The 'tech dude' who built his reputation as one of the marginal non-politician candidates during the 2020 Democratic primaries decided to run for mayor of New York (to succeed Bill de Blasio after this year). He's enjoyed a lead in polling from the beginning but now, less than 7 weeks from the Democratic primary election, it could be said he's running neck-and-neck with Eric Adams, a conservative Democrat and a veteran of the state party.

(There is a debate today at 7 PM EDT between the 8 leading Democratic candidates, if anyone cares.)


Yang projects a dorky and affable persona, but this remarkable profile brings him across as something like a calculating anime character, and a politician who blends Bloomberg with de Blasio, for better or worse.

From the moment Andrew Yang sat down in the back corner of a dark restaurant in the Bronx — brow knitted, wearing an overcoat and scarf that would stay on for the whole lunch — he was not the same cheerful New York City mayoral candidate of our popular conception, the one who cheeses for photos and tweets things like “It’s Friday!” when it’s Friday or shouts “Yankee Stadium!” while standing in front of Yankee Stadium. Politicians are always a little different behind the scenes, their ambition harder to conceal in close quarters, but the man sitting across from me was particularly unfamiliar. Since entering the race in January, Yang has pitched himself as the happy warrior for the Everyman, an energetic presence promising to lead New York out of its grim recent past. While other candidates have emphasized the city’s need for an experienced and empathic crisis manager, Yang has acted like a constant human joy machine.

But today, he was serious, even a little crabby. Gone was the man who wants to bring TikTok Hype Houses to New York; he was replaced by a bristly high achiever, albeit one who has a habit of punctuating somber statements with outbursts of giggles. I asked him, Did other people ever note this difference?

“I really appreciate the line of inquiry,” Yang said. (He actually seemed mildly offended by it.) “I think people underestimate what a disciplined operator [1] I am.”

“Anyone who’s an operator sees me and this campaign and says, ‘Oh, I get it, Andrew Yang’s an operator,’ ” he continued. “And then if you put a businessperson next to me for ten minutes — or, I’m guessing, the vast majority of people who also are operators — they get it. Like, we speak the same language.”Yang, 46, seemed to be saying he wasn’t just the goofy, smart guy from the 2020 presidential-debate stage who wore a MATH pin that made some fellow Asian Americans cringe. Yang — he of Phillips Exeter, Brown, Columbia, white-shoe law, start-up wealth [2], godfatherdom to Teddy Roosevelt’s direct descendant — could hang with the city’s power brokers.

He also appeared eager to reflect the value systems of those places of power: Yang, who calls himself the anti-poverty candidate based largely on his proposal for annual $2,000 direct payments to the poorest New Yorkers, said he envisioned himself spending his first six months in office luring back the city’s elite by calling the many Masters of the Universe who have recently decamped to Florida.

“ ‘Like, what are the issues that drove you out? What were the decisions?’ And then be like, okay, here are, like, the things that drove people away. If we resolve them, can we get them back?” he had told me previously. “It’s a pretty tight community, so if the mayor is calling people asking these questions and trying to get them back, I think there are a lot of people who would be thrilled about it.”

He slurped black spaghetti, continuing to sketch out his ambitions for the early days of his mayoralty. Aside from working the phones, his plans were vague. He was fuzzy about how exactly he would be able to wrest more control from Albany over the subways: “I haven’t had those conversations.” He said he thinks the MTA board should be altered to give the city more power, which sounds simple enough but, close up, is an incredibly complicated political proposition. One concrete move Yang knows he wants to make is to hire Kathryn Garcia [3], the former head of the Department of Sanitation and one of his rivals in the race. “What I appreciate about Kathryn is that she’s an operator,” he told me. He’s big on the idea that he would hire the right people to do the job, just like Michael Bloomberg did.

Yang said he calls Garcia at least once a week to say, “Hey, Kathryn, we’re gonna need you.” (It’s true he calls a lot, according to her campaign. “Makes her crazy,” said Christine Quinn [4] of the implications that Garcia should be Yang’s No. 2. Quinn was the front-runner in the 2013 mayor’s race until Bill de Blasio overtook her in the final weeks.)

[1] "Operator" usually has two usages. The first is similar to the sense of "fixer"; the second has been popularized post-War-on-Terror in reference to special operations forces (cf. commando).
[2] Yang's net worth only starts at $1 million though, placing him in the petite bourgeoisie
[3] Garcia is one of Yang's competitors in the primary, who received the New York Times' endorsement this week.
[4] Former City Council speaker


The profile leaves me with a higher regard for Yang's cunning, potentially intelligence, but less regard for his wisdom and values.