NYPD Turns Violent at BLM Protest + Comptroller Stringer Announces Mayoral Bid

Local News:

• While interfering in an arrest, a Black Lives Matter protestor broke his arm in two places after being shoved by the NYPD. Six protesters were detained by the NYPD following a demonstration outside the 34th Precinct on Saturday.
• A new report from the CUNY Center for Labor and Urban Studies finds that New York City unions have a historic opportunity to increase membership during the pandemic. Already, approximately 20 percent of city workers belong to a union.
• Pledged rule changes to limit the use of solitary confinement in New York prisons have been pushed back until 2023.
• A report by the Independent Budget Office illustrated the ballooning staff numbers at District Attorney offices across the City in the last decade, even as crime declined.
• The entire command staff of the Rochester Police Department, including the police chief and the deputy chiefs, announced that they are retiring. This comes after protests over the death of Daniel Prude in police custody, and after Mayor Lovely Warren announced reform plans.
• A Department of Education report says that 96% of New York City school classrooms have proper ventilation to reopen, but only 43% of bathrooms do. Some school staff members are not convinced by the report.
• The De Blasio Administration caved to Upper West Side residents who demanded that they move New Yorkers experiencing homelessness out of the Lucerne hotel, where they had been staying during the pandemic.
• More than 150 New York City business leaders sent a letter to Mayor de Blasio decrying “deteriorating conditions” in the city and urging stronger action to improve public safety and “other quality of life issues that jeopardize economic recovery.”
• Governor Cuomo unveiled a plan to allow indoor dining at restaurants beginning September 30. Restaurants will have to follow several rules, including remaining at or below 25% capacity, keeping tables 6 feet apart, and closing by 12 am.

Elections:

• New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer officially launched his campaign for mayor. His kickoff announcement featured speeches by a slate of progressives, including State Senator Julia Salazar and State Assembly Member Yuh-Line Niou.
• Tiffany Cabán, a former DSA-endorsed candidate for Queens District Attorney who came within 60 votes of winning that race, has announced her candidacy for the 22nd City Council district in Astoria. 
• Labor historian Joshua Freeman penned an essay that compared the slate of socialists headed for Albany to a group of Socialist Party legislators that were expelled from the state legislature 100 years ago.

• Rudy Giuliani’s son, Andrew, is considering a run for mayor in 2021. Andrew famously interrupted his father’s 1994 mayoral inauguration speech, an incident that SNL later parodied.

• City & State speculated whether or not labor unions would enter into electoral coalitions with socialists and progressives in 2021, after their traditional allies in the centrist Democratic establishment suffered significant losses in 2018 and 2020.