NYC NOW - Evening Roundup: Gov. Hochul Makes Argument for Congestion Pricing, Anthony Weiner Eyes Political Comeback, Parallels Between Mangione and Penny Cases, and a Community Champion Helps Unemployed Neighbors

Episode Date: December 11, 2024

New York Governor Kathy Hochul is taking her pitch for congestion pricing directly to the suburbs. Plus, former U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner is eyeing a political comeback. Also, WNYC’s Michael Hill and Arun Venugopal discuss the parallels between the man accused of killing United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson and the man acquitted in the chokehold death of Jordan Neely. And finally, a community champion helps unemployed Brooklynites.

Welcome to NYC Now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WMYC. I'm Jenae Pierre. Failure is not an option. It'll paralyze our whole region if these investments are not made and again they have to be paid for. New York Governor Kathy Hokel is taking her pitch for congestion pricing directly to the suburbs, Putnam County specifically. Hockel says the upcoming toll on drivers entering certain parts of Manhattan will help pay for commuter rail. upgrades in the Hudson Valley and on Long Island. That region cannot function at the level it should if we do not have a high-functioning,

well-financed, supported infrastructure system for public transportation. Congestion pricing has faced significant opposition in the New York City suburbs. The governor paused an initial plan that called for a $15 toll to be in place back in June. Since then, she's backed a plan for a $9-based toll, which will take effect on January 5th. Former U.S. Representative Anthony Wiener is considering a return to politics. WMYC's Phil Corso has more. Weiner's career was derailed by a series of sexting scandals and a conviction for having illicit online contact with a 15-year-old, but now he's filing to run for a New York City Council seat. Campaign finance records show the Democrat is targeting a seat in Lower Manhattan. Weiner said in a recent interview he's still exploring the possibility of running, but set up a campaign committee late last week.

week to participate in a forum hosted by the downtown independent Democrats this week. Two names continue to flood news headlines this week, Daniel Penny and Luigi Mangione. After the break, we look into the parallels between the two men and their cases. Stick around for the conversation. Luigi Mangione was arrested Monday in the shooting death of his own. United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson. That same day, hours earlier, a Manhattan jury acquitted Daniel Penny in the subway chokehold death of Jordan Neely, a homeless black man with mental illness. For all of the differences between them, there are parallels between the two cases that are

now at the center of attention. My colleague Michael Hill talked with WMYC's Arun Vanigapal to discuss them. First of all, I think a lot of us might have been caught off guard last week by the public response to the killing of the CEO, Brian Thompson. Yeah, I mean, nobody, you know, knew who the shooter was after the attack, but he was clearly valorized. People said he was hot. They painted the victim in death as the enemy. He was head of a company that's massively profitable and denies more insurance claims than any other. Okay. Kathy M. Newman is a professor of English at Carnegie M. University. I spoke to her, and she told me, you know, she was really struck by what she encountered online, including these thousands of laughing emojis in response to Thompson's death.

There was an outpouring of malice towards Thompson, the victim, and an outpouring of romance and support and almost love for the person who killed him. That really took me by surprise. Michael, let's go back over a year, and we'll see that Daniel Penny was also treated as a hero, A vigilante figure who did what the cops apparently can't or won't do in the eyes of the public. His legal defense fund, you have to remember, it got more than $3 million in donations, including $10,000 from Vivek Ramoswami, who was running for president at the time. More recently, J.D. Vance spoke up in Penny's defense. Lots of signs that the Manhattan DA faced a stiff challenge before trying to win a conviction and failing.

So the two men were turned into vigilante heroes, weren't they? Yeah, I mean, and certainly there's a long tradition of that in this country. I spoke to another scholar named Michael Asimal. He's a legal scholar who said, you know, Americans have always had this soft spot for vigilantes, you know, even going back to pre-revolutionary times. And he said pretty much overnight, Thompson became a very convenient villain, even if we had never heard of him before. because so many people have had their insurance claims denied or seen that happen with family or close friends, you know, they carry high levels of medical debt across this country. And that sense of precariousness is really widespread.

And, you know, without any action by our elected officials, even really violent action kind of filled that void. So here's how Asamal captured the public sentiment. The police aren't going after him. He's really invulnerable. so I'll just deal with the problem myself. And people really like that. People really like that, he says. In some cases, you know, maybe they hope it prompts a greater sense of urgency from people

who have actual power. So, Arun, what's different this time? Technology, for one, for a long time, we've had mass media. But think about it. The dominant news events for decades, including acts of political violence, they were filtered through a handful of news anchors, you know, serious people and serious comments. Now we've got this entirely new digital landscape. I spoke to Brian Ott.

He is a communication scholar at Missouri State University. He thinks we've entered an entirely new era. The whole decentralized networked nature of online communication is about there being no authority. And what networks share in common is that they're non-hierarchical. And hierarchy is precisely the thing in society that creates norms. that people then abide by. So we see this erosion of norms as he sees it. And, you know, this is the double edge of the digital landscape.

It does allow for marginalized voices to garner attention, racial minorities. But it also allows viewpoints considered fringe or even extremist to gain traction. And Brian Ott thinks that's the case both with the public response of Brian Thompson's killing and in the jury verdict that issued an acquittal to Daniel Penny. What does he think the future holds? Yeah, he's really worried. He thinks there's going to be more violence such as these incidents, and he's worried about President-elect Donald Trump's claim that he would pardon those convicted for the insurrection at the Capitol in 2021. He says if that happens, it'll absolutely send the message

that it is okay to circumvent the system and for people to take matters into their own hands, Michael. That's WMYC's Arun Vinicapal talking with my colleague Michael Hill. New York City is full of people making a difference in their neighborhoods, and we're calling them community champions. You know, the volunteer at the senior center, the nonprofit founder helping young moms, or the grandmother who rallies the blog for spring cleanups. Well, let me introduce you to Reverend Robert Jackson. He's the co-founder of Brooklyn Rescue Mission,

a group helping folks in bedstive facing unemployment and food insecurity. It's fantastic to see people come from maybe desperation to thank you and I'm happy. I got food for a week. I would come from a background of having a mother and father who were very community-oriented. My father was a barber, and he loved being able to educate and teach while he cut hair. My mother was a minister and also a hair dresser. And watching them serve community and also watching them help people became part of what I do. The win is you learn to have compassion.

You learn to be able to understand people's culture, even though I'm an African-American. We have everybody, like a lot of food programs around the city, not just us, line up. And they're Chinese folks, they're Latino folks, there's Ukrainian, there's Russian, there's Caribbean, there's everybody that's fighting food insecurity. You learn how to say good morning in Chinese. Learn how to say good money in Spanish. You learn what the cultural norms are so that people feel comfortable with you

and you feel comfortable with them. I have a say, P-O-W-E-R. It's power. And power means P, personal opportunity with equal responsibility. The world would be a better place if people worked on their personal

opportunities with equal responsibility. The eco-responsibility part is the willing to make it, succeed, and give back. Reverend Robert Jackson is the co-founder of Brooklyn Rescue Mission. Thanks for listening to NYC now from WNYC. Catch us every weekday, three times a day. I'm Jene Pierre. We'll be back tomorrow.