Vornado Realty Trust chairman Steve Roth went off on Zohran Mamdani in an earnings call on Tuesday, calling the mayor’s public mugging of billionaire Ken Griffin a “blunder” and an “ugly, unnecessary video stunt.”
It was about time New York City’s heavy hitters in real estate finally came off the ropes against the communistic mayor.
Back on Feb. 12, I implored them to show some guts standing up to Mamdani, whom some top builders, eager to curry favor, foolishly praised for “listening to our concerns.” But Mamdani’s stupid and potentially catastrophic video finally spurred them to action.
The clip, which assailed mega-billionaire Griffin for owning a $238 million apartment, could deflate Griffin’s commitment to partner with Vornado and the Rudin organization to build a $4.5 billion skyscraper on Park Avenue between East 51st and 52nd streets.
“We are all shocked that our young mayor would pull this stunt in front of Ken’s home and single him out for ridicule,” Roth said on a Tuesday earnings call. “This was both irresponsible and dangerous.”
Roth didn’t say that Mamdani’s video rant appeared laser-focused on chasing Griffin out of the Park Avenue deal — and the city — but maybe he should have.
The tower, for which preliminary work has begun, would be a 1.7 million-square-foot supertall. It would provide a home for Griffin’s Citadel companies, pump millions of dollars every year into the city’s tax coffers and generate thousands of construction and permanent jobs.
Could Mamdani really be so dumb as to try ruining commercial real estate development, the golden goose of the city’s tax base — and its solvency?
Roth’s comments followed billionaire Bill Ackman’s defense of Griffin on Bloomberg yesterday, in which he accused Mamdani of wanting “to drive out the Ken Griffins of the world” whose businesses contribute astronomical sums to the municipal treasure.
Although Roth said he still expects the 350 Park Ave. skyscraper to proceed, who could blame Griffin, who just announced an expansion of his Miami office space, if he walked away with a big “eff you, New York!”
The Park Avenue project is so clearly a win-win for the city that the left-leaning City Council — which nixes lots of worthy projects requiring zoning variances — unanimously approved it by a 48-0 vote last fall.
Let’s hope Mamdani’s “blunder” will be a wake-up call to real estate moguls who are the front line against municipal near-bankruptcy as occurred in the 1970s — and against the urban collapse the mayor seems to want.
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