Brad Lander, a candidate used to getting arrested, shakes up New York’s mayoral race

Brad Lander is used to getting arrested.

Brad Lander is used to getting arrested. In 2015, Lander was detained during a protest in support of striking car wash workers. Two years later, Lander participated in an act of civil disobedience supporting the raise of the minimum wage in New York. Months after that, he was arrested at the US Capitol while protesting a tax reform bill he believed would favor wealthy corporations. In 2018, Lander protested outside a state senator’s office as part of a campaign to renew a school-zone speed camera program. He was arrested there, too. But Lander’s latest encounter with law enforcement immediately became his most famous. The New York City comptroller and mayoral candidate was arrested this week inside a federal building after he confronted federal officers to try to prevent a migrant from being taken into custody. The arrest pushed Lander into the center of a Democratic primary campaign for New York City mayor that’s been dominated by rivals Andrew Cuomo and Zohran Mamdani. Images of his arrest were shared widely, even as critics questioned whether the incident was a publicity stunt a week before the June 24 primary. “My goal yesterday was not to disobey,” Lander told CNN in an interview on Wednesday. “But it was to show up, to put my body there, to bear witness to what was happening, to object to the lack of due process, to try to insist on the rule of law.”