee Curtis Sliwa.
Cuomoâs base overlaps with Adamsâ, as does Sliwaâs, although to a lesser degree. Should the multimillion-dollar hole in his war chest persist, the mayor will be forced to continue the time-consuming process of fundraising long after his opponents, placing yet another obstacle in the way of his longshot comeback bid.
Adamsâ campaign did not immediately comment on the boardâs latest decision. â Joe Anuta
â PAC CASH: The pro-Adams PAC, Empower NYC, has raised $1 million in support of the mayorâs long-shot reelection bid, including from crypto industry donors. (City and State)
â NUCLEAR OPTION: Hochulâs administration wants to continue subsidizing New Yorkâs aging nuclear facilities until 2050. (POLITICO Pro)
â RYDERâS LAW: The death of a New York City carriage horse has renewed calls for City Hall to phase-out horse-drawn carriages. (CBS News)
Missed this morningâs New York Playbook? We forgive you. Read it here.
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