Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo is picking up support in the borough that raised him with the rollout of his first endorsements from Queens lawmakers in the 2025 NYC mayor’s race on Thursday.
Queens Democratic Assembly Members Stacy Pheffer Amato, Vivian Cook, and Sam Berger are all backing Cuomo’s run for City Hall, according to an announcement his campaign shared first with amNewYork Metro.
Cuomo — who often refers to himself as a “Queens boy” for his upbringing in the borough, but has spent decades living upstate — has been racking up endorsements from elected officials, unions and political clubs since launching his mayoral campaign on March 1. He is attempting to make a political comeback after resigning as governor in 2021 amid multiple accusations of sexual misconduct, which he denies.
The three lawmakers cited Cuomo’s focus on combating crime, ability to manage the state government, and support for New York’s Jewish community as reasons for backing his candidacy.
Pheffer Amato, whose district covers Howard Beach and much of the Rockaway peninsula, lauded Cuomo’s proposal to increase the NYPD’s ranks by 5,000 officers.
“Our City is struggling with recruitment and retention of our police officers,” Pheffer Amato, who chairs the Assembly’s Governmental Employees Committee, said in a statement. “The NYPD’s uniformed headcount is at its lowest in decades, and we need a mayor who will stand up for our men and women in blue. Andrew Cuomo is that candidate.”
The endorsements build on Cuomo’s ongoing trend of removing support from embattled Mayor Eric Adams, whose chances of winning re-election are looking increasingly dim.
Pheffer Amato is defecting from the mayor after endorsing him in the 2021 Democratic mayoral primary. Cook, who backed businessman Ray McGuire four years ago, represents part of southeast Queens, a voter-rich portion of the city that solidly went for the mayor in 2021.
Berger did not make an endorsement in the 2021 race as he was not yet in elected office.
The announcement also is a slight blow to City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, who has represented a large swath of southeast Queens since 2017. The speaker kicked off her mayoral campaign in southeast Queens’ Rochdale Village Shopping Center on Saturday with the support of other World’s Borough elected officials, including Democratic Assembly Member Andrew Hevesi.
But Cook said she is backing Cuomo because she believes his 11 years as governor gave him the management skills to address the city’s most “serious problems.”
“Before he was governor, Albany was a dysfunctional laughingstock,” Cook said. “He kept our neighborhoods safe, made government work for the working and middle class, and ensured our city was affordable enough that owning a home was an attainable dream.”
By contrast, Cuomo’s opponents have made his treatment of the city as governor, when he was engaged in a years-long feud with former Mayor Bill de Blasio, one of their central lines of attack against him. They charge his cuts to the MTA and housing programs, as well as his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, all caused tremendous damage to the five boroughs.
Meanwhile, Berger said Cuomo will be a “strong partner” in City Hall.
Furthermore, the Assembly member — who represents orthodox Jewish parts of Flushing — described the former governor as a “steadfast ally” to the city’s Jewish community and Israel.
“Whenever antisemitism reared its ugly head, he stood up and fought back,” Berger said. “With antisemitic hate crimes on the rise in our city and around the world, we need a mayor like Andrew Cuomo who will combat it with both words and actions—just as he always has.”
