Supporters and donors to Hillary Clinton have apparently proposed a new plan for the former presidential candidate: mayor of New York City.
Clinton would have to run against incumbent Democratic Mayor Bill de Blasio, who will be seeking another term, according to the New York Times and Newsmax. De Blasio helped manage her Senate campaign in 2000.
Since Election Day in November, Clinton has kept a relatively low profile, making few public appearances.
Clinton did particularly well against President-elect Donald Trump in New York City, winning some 79 percent of the vote.
“She’s talking about it,” a former New York City elected official told Newsmax, a conservative-leaning website owned by Christopher Ruddy, a friend and donor of Clinton. Other sources said that she’s being pushed to run to appeal to voters who are dissatisfied with de Blasio’s tenure as mayor.
A recent Quinnipiac poll shows that only 39 percent of New Yorkers believe de Blasio should be reelected.
Veteran New York Democratic consultant Hank Sheinkopf told Newsmax that she “would be a terrific candidate for mayor.” He added: “She is wildly popular among New Yorkers—so much so that were she to file, de Blasio would have to file his retirement papers on the same day.”
According to the Times, a spokesperson for Clinton declined to comment, while a spokesman for de Blasio also declined to issue a comment about the speculation.
But the paper noted that there has been speculation for weeks after Nov. 8 about a possible Clinton bid, apparently even being discussed in Congress. “I heard it three times in the two days I was on the Hill,” Bradley Tusk, a former top aide to Mayor Michael Bloomberg, told the paper.
Tusk, however, acknowledged that her running for New York City’s top office seems unlikely. “The reality is that she’s not going to and all it does is further delay the thinking and plans of people who actually could run and win,” Tusk said.
