Is Rudy Giuliani correct that Bill de Blasio is the worst Mayor NYC ever had?

Andrew (No)

Rudy Giuliani's claim that Bill de Blasio is the worst mayor in the history of New York City is largely built on manipulated statistics regarding crime rates, and he is wrong to do so. Giuliani falsely claimed violent crime rose in New York City while the truth is that all significant crimes have decreased under the de Blasio administration. The current annual number of murders is lower than Giuliani's best year in office. Giuliani used two sets of statistics, overall crime, and many murders to create this misleading claim.

Giuliani is unfairly cherrypicking his murder statistic on de Blasio, only looking at extremely recent data, which shows an increase in murders. Sociologists believe that the NYC rise in murders is closely tied to the current pandemic crisis and not long term trends. In fact, the annual number of murders under de Blasio is lower than both Bloomberg and Giuliani. While murders may have increased during a short period during 2020, it is dangerous to extrapolate from short term changes.

Giuliani's stunt of calling de Blasio the worst New York City mayor of all time is clearly an attempt at whipping up tensions to drive fear and hopefully win the next mayoral race for a conservative candidate. If the correct and equivalent statistics are used for comparison, de Blasio has done better on crime than Giuliani. There are many ways to judge a mayor; unfortunately, for former mayor Rudy Giuliani, the metrics he chose to favor the current mayor, Bill de Blasio, do not apply the way he so wishes. 

Sharon (Yes)

New York City is in a world of hurt right now, but it's not just the COVID-19 pandemic causing its misery. Giuliani is not the only one calling NYC's de Blasio the worst mayor, as he's contributed vastly to the city's problems. Indeed, more people are moving out of NYC daily than any other city in the nation. Moving companies are overwhelmed by the number of people trying to escape New York. 

Crime has dramatically increased in NYC on de Blasio's watch—1,000 shootings occurred before Labor Day this year. His adversarial relationship with the NYPD is well documented. Bail reform, which eliminates bail for many crimes, has added to crime numbers as numerous people often re-offend. Under his leadership, violent unrest results in multiple bloody police attacks and looting. Yet, de Blasio decided to cut about $1 billion from the police budget. The homeless problem is out of control and dangerous to city residents. One scheme had the city paying $175 per night per person to house homeless people in hotels, subjugating surrounding neighborhoods to open-air drug dealing and drug use, public masturbation and urination, people passed out in the street, fighting, aggressive panhandling, and harassment. Ten sex offenders placed in the Belleclaire were just a block from a public school playground.

The city faces an astronomical revenue shortfall as businesses suffer from COVID-19 regulations, especially restaurants, and damage from protests and looting haven't helped. Events are canceled, while BLM protests don't have to adhere to those restrictions. The quality of life has been utterly lost, with no effective solutions in sight. These horrible decisions and more were helmed by de Blasio, the worst mayor ever.