In vying to become the City Council’s next speaker, Julie Menin has in private conversations floated bringing back use of the chamber’s subpoena power, a tool that could be a potential check on incoming Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s administration, according to three sources familiar with the matter.
It’s not unusual for city agencies to refrain from providing all the information and documents requested by the Council — an issue that has become especially pitched under Mayor Adams, whose outgoing administration has several times refused outright to show up to Council hearings. Nonetheless, the Council has in recent decades rarely used its subpoena authority. Outgoing Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, for instance, hasn’t once issued a subpoena under her four years as the chamber’s top leader despite heightened tensions with the mayor’s administration.
Against that backdrop, Menin, a Democrat who represents the Upper East Side, has this year in running to become the Council’s next speaker told fellow members she’d be willing to be more hawkish and issue subpoenas, the three sources told the Daily News. The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Menin has referenced that willingness in a broader context about a need to perform oversight of city agencies once Mamdani, a democratic socialist, takes office Jan. 1 with hopes of enacting an ambitious affordability agenda.
In a statement Tuesday, Menin acknowledged she has talked about how she would as speaker increase the Council’s use of subpoenas, but said she did not do so in the context of Mamdani.
“The City Council has historically failed to fully utilize its subpoena power when it comes to holding bad corporate actors accountable,” Menin said. “Much like Mayor-elect Mamdani, I want to use every tool at our disposal to go after businesses that flout our laws and operate without proper scrutiny … I would make sure the Council uses its subpoena power to protect the interests of all New Yorkers.”
Menin has emerged as one of two front-runners in the Council speaker race, which is decided internally by the body’s 51 members via a vote in the chamber early next year. In campaigning for the job, she has positioned herself to fellow members as the more moderate candidate in the contest, pitching herself as someone who can both work with the incoming mayor on priorities like childcare while also being able to push back on him when necessary, sources familiar with her outreach efforts said.
In addition to the issue of subpoena power, the sources said Menin has privately affirmed she would not as speaker simply be a rubber-stamp on the Department of Community Safety, a $1 billion agency Mamdani proposes to launch to take over certain responsibilities from the NYPD, such as handling mental health calls. The Council will likely need to approve any launch of the agency, and Menin’s position indicates she’s not going to move to do so without serious deliberation.
A Menin spokesman said she’s supportive of removing police from responding to some mental health crises, but confirmed she wouldn’t act on any such steps without extensive deliberation in the Council.
The other leading candidate in the speaker’s race is Brooklyn Councilwoman Crystal Hudson, a progressive Democrat who has occupied the more left-leaning lane in the contest. In trying to line up support for her speaker bid, Hudson has vowed to work closely with Mamdani on implementing his agenda.
Some Hudson-supporting Council members say Menin’s campaign signals she may try to block Mamdani’s agenda. “It’s one thing to say you’re going to be a check on the mayor, it’s different to position yourself as an antagonist,” said one progressive Council member, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Menin’s positions on being a check on Mamdani has earned her support from some of the Council’s more conservative members, who are uneasy about Mamdani’s left-wing agenda and relative inexperience in government.
“That is, in part, why she has my vote,” Queens Councilwoman Joann Ariola, the Council’s Republican minority leader, told The News this week, referencing Menin’s commitment to oversight of the incoming Mamdani administration. “She would be a check and a balance on the mayor’s office when necessary … We have admittedly a mayor coming in who doesn’t have a lot of experience so I would feel a lot more comfortable with her as a resource.”
Mamdani has yet to exert any public-facing influence in the speaker’s race, and it’s unclear if he will try to do so. Ideologically, he is the most aligned with Hudson.
A spokeswoman for Mamdani declined to comment Tuesday.
With Josephine Stratman
