AI and crypto take center stage at NY-12 debate

The race to replace retiring Rep. Jerry Nadler in a powerful Manhattan congressional district got “feisty” in a PIX 11 debate Thursday night.

Assembly Member Alex Bores, one of the leading candidates in the Democratic primary for New York’s 12th congressional district, faced the brunt of his opponents’ attacks. Assembly Member Micah Lasher, who is narrowly leading Bores in a recent PIX 11/Emerson College poll, and Jack Schlossberg, social media commentator and grandson of President John F. Kennedy and polling in third place, went after Bores on similar ground, alleging that he is beholden to not just the artificial intelligence industry but the cryptocurrency industry.

“There’s one candidate on this stage that’s been standing up to Big Tech for more than a decade, one candidate on the stage who has voted consistently for regulation of artificial intelligence, one candidate on this stage who is not backed by any of the big AI companies,” Lasher said in the first 30 seconds of his first answer of the evening. “That candidate is not Alex, that candidate is me.”

The first question, which was about how candidates would protect jobs in the age of AI, left an obvious opening for Lasher, and then Schlossberg, to go after Bores. While an Open AI-funded super PAC has spent millions in opposition to Bores – who successfully fought for a major AI regulation in New York state – another super PAC linked to Anthropic has spent in support of him. “The most important question is whether the regulators are disinterested, and whether or not they are in the pocket of the AI industry,” Schlossberg said.

Lasher also pointed to a super PAC backing Bores and funded by crypto billionaire Chris Larsen – and Bores receiving an “A” rating from a pro-crypto group – as proof he’s beholden to that industry too. 

Bores brushed off the claims as MAGA talking points. “They’re so feisty today,” Bores later said of his opponents after multiple digs at his financial backers. Former Republican and Trump antagonist George Conway, polling in fourth in the recent poll, referred to it later as a “triangular firing squad.”

If the strategy risked leaving viewers with the impression that Bores is the candidate the others are most concerned about, it also sought to shake up one of Bores’ dominant narratives in the race: That he is a candidate who will stand up to Big Tech. Schlossberg and Lasher argued that the spending in support of him by Anthropic executives and Larsen would make him beholden to the industry. Bores countered that Open AI would be thrilled if any of his opponents won.

Lasher didn’t lay off in the post-debate spin room, telling reporters, “I commend Alex for doing a very good job perpetrating a fraud on the voters.”

The middle-of-Manhattan Democratic primary is one of this spring’s most competitive, and far and away the most expensive. In addition to the candidates’ own hefty campaign chests, outside spending totals more than $7.5 million in support of Lasher and $129,000 against him, and more than $6.3 million in support of Bores and more than $4.1 million against him. 

The Democratic primary candidates in the June 23rd race – at least the four who were on the debate stage Thursday – agreed on a lot in the race. They all support banning congressional stock tradings, banning private immigration prison contracts, taking former Mayor Ed Koch’s name off the Queensboro Bridge,bridge, even “Knicks in four.”

Schlossberg sought to distinguish himself as the only candidate committing outright to supporting legislation blocking offensive military aid to Israel. 

Conway largely stuck to his unwavering campaign theme during the debate. None of the other candidates’ proposed policies – which he incidentally called “great” – matter unless President Donald Trump is out of office. “A lot of the debate was weird and beside the point,” he told reporters afterwards.