He wears a red beret everywhere and once had 17 cats. Now he’s the wildcard of the NYC mayoral race

New York mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa participates in the 2025 NYC West Indian Day Parade in Brooklyn on September 1. Roy Rochlin/Getty Images New York —

Curtis Sliwa’s preferred campaign mode is riding the subway. He boards trains in the back car, then chats and handshakes his way forward, one by one, through the riders that he leaves just with a business card about his candidacy. He asks everyone where they grew up.

The responses are part minor celebrity sighting, part genuine affection. One man looked up from his book about the 1998 Yankees to say, “Oh, it’s you!” A Staten Island Ferry attendant held the boat for him, saying “We got you, Curtis.”

Every New Yorker he finds, Sliwa asks where they went to high school. To Danish tourists, he talked about the bathroom attendants