In Final Debate, Candidates Spar For the Spotlight
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

In their last official televised debate before Tuesday’s primary, the four Democrats running for mayor expended most of their energy packing as much information as they could into 30-second intervals and trying to distinguish themselves by repeating their policy proposals.
While the debate, held in a WNBCTV studio in Midtown Manhattan, may not have been marked by political haymakers or rough personal attacks, the candidates delivered some sharp one-liners and took several jabs at one another’s policy proposals.
The four candidates – the front-runner, Fernando Ferrer; the speaker of the City Council, Gifford Miller; the president of Manhattan, C. Virginia Fields, and a Brooklyn-Queens congressman, Anthony Weiner – each seemed to go into the hour-long debate with a clear agenda.
Mr. Miller, for example, repeatedly tried to cast himself as the candidate with the most City Hall experience, squeezing the “I’m the one who’s already done it” tagline into almost every answer.
“I am the only person on this stage that’s actually closed a $7.5 billion budget gap, and you do it by rolling up your sleeves, by making sure you make the right choices,” Mr. Miller said when asked how he would close the city’s looming $4 billion gap.
Mr. Ferrer, who has long been consider the front-runner but needs to win at least 40% of the vote Tuesday to avoid a runoff, seemed to be debating the one man not in the room: Mayor Bloomberg.
Ms. Fields, who has been bruised by criticisms that she has been too vague about how she would pay for her initiatives, went to great lengths to bring up details. At one point, when she was asked for specifics of how she would pay for her housing proposal, the candidate refused to stop talking. “I really want to be specific,” she protested.
One of the more aggressive attacks of the night came from Mr. Weiner, who assailed Mr. Ferrer’s plan to pay for his education proposals with a stock transfer tax. That proposal, intended to raise $4 billion for education spending, has been met with widespread disdain and was noticeably absent from the candidate’s remarks last night. Still, Mr. Weiner was quick to bring it up.
“I have a strong difference with Mr. Ferrer on this issue,” he said. “We are owed the money. It is due to us. Us putting money on the table is essentially plea-bargaining with the wrong party.”
When the candidates were asked how they would close the city’s projected $4 billion budget deficit, the council speaker took at swipe at his chief rival in the race, Mr. Weiner, who has the same youthful look and is the only other non-Hispanic white candidate in the race.
After Mr. Weiner, who has been surging in the public opinion polls in recent weeks, said he was the only Democrat to propose middle-class tax cuts and deep reductions in spending on inefficient programs, Mr. Miller jumped in.
“Well, there’s a lot to clarify there,” Mr. Miller said from behind his podium. “It’s not true that Anthony is the only person proposing cuts for the middle class. I am the only person proposing a cut for the working poor, doubling the earned income tax credit.”
At one point, when a WNBC questioner momentarily confused the two men, Mr. Weiner jumped in with “We get that a lot,” which drew laughs.
All four candidates said they would use the office of mayor as a “bully pulpit” to lobby President Bush to withdraw American troops from Iraq. They also all lashed out at a leader of the In dependence Party, Lenora Fulani, who has endorsed Mr. Bloomberg and has been criticized for past remarks that have been interpreted as anti-Semitic.
Mr. Weiner, rebutting a questioner’s suggestion that he had accepted an endorsement from her party in a past election, said she had no connection to the group that backed him, the Queens Independence Party. “Frankly, Mike Bloomberg should give back their money and sever ties with this hateful woman,” Mr. Weiner said.
Mr. Weiner was the only one of the four candidates to say which of his opponents he would vote for if he couldn’t vote for himself. His vote would go to Ms. Fields. Ms. Fields later thanked Mr. Weiner – but she did not reciprocate.
There is another debate tonight among the Democratic candidates, at 7 p.m. on WABC, but last night’s was the second and last required by the Campaign Finance Board of candidates accepting public matching funds, as all four of the Democratic mayoral contenders are doing.