Universal child care poised to become campaign issue in NYC mayoral race

Lawmakers mounting a challenge to Mayor Adams in the upcoming election rallied Tuesday behind a plan to make child care universal in New York.
The proposal by New Yorkers United for Child Care, a prominent advocacy group that quickly became a key player in local politics after Adams scaled back a planned expansion of 3-K, or preschool for 3-year-olds, would make child care a public good for all children from just after birth to age 5. Advocates estimated the plan would cost $12.7 billion and take five years to phase in.
“I believe New Yorkers United for Child Care has already won the 2025 New York City mayor’s race,” Comptroller Brad Lander, who launched his mayoral campaign in July, said at Columbus Park in Lower Manhattan. “You see all the candidates are here supporting it, because we know this is the right campaign at the right time. Let’s get it done.”
The electeds all appeared in their official capacities and it was not a campaign event per se. But with a primary election coming up in June, candidates have already coalesced around child care as a potentially salient campaign issue against an unpopular incumbent who has come under fire for his education cuts.
Adams during a weekly Q&A session with reporters brushed off the criticism. He defended his record on child care, such as lowering the cost of copays for the lowest-income families from $55 per week to less than $5 per week, or temporarily allocating part of the city budget to continue 3-K programs that had been scaled up with now-expired federal pandemic aid.
“When you are running, you can say anything. Go look at my promises that I made on the campaign trail and see how I lived them out. That is what the numbers say,” Adams said at City Hall.
“I have a record to run on,” he added, “We just got started. I’m just lacing up my shoes and stretching. We haven’t even started the real run.”
The plan by New Yorkers United for Child Care recommends adding universal 3-K and pre-K programs over the next two years. In the outyears, access would be expanded to toddlers and infants as young as 6 weeks old, while increasing the wages of child care workers and investing in infrastructure. The sites would run for full days when parents are working and be within 15 minutes of a given family’s home.
Rebecca Bailin, the organization’s executive director, defended their plan’s high price tag, which is less than families are currently paying in private expenses, as an investment and economic development strategy. Families with young kids are 40% more likely to leave New York, costing the state and its employers valuable tax revenue and risking larger population losses, according to the report. And the city is losing an estimated $23 every year in economic activity due to child care issues, it said.
“Almost every single mayoral candidate has either been here speaking with us, or has spoken about our issue,” Bailin said.
In addition to Lander, the child care rally featured mayoral hopefuls Zellnor Myrie and Jessica Ramos, state senators from Brooklyn and Queens, respectively, and Zohran Mamdani, a state assemblyman from Queens. Public Advocate Jumaane Williams — who could lead the city on an interim basis if Adams were to step aside early, though has declined to challenge the sitting mayor — also spoke in support of the plan.
Adams — who is currently fighting federal bribery and corruption charges involving the Turkish government — has declared he will not resign.
“It is time that we step up and it is time that we turn the page on a mayoral administration that cares more about [Adams’] charges than our children,” said Mamdani, who announced his run last month as the most left-leaning candidate in an increasingly crowded race.