Zapped by GOP, Curtis Sliwa 'glazes' Gen Zers

Daily Point

The showman after the mayoral race

Only five months ago, Curtis Sliwa, the Republican nominee for New York City mayor, found his candidacy snidely dissed by national GOP fundraisers and the nation's top Republican, President Donald Trump. Party stalwarts wanted Sliwa — who turns 71 this week — to help support former Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo against democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani and ignore the fact of Sliwa's uncontested nomination last June.

The man with the trademark red beret stood firm and refused. Supporters, including GOP elected officials, said the only real bar to his winning would be that too many people thought he couldn't win.

Mamdani won the three-way race with 51% in the general election. The well-funded Cuomo got 41% — with even billionaire GOP donor John Catsimatidis, the owner of WABC/770 AM radio, where Sliwa drew attention hosting a show for years, backing Cuomo in October. Trump seemed bent on personally humiliating the Guardian Angels founder by saying the nominee was "not exactly prime time" and "He wants cats to be in Gracie Mansion. ... Now, we don't need to have thousands of cats."

Sliwa got 7%. He'd drawn 27% as the Republican candidate in 2021 against Eric Adams.

Back on the political sidelines as a conservative populistic voice, Sliwa nowadays has some interesting things to say. He's back on the air, but on 710 WOR, with former TV news anchor Larry Mendte. Still with an urban voice, Sliwa seems to have turned away from the MAGA movement (to which he was never quite recruited), based on dozens of public statements.

Trump's televised curtsying to Mamdani? They're both "actors," says Sliwa. ICE's mass deportation program? Arrest quotas mean not chasing out criminals but "vital" day laborers and restaurant workers. Mamdani? "He has such a passionate following. It's like they don't see that he's fallible. It's like Trump with his followers, his zealots."

One veteran Long Island Republican loyalist of Sliwa's generation called Sliwa, who was not immediately available to The Point for comment, "a showman." And Sliwa seems to be trying to build a young, independently conservative audience, perhaps inspired by the kind of following that the late Charlie Kirk attracted, the politico said, noting the president has only about three years left on his term.

And so, Sliwa has criticized Trump's leading the United States into a Mideast military intervention of the sort he used to castigate. "Young Americans are losing faith that the American dream is possible. Americans are struggling with rising costs and just trying to get by," Sliwa wrote on his Substack account. "So why are we constantly told endless wars are the answer, while the struggles of working people at home go unanswered?"

Sliwa clearly seeks a new market with his personal appearances. On social media he extended special thanks to the Hofstra University Republicans "for hosting and helping make the conversation possible." In January at the Yale Political Union, Sliwa argued for what the Yale Daily News described as "open discussion and debate among citizens" and he "critiqued powerful billionaires and politicians."

Sliwa also urged students not to dedicate their public service to the "Elon Musks of the world who say not to worry because AI is on the way." He has also appeared at Cornell University.

One sign of Sliwa's adaptation comes from a Gen Z phrase he added to his verbal arsenal. "Stop glazing me, Zohran," he said during the mayoral campaign. For those raised in the latter half of the last century, "glazing" means over-the-top, excessive praise or the practice of being a suck-up.

The longtime leader of civilian crime patrols on the subways might just be crafting a new constituency. 

— Dan Janison dan.janison@newsday.com

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Quick Points

Chuck Norris LI connection

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— Mark Nolan mark.nolan@newsday.com

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