The Rev. Michael Blake, the Jamaican-American candidate for New York Metropolis mayor, formally launched Mission 2026 NYC at Bronx Drafthouse in The Bronx on Monday, March 10.
The occasion, which additionally served as a Consider in Blake marketing campaign fundraiser, featured performances by Tony & Grammy Award-winning actor and singer Leslie Odom, Jr. and GRAMMY Award-winning up to date Christian artist Israel Houghton.
Blake launched Mission 2026 NYC as “a daring, New York-first initiative designed to counter federal overreach and construct a stronger, extra resilient metropolis.”
He mentioned his platform prioritizes financial justice, tenant protections, and social companies to make sure New Yorkers thrive.
“New York wants management that delivers insurance policies to enhance lives, not scandals and excuses,” mentioned Blake, a former New York Meeting Member, Democratic Nationwide Committee vice chair and aide to former President Barack Obama.
“I’m the one individual on this race who has labored at each degree — federal, state, nonprofit, and enterprise — to show assets into tangible and constructive outcomes for our 5 boroughs,” he added.
“Whereas others on this race are targeted on staying out of jail by cozying as much as a president who needs to chop our metropolis’s social companies or utilizing taxpayer {dollars} to defend their transgressions after resigning as governor, I’m targeted on defending our metropolis’s future,” continued Blake, clearly taking a dig at New York Metropolis Mayor Eric Adams and former Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
“New York is the wealthiest metropolis on the planet—there isn’t a purpose an individual ought to go unhoused, hungry, or forgotten,” he mentioned.
On Monday evening, Blake outlined key priorities of Mission 2026 NYC, together with no federal cuts, assured earnings, common childcare, taxing empty flats, paying quicker, eliminating credit score checks, free CUNY tuition, money for content material, reproductive rights protections, and immigration protections.
Blake mentioned his marketing campaign will roll out detailed coverage positions for every initiative within the coming weeks, internet hosting press briefings, group occasions, and boards to interact New Yorkers and description how Mission 2026 NYC will probably be carried out.
Following the announcement, Leslie Odom Jr. and Israel Houghton took the stage, including their voices to the motion.
Odom, famend for his Tony Award-winning efficiency as Aaron Burr in Hamilton, was just lately acknowledged by Time’s 100 Most
Influential Individuals of 2024 checklist. Houghton, a five-time Grammy Award-winning artist, has been a frontrunner in up to date Christian music.
Rev. Michael Blake is the founder and CEO of Atlas Technique Group Inc., which is concentrated on financial empowerment by rising entry to capital, contracts, and alternatives for minority-owned, women-owned, and small companies.
He mentioned his work contains collaborations with the Washington Soccer Group, Eccalon, and Operation Hope.
Blake additionally based the KAIROS Democracy Mission, a nonpartisan social welfare group that mobilizes communities of colour and engages younger Individuals within the real-world affect of democracy.
Blake’s public service profession contains being an aide to former President Barack Obama, the place he created the White Home City Entrepreneurship collection and co-led the Minority/Ladies-Owned Enterprise Enterprises initiative; inaugural Democracy Scholar on the W. E. B. Du Bois Heart for Freedom and Democracy; former vice chair of the Democratic Nationwide Committee; former New York Meeting Member; chief organizer of Mission Freedom, a people-centered reply to conservatives’ Mission 2025.
With Mission 2026 NYC launched, Blake reaffirmed his dedication to “preventing for a stronger, extra simply New York.”
