Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams is the top choice of a plurality of voters in New York City’s mayoral race, but the former NYPD captain is not a popular second and third pick, according to a new poll released hours before Tuesday’s primary.
The survey from Democratic firm Data for Progress conducted between June 18 and 20 puts Adams as the first choice of 26 percent of likely voters, followed by former City Hall lawyer Maya Wiley (21 percent), former Sanitation Commissioner Kathryn Garcia (18 percent) and Andrew Yang (12 percent). Comptroller Scott Stringer rounds out the top five with five percent support, while six percent of voters remain undecided.
With undecided voters excluded, each of the top three candidates receives a two-percentage point bump. Adams goes to 28 percent, Wiley remains second on 23 percent, while Garcia hits 20 percent. Yang remains in fourth on 13 percent, while no other candidate cracks double digits.
The poll of 1,354 likely Democratic primary voters shows Garcia with a sizable advantage among second preferences, which could play a vital role in determining the outcome due to the new ranked-choice voting system.
The survey shows Garcia as the second choice of 22 percent of voters, while Wiley receives 15 percent of second preference votes, Adams garners 13 percent and Yang and Stringer each receive 11 percent of second choice votes.
The poll of third choices might cause the Adams camp more alarm, as the topline leader is the third preference of just nine percent of voters, placing him eighth among the top contenders.
Stringer comes out on top of the poll of third preferences with 16 percent. He’s followed by Garcia and Wiley on 14 percent each. Yang is close behind with 13 percent of third preferences, then former HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan (12 percent), former Citigroup executive Ray McGuire and nonprofit executive Dianne Morales (10 percent each). However, a wild card is the possibility that two of Morales, McGuire, Donovan and Stringer could be eliminated before third preference votes are tabulated.
The poll shows a big advantage for Adams with African American voters (44 percent of first preferences compared to Wiley’s 21 percent), as well as Hispanic and Latino voters (31 percent to 21 percent for Wiley) and voters without a college degree (33 percent to 16 percent for Wiley).
Wiley’s campaign appears to be getting most of its support from young voters. The poll shows her as the first preference of 37 percent of voters under 45, more than double any other candidate (Garcia is next with 16 percent of the under-45 vote). Meanwhile, a third of white voters have Garcia as their top choice, followed by Wiley (22 percent) Yang (12 percent) and Adams (11 percent).
Data for Progress also polled the Democratic primary race to succeed Stringer as Comptroller. Their survey showed Brooklyn Councilman Brad Lander in the lead with 26 percent of first preferences, followed by City Council Speaker Corey Johnson on 18 percent with no other candidate cracking double-digits. Johnson is the second choice of 30 percent of voters followed by Lander (16 percent).
Earlier Monday, Ipsos released a mayoral election poll showing Adams as the leader in first choice votes and beating Yang in the seventh round of a ranked-choice voting simulation. In that poll, 55 percent of respondents said “crime” was the most serious issue the city faces, and 39 percent said Adams was the best choice to tackle the issue.
