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April 13, 2025 13 mins
Sliwa describes himself as a Republican candidate ''running for mayor of New York City to finally end the disastrous reign of de Blasio-Cuomo''.  In the late 1970s, he founded the Guardian Angels, a nonprofit volunteer organization that began its anti-crime activities by patrolling the subways.  Today, the group has chapters in 13 countries and over 100 cities, according to its website.  Safety and refunding the police are central to  the campaign of Sliwa, a radio host who still wears the Angels’ trademark red beret.  He proposes adding 4,500 uniformed and 500 undercover officers to patrol the subways.  He also calls for restoring "all budget cuts" to the NYPD  and giving the department more money to combat gun violence.  Sliwa is part of the Republican wing that does not support former President Donald Trump.  In the first debate of the GOP candidates, he said he had never voted for Trump.  The 67-year-old current Manhattan resident got involved in community work at an early age. At 14, he became known as a "neighborhood garbage collector" when he opened a recycling center in Brooklyn.
Website: sliwaforny.com
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Transcript

Episode Transcript

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Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is a podcast from WR Now the WR Saturday
Morning Show.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
Here's Larry Minty, Hello and welcome to Saturday Morning. On
today's show, Curtis Leewood tells us his plan to win
the mayoral election as a Republican in a very democratic city.
So good to see you again. Thank you for coming in.
That was great, lair.

Speaker 1 (00:22):
You know, generally it's your colleague Mark Simone who touts
me as the next mayor all the time. He did
it though last time, even more so than most of
the folks at the station that I usually work at.

Speaker 2 (00:34):
Yeah, I didn't even know he said that. I didn't
even know he said that. But we're on the same
line and on the same wavelength because i'd love to
see you. I think you'd be wonderful for the city
to become mayor. But you know what you're up against.
You know about the Democratic registration in this city. You
know about funding and the funds the Democrats get. How

(00:54):
do you plan on doing this? Well, I'm no one.

Speaker 1 (00:56):
If it was just one on one a Democrat versus
a Republican, you'll right, that would be an arduous situation.
But it's gonna turn out. You're gonna have four in
the general. Maybe more so, let's assume that Cuomo wins
the Democratic primary. Body's gonna get battered and Bruce because
he's ranked choice voting. Most voters have no idea how

(01:17):
that Bengo card works. And the far left, the Liberals,
the progressives, they're working very hard to remain discipline this time.
Don't put Adams on your Bengo card, don't put Cmo
on your Bengo card. So it'll probably end up being
very tight. I believe that the new golden child of
the Democratic Party, Zoran, will become the Working Families Party

(01:42):
candidate because they hate Como, who tried to destroy them
and yet they were able to survive that. I think
Eric Adams is going to run as an independent. It's
gonna do what John Lindsay did in nineteen sixty nine.
Is a sitting mayor who lost the Republican nomination and
yet one anyway against three when he ran on the
Liberal party line. And then I'm the lone Republican. Now

(02:03):
I got thirty percent of the vote last time. Start
doing your mathematics. So all of a sudden, when you
got four involved in the general race, and you know
the three Democrats are going to be going at one another.
If I hold the thirty and a few percentage points,
I'm the mayor. I mean, just through the analytics. Nobody
wants to do that. But when you tell them there's

(02:24):
going to be four in the general, so well, now
that's conceivable, that's plausible.

Speaker 2 (02:28):
Yeah, and not only four, but four that can get votes.
I mean four that could get over ten percent at least,
maybe even twenty percent. And with that, you're right, the
math works in your favor. There's another mathematical equation to
take in in this, and that is very few people
show up for these elections. It was twenty one percent
the last election. So if Republicans get out to vote,

(02:49):
or if some common sense Democrats get out to vote
and vote for you, you got a shot.

Speaker 1 (02:53):
And Larry, it's really the independents who have this way.
They double the number of independence registered and Republicans. And
I used to be the chairman of the State Reform
Party until Andrew cmo decided, in his war against the
Working Families Party, how dare they nominate Cynthia Nixon. He
destroyed all the independent parties. So you had the Green Party,
the Libertarian Party, the Reform Party, the Independence Party wiped out.

(03:17):
All he succeeded in doing was strengthening the Working Families Party.
So you only have two now independent parties, Conservatives, Working
Families Party. They want revenge against CMO, so they're going
to be going ad them hard. Eric Adams is sitting
on three million dollars. People are always not raising any money.
He's got three million dollars untouched that if this federal

(03:38):
judge drops the case against them, which he's going to
based on the recommendation of the council that he appointed,
then he's going to go to the campaign Finance Board
and said you wouldn't give me matching funds on the
three million because you said I was indicted for a
shadow for store donors, which is a serious crime. Now

(03:59):
I've been relieved to at where's my matching funds? So
you're talking about three Democrats who are going to be
going at one another, and I'm opposed to almost everything
that they're in favor of. You almost have to look
at me. Can you mention congestion pricing? They're all four
congestion pricing. I'm the only one opposed to it. Andrew
Cuomo is the author the godfather of.

Speaker 2 (04:20):
No cash bail. He doubled down on it a week ago.
Let's zero it on congestion pricing for a second. How
can you stop it?

Speaker 1 (04:27):
Well, you work in tandem with the Trump administration and
you try to apply the pressure, and you work with
Lee Zelden, the former congressman who's head of the EPA,
and you state to him, Hey, there were not effective
EPA studies done. Murphy has brought that up in New
Jersey as as a FA seller. The borough president along
with molgru the chairman of the UFT an unlikely Unity

(04:51):
team there against congestion pricing, and.

Speaker 2 (04:53):
There was no public comment either.

Speaker 1 (04:55):
No, and this nonsense that they're saying business is up.
Where do you walk around Midtown? It's like a coachtown.
I'm coming up to your studios here. It's nobody around.

Speaker 2 (05:04):
No, they're talking about the big the big items stores
like sacksoonyth Avenue. They're talking about those stores because now
there's no congestion. The peons aren't on the roads anymore,
so the rich people can make it to shop where
they want to shop. I'll tell you what if crime
is the biggest issue, and it seems like it is
over and over again. I can't think of anyone who's

(05:26):
going to do more to fight crime in this city
than you. What do you think of all these statistics
that are thrown out that crime is down, crime is down,
crime is down. You have the Trump administration saying, what
are you talking about. We're looking at the stats. It's
up fifty eight percent from four years ago. Oh.

Speaker 1 (05:41):
In fact, they've demanded a complete accounting of all the
crimes that have been committed in the subways and on
the buses in order to continue federal funding for mass transportation.
And they're right to do that. They've cooked the books.
There's not a man or a woman or a child
in New York City who thinks it's safer in their neighborhood,
safer in the subways. So you can stop making arrests

(06:03):
and it can make your figures look good in the books,
and you can tout the fact that crime is at
an all time low level. Nobody believes that. And the
only one who's ever forough crime. The only one who
knows how to bring crime down is courtis Lee. With
forty six years Guardian Angels leader. I've been doing this
on a regular basis with no governmental support. Eric Adams

(06:25):
was supposed to be missed the law and order. He's
failed in that test. And Andrew Cuomo is the author
of every rule in regulation that has allowed the criminals
to run free, and he has not apologized or amended
any of them. He says he wants to hire more cops.
He says it's recidivism. Well, recidivism is the result of
the fact that there's no cash bail and you put
them right out into the streets. He's also the author

(06:48):
of the bill that said sixteen to eighteen year olds
could no longer be considered adults. And they run the
streets and they commit most of the violent crimes. So
every way you look is a Cuomo statue or CuMo
law that has encouraged anarchy, that has encouraged chaos and
has led to this unpresidented crime rise. Nobody feels safe

(07:09):
in New York City, nobody.

Speaker 2 (07:10):
We want to talk about Donald Trump and the effect
he might have on this race, because Donald Trump is
hated in this city because it's so heavily democratic. Yeah,
Donald Trump could be a big supporter. What are you
going to do? Do you distance yourself, do you embrace him?
What do you do? Uh?

Speaker 1 (07:29):
You do what Donald Trump wants the president of the
United States. And right now their guy is Eric Adams.
It's not Curtis Sleewand they got Eric Adams in their pocket.
If they tell Eric Adams to jump, he says, how high? Whatever, whatever,
President Donald Trump and Tom Holman, Juan or anyone else
in the administration. And they direct it right at Eric Adams.

(07:52):
He will not condemn him, he will not criticize him.
He will do whatever they tell him. So that's their
guy for right now. Let's see how Eric Adams survived.
I think he runs an independent campaign, but having his
ward if Donald Trump is a help, but it can
also hurt. He got thirty percent of the vote citywide,
the best he's ever done in the prior to election runs.

(08:14):
As Eldon got thirty percent. I got thirty percent. You
got to get over thirty percent with four people in
the race. If I get thirty three to thirty five percent,
I'm the next mayor of the City of New York.

Speaker 2 (08:23):
Would you accept his support? Would you accept Republican money
from the RNC?

Speaker 1 (08:29):
I don't know if I'd so much accept the money
from the RNC. I don't take money with strings attached.
You're not going to see any heavy high rollers funding
Curtis Slee. There's nobody from Park Avenue, there's nobody from
the Fortune five hundred Confab. I'm the outer borough guy. Now,
if they want to come to the out of boroughs
and help homeowners save their homes from the city of

(08:51):
Yes that is meant to destroy residential neighborhoods. All the
migrant shelters they put in the devastated neighborhoods, regular shelters,
and now they have this Larry, these lithium ion battery
warehouses they're putting all over the outer boroughs, not putting
them on Park Avenue, not putting them on Billionaires Row.
And this is so dangerous because in fires that have

(09:15):
taken place in California, it's taken five to six days
for the fire to burn itself out. They have no
way to put the fire out, and they're putting it
in residential neighborhoods, and I'm leading the effort to stop
it in the Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn and Staten Island.

Speaker 2 (09:30):
So if I can put all this together, what you've
told us this morning, you are not going to be
the Trump candidate. Mayor Adams is the Trump candidate, which,
by the way, is so smart because if he's dislike, oh,
that's going to go to Mayor Adams and not to
the Republican candidate. But you're also saying that you and
by the way you are this, you are a man
of the neighborhoods. You've worked in the neighborhoods, You've been

(09:52):
to all the neighborhoods. And because of that, however, you're
not going to get the big money. And you need
some money. You do need some money where you gonna
get it.

Speaker 1 (10:01):
Well, last time around, I was able to collect eighteen
thousand contributions, more than anybody else but small level seventy
two dollars average. I was able to get six and
a half million dollars in matching funds. We expect to
double that amount this time, so we'll be competitive. If
people want to find out what I stand for, what

(10:21):
my platform is, and how to contribute or how to
get involved, they go to sliwa for NYC dot com.
That's Sliwa for NYC dot com. I've never been the
big money guy. Look they're fighting. Well, you got Cuomo.
He's in the back pocket. All of a sudden of
the corporate developers and real estate interests. Eric Adams is
right behind them. Why would I go knocking on their

(10:43):
door when they want to destroy the residential neighborhood? Said, Oh,
the heart and soul of the blue collar working class
of New York City, which is the real new Republican Party.
It's not the elite, it's not the wealthy, it's not
the rich, it's not the country club Republicans. It's the
blue collar working class that really is at the heart
and soul of the Republican Party in the United States today.

Speaker 2 (11:04):
You're right, it is switched. It absolutely has switched. And
Donald Trump did that. It's a shame that you can't
side up to Donald Trump. I understand the political climate.
But the nice thing about this is nobody's going to
own you.

Speaker 1 (11:18):
No, no, And even my worst critics have said, you
can't buy, you can't rent, you can't lease. Sliwa And
right now, President Donald Trump has enormous problems that he
has to deal with internationally nationally. Figuring out who should
be the next mayor of the New York City cycle
should be the least of his considerations. To be honest

(11:39):
with you, the least of his considerations.

Speaker 2 (11:41):
Although it is important to him. He seems to focus
on New York a lot. So it is important to Doll.

Speaker 1 (11:47):
You're going to have to cooperate with the President of
the United States and the White House because so much
of what we get and we provide is right from
the federal government. You look at ninety five percent of
the money for all public housing projects comes from the
federal government. So if you don't cooperate with the Trump

(12:07):
administration and they start cutting funds, there's not enough people
left in New York City to tax to fund all
the social service programs because they're already on their way
to Florida real.

Speaker 2 (12:17):
Quick, we're running out of time. But how would you
have handled Columbia University when those riots started.

Speaker 1 (12:22):
Uh, the mayor was going to see the Pope. He
should have canceled that trip. He should have been right
there on the campus. He should have had the NYPD inn,
he should have made arrests, and he should have named
in shamed Alvin Bragg who released them after they took
over Hamilton Hall because of Cuomo's.

Speaker 2 (12:38):
No cash bail.

Speaker 1 (12:39):
You see, it always comes back to Andrew Cuomo.

Speaker 2 (12:42):
He's tough.

Speaker 1 (12:43):
Oh, he knows how to govern. Yeah, he did a
really great job that he had to flee all but
because he feared impeachment and indictment.

Speaker 2 (12:51):
Give him another chance.

Speaker 1 (12:52):
What to destroy New York City like he destroyed New
York State. No, go to sliwa nyc dot com.

Speaker 2 (12:58):
And with that, I'm gonna say goodbye, but with a
promise that you're going to come back. It's an open
door policy. Anytime you want to come back, please, do.

Speaker 1 (13:05):
You offer me a microphone?

Speaker 2 (13:06):
You know I'm there the Great Courtisley. I have to
come up with something different than the next Mayor of
New York, but the next Mayor of New York.

Speaker 1 (13:14):
This has been a podcast from wor
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