Outgoing NYC Comptroller Brad Lander formally launched his bid for Congress Wednesday with a nearly three-minute video that featured an awkward tribute to beloved PBS kids’ show host Fred Rogers.
Lander, who is challenging Democratic Rep. Dan Goldman in the 10th Congressional District, located in lower Manhattan and brownstone Brooklyn, took a series of jabs at his rival without mentioning Goldman by name.
“I’m running for Congress because the challenges we face can’t be solved with strongly worded letters or high dollar fundraisers, and not by doing AIPAC’s bidding,” he said, referring to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which has supported Goldman in his two prior runs for Congress.
At another point in the video, Lander said: “While the oligarchy drives an affordability crisis, they shouldn’t be able to buy a seat in Congress,” an apparent reference to Goldman’s status as an heir to the Levi Strauss fortune.
The former Brooklyn council member and failed mayoral candidate then quoted Mister Rogers, who Lander called “a man who knew a thing or two about loving their neighbors: Love isn’t a state of perfect caring, it’s an active noun.”
“I know it’s corny,” Lander added, “but I love the idea that democracy is just neighbors working together to make our lives in common better.”
The candidate then drove the point home by singing a snippet of the “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” theme song to wrap up the video: “Would you be mine? Could you be mine? Won’t you be my neighbor?”
Lander has already been endorsed by the Working Families Party, Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-VT.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani after the pair cross-endorsed each other during this year’s Democratic primary.
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