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On February 17th, the Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino, in Atlantic City, is to be demolished by implosion. Shuttered since 2014, the thirty-seven-year-old building has already been stripped of most of its concrete façade, falling chunks of which began crashing onto the boardwalk last year. Never an architectural treasure, it now resembles the shaky remainders of a truck bombing. Donald Trump hasn’t even owned it since 2009, and in 2016 his residual ties were severed in bankruptcy court. Yet a moot question must be raised: Might this building have merited preservation as a site for future generations to contemplate the forces and passions that shaped the forty-fifth President? If Abraham Lincoln or Theodore Roosevelt or even Grover Cleveland had owned a casino, wouldn’t it be cool if it were still standing and you could play a few slots?
What You Need to Know About the Special Elections in The Bronx and Queens
What’s so special about the special elections for City Council this year? Lots including the advent of ranked choice voting. Early voting is already underway in one race and the others are coming soon.
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Hiram Alejandro Durán/THE CITY
Hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers are gearing up to vote for mayor, city comptroller, public advocate, district attorney, borough president and for their local City Council members.
Most voters in the city will only have to cast a ballot twice this year: during the Democratic or Republican primaries in June and in the general election in November.
Indian American Neeta Jain is hoping to win the New York City Council seat in the District 24 special election on Feb. 2.
Jain is looking to win the seat which represents the Kew Gardens Hills, Pomonok, Electchester, Fresh Meadows, Hillcrest, Jamaica Estates, Briarwood, Parkway Village, Jamaica Hills and Jamaica neighborhoods.
According to her campaign site, Jain says the city is struggling under the pandemic, recession and racist politics from former President Donald Trump.
She says her unique combination of progressive activism and real world leadership give her the experience we need in City Hall right now. Â
The activist is New Yorkâs first Indian American woman Democratic district leader, an elected DNC Delegate for Biden-Harris, an accomplished educator, and founder and president of the International Ahimsa Foundation, according to her profile.
Moumita Ahmed, one of the eight candidates running in the Feb. 2 non-partisan special election for the New York City Council seat vacated by former Councilman Rory Lancman, who took a job in Governor Andrew Cuomo’s administration, said during a debate on Tuesday that she supports the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement. Last week, she came under fire over an alleged antisemitic tweet.
“I support the two-state solution and I support people’s right to boycott,” Ahmed said during a virtual candidate forum hosted by the Citizens Union, Queens Daily Eagle and the Gotham Gazette. “In my district, there are differences of opinions when it comes to that, so I want to make sure that I protect people’s First Amendment right to boycott.”
Ranked-choice voting sees first test AG’s suit against NRA moves forward Garcia calls for vaccine czar
Presented by Opportunities for NY
A new system of ranked-choice voting will transform New York City’s elections, including this year s race for mayor. Now it’s about to get its first test: early voting
Instead of picking one candidate, voters
will choose up to five, ranking them in order of preference. If a candidate gets a majority of first-choice votes, they win and that’s the end of it. But if no one does, a computerized system eliminates the last-place candidate and parcels out their votes to the second choice. The process repeats itself until someone gets a majority.