NYC NOW - June 26, 2024: Midday News

Episode Date: June 26, 2024

The MTA board is set to vote Wednesday on a resolution to comply with Governor Kathy Hochul’s indefinite pause on congestion pricing, with hopes to resurrect it later. Meanwhile, the NYPD has ended its search for two teenage boys who were swept into the ocean while swimming after hours at Jacob Riis Park in Queens. Plus, WNYC’s David Furst speaks with senior politics reporter Brigid Bergin to break down the New York primary results from Tuesday. Finally, WNYC’s Ryan Kailath visits Seven Brothers deli in Oceanside, New York, to learn more about their viral pickle sandwich.

Welcome to NYC Now. Your source for local news in and around New York City from WMYC. It's Wednesday, June 26. Here's the midday news from Lance Lucky. The MTA board is set to vote today on a resolution to comply with Governor Hokel's indefinite pause on congestion pricing with the hopes of resurrecting it later. The resolution requires final sign-off from the MTA as well as the city and state departments of transportation. It urges the MTA president to continue seeking to implement the tolls once Hockel lifts the pause. Transit advocates are urging the board to reject Hockel's pause and make a long-shot bid to activate the tolls anyway.

State law requires the tolls to finance $15 billion in the MTA's budget. The agency previously planned to launch the tolls this Sunday. Hockel's decision has forced the MTA to reassess what construction projects it can still pursue. The NYPD has ended its search for two teenage boys who were swept into the ocean off the Rockways last Friday. The teens were swimming at Jacob Rees Park after hours when the current pulled them from the shore. Mayor Adams says rescuers used drones to search for the 16 and 17-year-old boys, but they were unable to find them. It's a painful moment. It's one of those tragedies that hit us, and all you can do when it happens is, you know, you look at your child and you hugged them

a little harder, but any given day you could lose a loved one. Officials say the teens went into the Water after 6.30 Friday evening, a half hour after lifeguards left for the day. The National Park Service has warned that erosion has created extremely hazardous conditions at Reese Beach this summer. It's 85 now. An air quality alert in effect today, and about 92 this afternoon. It'll feel closer to 95. Shower is likely tonight, maybe severe thunderstorms as well. And about 88 tomorrow and then only around 80 and sunny Friday. This is WNYC. Stay close. There's more after the break.

On WNYC, I'm David First. In New York, the polls are closed on this year's federal and state primary contests. The results came in pretty early last night, and overall it was a good night for incumbents except for one. Joining us now is WNYC's senior politics reporter Bridget Berg. And Bridget, a lot of people were watching the primary in the Northern Bronx and Westchester County. That is the 16th congressional district. Tell us about what happened last night. Well, David, as we have been hearing, Representative Jamal Bowman was fighting for his political life, and he lost.

Westchester County Executive George Latimer won a really pretty resounding victory, beating Bowman by 18 points. He delivered a speech that after a very divisive and expensive primary was all about unity. Here's a little bit of what he said last night. This country cannot afford to split your little pieces, and every single representative has to understand the necessity for unity so that we can keep all that. Now Bowman conceded, but his speech was much more reflective of the campaign he ran, unapologetic in his opposition to Israel's war against Hamas, and really espousing a kind of movement politics rhetoric, making the race a much bigger fight, not just about him, but about bigger, goals for a multiracial, multi-ethnic democracy. This race was never about me and me alone. It was never about this district and this district alone.

It was always about all of us. And David, that message from Bowman to his supporters was that even though they lost this fight, that the fight goes on and they need to continue pushing for their bigger goals. Okay, a little bit different message than, than straight up unity right there. What about the other congressional primaries in the city? Well, no big surprises there. Democratic incumbent Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez,

Bowman's fellow squad member, easily defeated her challenger, Martin Dolan, by nearly 63 points in Lower Manhattan in Brooklyn. Congressman Dan Goldman held on against two primary challengers very decisively, excuse me, decisively by some 40 points in the closest contest. Yeah, no nail biters so far. No, no nail butters there. And then even out on the east end of Long Island, John Avalon was running against Nancy Goroff in that Democratic primary. He won by a very wide margin about 40 points. That is going to be one of those races to watch in November. He's going to

face Republican incumbent Nick Loloda. All right. Well, looking ahead to November, is there a lesson for Democrats from these wins and losses? I think that Latimer and his supporters definitely seem to think this is, this victory signals that voters want more moderate politics. His victory speech was all about, as we talked about unifying those divisions and saying, while not perfect, that American democracy is really what's at stake this year. Those are definitely. themes we're going to hear echoed by other Democrats. We've heard them from President Biden. What I think is a little bit more unclear to me is how much Israel's war against Hamas and Gaza will remain an issue in the general

election. You know, certainly we know there are voters who are very angry with the approach of the Biden administration, Congressman Bowman included. He made that very clear again last night in his speech. But when the fight is between a Democrat and a Republican, and maybe they have a similar position. I'm not sure if that issue will galvanize voters in the same way. You know, we saw that in the special election back in February, where Democrat Tom Swazi won, in many ways, because he shared a similar position with the Republican Mazi Pillip, it kind of diffused the issue for his opponent because they were so similar on that particular issue. Well, let's talk briefly about some of those state races. Tell us about some of the winners in those contests. Well, as you mentioned,

It was a good night for incumbents. They held on to their nominations in most places for those handful of open seats that people were keeping an eye on in Manhattan. Michael Asher, who's been active in Democratic politics for a long time, won the nomination in the 69th Assembly District. Jordan Wright is poised to succeed his father, former assemblyman and head of the Manhattan County Democratic Party, Keith Wright, an Assembly District 70 in Harlem. and city councilman Kalman Yeager was nominated for Assembly District 41 over in Brooklyn. In Queens, incumbent Assemblyman Juanardia lost, one of the few incumbents to not be successful. To Claire Valdez, she is a Democratic socialist.

That's District 37 in Western Queens. She had a very organized campaign very early on. And that loss, I think, is not so much a surprise to people, Juanardalia had faced some charges of sexual harassment, sexual assault, and there were people who had called for him to resign earlier. So he was facing some challenges going into this primary. Another race in Queens, Lorinda Hooks, community organizer, appears to have kept former state Senator Ira Montserrat from making his return to elective office once again. He's run several time since he was ousted from the state Senate and then went to jail later for some corruption

charges. Hooks won the nomination for Assembly District 35 in East Elmhurst. All right. And just to finally here, you were reminding us to pay attention to judicial contests, especially in Queens. What about the results of those races? Well, David, the big race was the surrogate court race in Queens and the party-backed candidate Cassandra Johnson beat Wendy Lee, who was running really as an independent Democrat. And that's a big win for the county party organization, sometimes referred to as the machine, which has controlled that court for a very long time and appears to be poised to continue to do that going forward. All right, WNYC's Bridget Bergen, breaking down all of the primary election results for us.

Thank you. And we'll look ahead to November with you. Thank you. A Nassau County deli is in a pickle. After one of its sandwiches took off on TikTok, WNYC's Ryan Kyloth, went to check it out. I worked for the news. They sent me to cover your viral sandwich. Oh, Jesus.

Really? Wow. It has been pickle mania. Anthony Fiorito is co-owner of Seven Brothers in Oceanside, New York. In January, they started selling sandwiches, any filling you want, with a pickle for a bun. No bread. Last month, a local woman reviewed it on TikTok, and four million views later... It's really, really crazy.

Doing about 200 to, like, 250 pickled sandwich. sandwiches a day. Fiorito used to go through two pails of pickles a week. Now he orders 30. He says his pickle guy, the owner of Boershead provisions, made a personal visit. Somebody came from Albany. They drove three, four hours to come here for this thing. It's unbelievable. I think this is the best sandwich I've ever had in my entire life. It was an 11 out of 10. Now, do you just hate bread or? No, I just really love pickles. Kaylee and Ashley Sernelia drove an hour in from Suffolk County for the sandwich. Gave it top marks.

It's small, not a lot of surface area, crunchy as they scoop out the soft inside of the pickle. And it's about $10, depending what you get inside. Ryan Kyloth, WNYC News. Thanks for listening. This is NYC now from WNYC. Be sure to catch us every weekday, three times a day, for your top news headlines and occasional deep dives. Also subscribe to where you. wherever you get your podcast.

We'll be back this evening.