Whether Andrew Yang runs for mayor of New York City next year will depend on the blessings of Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Rep. Alexandria "AOC" Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and their political legions, Democrat sources in the Big Apple tell Newsmax.
Talk of an alliance between multi-millionaire entrepreneuer and brief 2020 Democrat presidential candidate Yang and the Sanders-AOC forces in New York emerged Wednesday as a poll reported in the New York Post showed Yang leading the pack of prospective Democrat hopefuls for mayor in 2021.
According to the Slingshot Strategies poll obtained by the Post, Yang tops the mayoral field among likely Democrat voters citywide with 20% of the vote.
He was followed, the poll showed, by Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams with 14%, and City Comptroller Scott Stringer with 11%.
Slingshot also showed former City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and former mayoral counsel Maya Wiley tied at 7% each, and soon-to-be-former-Rep. Max Rose at 6%.
That Yang could emerge as the first private businessman to become mayor since Mike Bloomberg in 2001 is considered a strong possibility in large part because of the unpopularity of traditional politician and two-term Mayor Bill de Blasio, who is termed out in 2021.
“Yang, I think, would have a good chance in the Democratic primary after the current incumbent,” said Laurence Barrett, former Time magazine correspondent and author of the critically-acclaimed novel “The Mayor of New York.”
But for Yang to build a grass-roots organization, many observers of city politics believe he would have to forge an alliance with the growing Sanders-AOC "progressive" wing that is increasingly strong within the Democratic Party.
There is evidence that this will happen. In April, the New York City Board of Elections canceled the Empire State’s Democrat primary on the grounds Joe Biden had wrapped up the presidential nomination. Yang promptly filed a lawsuit in federal court, joined by seven New Yorkers who filed as Yang delegates, that he should not be removed because he had met state requirements to be on the June 23 ballot.
The Sanders campaign and AOC weighed in with the "Yang Gang," almost surely because a larger turnout engendered by the primary would help their insurgent candidates challenging sitting Democrat congressmen.
In June, a U.S. District Court judge ruled in favor of Yang’s suit and the Democrat presidential primary was held.
Whether the alliance forged between Yang, Sanders, and "AOC" in 2020 continues in 2021 will almost be pivotal to whether the former presidential candidate can be nominated for mayor.
There is also some early skepticism about a Yang bid among New York Democrats.
Hank Sheinkopf, longtime Democrat consultant and friend of Bill and Hillary Clinton, told us: "Yang is no front-runner, but rather the great hope for business directed younger voters who call themselves progressives — as long as it doesn't cost them a dime."
John Gizzi is chief political columnist and White House correspondent for Newsmax. For more of his reports, Go Here Now.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.