Chuck Schumer Walks Out Rather Than Say if He’s Voting for Zohran

New York City votes Tuesday for its next mayor, but Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer still has to make a decision on who he’ll pick on his ballot.

The Democratic leader ran away from the press Friday when asked who he intended to cast his ballot for in the upcoming election.

“[Zohran] Mamdani, are you going to vote for him?” asked CNN’s Manu Raju.

“The bottom line is very simple. I have a good relationship with him, and we’re continuing to talk,” said Schumer.

“But the vote is on Tuesday. What are you going to do?” pressed Raju.

But Schumer had already turned his back and walked out of the room.

After a tight Democratic primary (and stunning upset victory) this summer, Mamdani has gained citywide appeal. The Ugandan-born New Yorker is currently leading the mayoral race by double digits, according to three new polls out this week.

An Emerson College poll published Thursday put Mamdani at 50 percent favorability with likely voters. Ex–New York Governor Andrew Cuomo trailed behind at 25 percent, while the poll estimated that Republican mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa would attract 21 percent. Just 5 percent of voters remained undecided, according to the Emerson College poll.

Mamdani’s candidacy has proven a pivotal turning point for the Democratic Party, separating out the politicians with a dream for the future against those without one. Ultimately, Schumer’s abstention only serves as yet another illustration of how detached Democratic leadership has become from the desires of their base, who apparently—per New York’s anticipated election results—crave drastic change.

Mamdani’s campaign has already collected support from the likes of Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and New York Governor Kathy Hochul.

Like Schumer, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries waited until the last minute to support the Democratic Socialist. Jeffries extended his backing just last week, too late to make any meaningful difference in the race’s outcome.

As Americans braced Friday for SNAP benefits to expire, President Donald Trump couldn’t stop bragging about his extravagant new bathroom.

With less than 24 hours left to fund essential food resources 42 million Americans rely on, Trump was hard at work sharing pictures on Truth Social of the pristine white marble facility adorned with gaudy golden hardware. In a separate post, Trump explained that they were photographs of the refurbished bathroom in the Lincoln Bedroom.

“Highly polished, Statuary marble!” he wrote. (In September, Trump reportedly took an hour to give Republican lawmakers from Florida a tour, where he showed off the new marble tiles he’d selected for the floors.)

But Trump wasn’t done there. With the deadline to ensure funding fast approaching, he turned his attention to his renovations at the Kennedy Center.

“It is really looking good!” he wrote in another post on Truth Social, touting fixes to the apparently corroded columns, rebuilt stages, fresh carpets, as well as “new seats, new chairs.”

“It is happening faster than anticipated, one of my trademarks,” Trump wrote. “My people are doing a really great job! We are bringing this building back to life. It was dead as a doornail, but it will soon be beautiful again!”

But it seems that speed is only a virtue when it comes to construction—the president has allowed the government shutdown to stretch on for 31 days, making it the second-longest in history.

A federal judge in Rhode Island issued a temporary order requiring the government to use contingency funds to pay for SNAP benefits as the shutdown continues. But just hours earlier, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins wouldn’t commit to releasing SNAP funds if ordered to do so.

Two federal judges have ordered the Trump administration to use contingency funds to pay out SNAP funds while the government is shut down.

U.S. District Judges John J. McConnell in Rhode Island and Indira Talwani in Massachusetts each ruled Friday that the government had to keep funding the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, either partially or in full for November. Prior to news of the ruling, the U.S. Department of Agriculture was planning to freeze payments for food stamps Saturday.

White House officials had refused to fund SNAP from a $5 billion contingency fund that existed precisely to keep funding the program in the event of something like this. In response, 25 states and the District of Columbia sued the federal government in federal court to keep the program running, alleging that the USDA had “both the authority and legal duty” to do so.

Both Talwani and McConnell asked for updates from the government by Monday. In his ruling, McConnell ruled that the previous work requirement waivers must stay intact, reversing the USDA’s decision during the shutdown to terminate waivers exempting older adults, veterans, and others from work requirements.

Talwani called the government’s suspension of SNAP unlawful, writing in her ruling that “Defendants’ suspension of SNAP payments was based on the erroneous conclusion that the Contingency Funds could not be used to ensure continuation of SNAP payments. This court has now clarified that Defendants are required to use those Contingency Funds as necessary for the SNAP program.”

The Trump administration will undoubtedly appeal, possibly all the way to the Supreme Court. But for now, millions of people across the country will not have to make hard choices about how to feed themselves and their families. Several states that had already declared emergencies to tackle the impending crisis will have at least some temporary relief.

This story has been updated.

One Republican representative is angry that Donald Trump’s redistricting war has put his congressional seat in danger.

California Representative Kevin Kiley criticized the GOP in an interview with The New York Times’ podcast The Daily Friday, saying that his party’s attempt to grab more seats in the House of Representatives and keep control of Congress is “incredibly destabilizing.”

“I said from the moment this was on my radar that it shouldn’t be happening anywhere. I’m against it in Texas, I’m against it in California. It’s pure political opportunism,” Kiley said.

If California Governor Gavin Newsom is successful in his retaliation, Kiley could be squeezed out of Congress, as California would gain five new Democratic seats. The congressman tried to head off the redistricting tit-for-tat back in August by introducing a bill to prevent congressional districts from being redrawn in the middle of a decade, as opposed to the customary end of a decade following the national census.

But Republican leadership didn’t support his idea and went on with their gerrymandering efforts across the country, including in places like Ohio, Missouri, Utah, and Indiana. This has prompted Democratic redistricting efforts in states besides California such as Maryland, New York, and even purple Virginia, and drawn the ire of other vulnerable Republicans in addition to Kiley. Who knows what Congress is going to look like when the dust clears?

The U.N. human rights chief has taken the unprecedented step of condemning America’s military strikes on boats in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean, accusing the U.S. of violating international law.

The Trump administration has committed 14 known strikes on small boats in the two regions over the last two months, killing at least 61 people.

Volker Türk, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, issued the critique—the first of its kind—Friday, calling for a “prompt, independent, and transparent” investigation into the strikes.

“These attacks and their mounting human cost are unacceptable,” Türk said, as relayed by spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani. “The U.S. must halt such attacks and take all measures necessary to prevent the extrajudicial killing of people aboard these boats.”

Shamdasani added that Türk believed “airstrikes by the United States of America on boats in the Caribbean and in the Pacific violate international human rights law.”

The White House has insisted the violence is justified, broadly accusing the boats of trafficking narcotics to the U.S. from Venezuela and Colombia, though U.S. lawmakers have been more than skeptical—particularly since several of the boats were thousands of miles away in international waters, and since the attacks were conducted without prior investigations or interdiction. On Thursday, Democratic Representative Sara Jacobs revealed Pentagon officials weren’t even concerned with identifying the people on the boats before attacking.

Trump has blamed the attacks on Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro, who has remained atop the country’s government despite Trump’s forceful attempts in 2019 to install then–opposition leader Juan Guaido.

Last week, the Pentagon announced it would deploy the world’s largest warship—the USS Gerald R. Ford—to Latin America in an effort to ramp up the military firepower available for fighting the small watercraft.

But the escalation has only further strained America’s relationship with its Latin American neighbors. In an address to his country late last week, Maduro accused the U.S. of fabricating “a new eternal war.”