Will Corey break the speaker curse?
One might say that Corey Johnson already fell victim to the City Council speaker curse. After all, his run for mayor ended before it began, when he closed his fledgling campaign in September and became the latest speaker to unsuccessfully seek higher office after leading the city’s legislative body. Three of the four speakers before him ran for mayor and lost in the Democratic primary. The other, Melissa Mark-Viverito, ran for both public advocate, then Congress, and lost in both primaries.
Now six months after opting out of the 2021 elections, Johnson is opting back in. He officially kicked off his campaign for New York City comptroller Tuesday with a press conference in Manhattan’s Madison Square Park. And with that, he’ll get a second shot at becoming the first speaker in the modern era to extend his life in electoral politics.