NEW YORK — Brad Lander’s day job is overseeing the city’s cash. As a mayoral candidate, he is burning through his own.
The city comptroller had spent nearly $1 million more than any other candidate in the Democratic primary for New York City mayor, as of the latest data through May 19, yet he’s still polling a distant third. And with a mandatory spending cap of roughly $8 million and just two weeks until the election, Lander finds himself at a significant disadvantage to opponents with more money for voter outreach in the final stretch of the race.
The fiscal steward vying to replace Mayor Eric Adams has dropped $4.7 million on two television ads, a stable of consultants and staff salaries totaling more than $700,000, according to records from the city’s Campaign Finance Board. He’s left with $2.8 million, as of the latest disclosure period in May.
By comparison, front-runner Andrew Cuomo had $5.7 million and second-place Zohran Mamdani, the democratic socialist lawmaker, had $4.5 million. Also in financial distress is City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, who got into the race late and has $2.3 million in the bank. The candidates’ updated finances will be published Friday.
Lander paid $226,500 to fundraiser Jenny Galvin, $195,650 to pollster Global Strategy Group and $161,644 to consultancy BerlinRosen. Digital marketing and fundraising firm Authentic Campaigns netted $135,451, and the campaign even paid $35,677 to a firm that helps campaigns optimize spending.
The spending hasn’t really helped all that much. Lander is polling significantly behind Mamdani — the state assemblymember who has captured the progressive movement Lander hoped to tap into — and Cuomo, who is benefiting from more than $10 million worth of ads coming from two super PACs and the gratis services of a prominent lobbyist quietly powering his campaign. A government reform group has requested an investigation into Cuomo’s use of that firm, Tusk Strategies.
“Conventional campaign wisdom is you unload most of your spending six to eight weeks out from the primary,” said Democratic strategist Trip Yang, who is not affiliated with any of the mayoral candidates. “Brad is doing what he needs to, but for some reason it is not really breaking through in the polls.”
Lander has banked more on broadcast and digital ads than Mamdani. That strategy is reminiscent of former Mayor Bill de Blasio’s 2013 campaign, which did not feature a single piece of direct mail. The city comptroller has dropped $2.5 million on TV ads via Great American Media that feature him at the controls of a frontloader crushing Teslas in a junkyard and riding Coney Island’s famed Cyclone while calmly taking notes on a legal pad.
“We will be up on broadcast, streaming, and digital every day through June 24th thanks to the grassroots support for our campaign from every corner of this city and a hunger from New Yorkers to end the Adams-Cuomo nightmare of corruption,” said Alison Hirsh, Lander’s campaign manager, in a statement.
A Lander spokesperson argued he has less cash than other top contenders because he started running earlier.
Lander began raising money in February 2022, one month into his and Eric Adams’ tenures, when each was presumably planning to run for reelection. As the mayor’s political standing faltered, the comptroller started to see an opening to challenge the brash, Trump-aligned Democrat.
By the time Lander announced his candidacy for mayor last summer, he had already spent a half-million dollars, public records show. In the ensuing three months before Mamdani announced his candidacy in October, the comptroller dropped another $200,000. Taken together, that accounts for the bulk of the discrepancy between Lander and Mamdani, the next-biggest spender in the race.
As of last month, Mamdani had dropped $3.9 million, leaving him with $4.5 million in his war chest. Once he maxed out on fundraising, he cut a video suggesting his prospective donors give to Adrienne Adams, instead — a nod to the city’s ranked-choice voting system that encourages partnerships to damage the front-runner.
The democratic socialist Mamdani is employing a different strategy than the city comptroller, evidenced by a substantial investment in mailers as he inches closer to Cuomo in the polls. Mamdani’s campaign paid direct mail firms Moxie Media and Century Direct Solutions — along with a printing company and a sticker firm — more than $400,000.
A spokesperson said the campaign wanted to balance the success Mamdani has had producing viral social media videos with an effort to reach more analog voters. (The average age of the city’s most active voters suggests they are not on TikTok.)
In the home stretch with a significant polling advantage, Mamdani had $1.8 million more to spend than Lander. The comptroller announced May 20 that he had maxed out on fundraising, but some of that cash won’t come through until June 20, the next public matching funds payout.
Both are chasing Cuomo, who does not have money troubles, despite his disastrous turn before campaign finance regulators.
After initially denying him matching funds based on systemic paperwork errors, the Campaign Finance Board fined the former governor $756,994 for improper coordination with a super PAC supporting him called Fix the City. The outfit has raised $10 million and spent around $8 million boosting Cuomo with television ads. A separate super PAC affiliated with the New York Apartment Association pledged to drop $2.5 million supporting the governor.
Cuomo has spent $1.9 million and has $5.7 million left in the bank.
Adrienne Adams was worse off than the city comptroller as of last month’s filing.
She entered the race late and has been scrambling for cash since. The board awarded her $2 million in matching funds last month, which led her to announce a broadcast ad shortly afterward. Even without sufficient money, she has been polling near Lander on the strength of endorsements from municipal labor union DC 37 and state Attorney General Letitia James. On Thursday, U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez endorsed Adrienne Adams as her second choice behind Mamdani, making the impact of her remaining cash reserves harder to predict.
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