NYC mayoral hopeful Scott Stringer takes shot at frontrunner Andrew Cuomo, claims his ‘specialty’ is defeating ex-governors

Scott Stringer says he has a very particular set of skills: taking down ex-governors.

The mayoral hopeful pitched himself as the sole candidate who can dethrone powerhouse frontrunner Andrew Cuomo — since he’s defeated a former governor once before.

“This is my specialty, I save people from former governors,” the former city comptroller assured The Post editorial board during a sit-down Wednesday.

“You just got to let me be me,” Stringer said optimistically.

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The former state Assemblyman has been lagging in the polls, but he remained hopeful during the one-hour interview that his campaign would finally get off the ground in the coming weeks — with just three months to go until the heated Democratic primary.

Stringer, who was the first Dem candidate to announce a challenge to Mayor Eric Adams early last year, compared the tough, crowded race to his first campaign for city comptroller.

The then-Manhattan borough president kneecapped ex-governor Eliot Spitzer’s bid to return to public life in 2013. Spitzer had resigned in disgrace five years prior amid a prostitution scandal.

The June 24 Democratic mayoral primary, however, promises to be a much stiffer race, with 10 people vying for the nomination and Cuomo dominating the field even before he officially entered the race March 1.

“We have a crisis of leadership, a crisis of management and it didn’t start with Eric Adams, it started with (his predecessor) Bill de Blasio and I know that because my job as comptroller was to hold him accountable,” Stringer said.

He then took a shot as his successor, current City Comptroller Brad Lander, who is also running in the Democratic mayoral primary, calling him “Brad Pander.”

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Stringer said if he’d still been comptroller over the last three years instead of Lander, “I would argue that Eric Adams would not be in the trouble he’s in today.”

Adams, Lander, Cuomo, Democratic Socialist Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani and even state Sen. Jessica Ramos — who has never run in a citywide election — all polled ahead of Stringer in an Emerson College/Pix11/The Hill survey released Wednesday. Cuomo was ahead of the pack with 38% support, to Stringer’s 5%, the poll showed.

But Stringer insisted he sees a path forward through the crowded field as a moderate, scandal-free candidate — and a good-government manager who could stabilize City Hall after years of turmoil under the embattled Adams administration.

Stringer was alone when he arrived for Wednesday’s meeting, with just one campaign staffer joining him soon after — a far cry from Cuomo, who came with a couple of aides and even brought along a slideshow presentation when he sat down with the editorial board last week.

Having spent eight years as comptroller, Stringer touted his experience rooting out “waste and fraud,” and pointed at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority as one place to start, vowing that he’d appoint board members who understand “finance maintenance,” if elected.

The longtime pol took a break from public life in 2021 after his first bid for mayor cratered when he was hit with a sexual assault lawsuit. That case suing the accuser for defamation.

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Much of what Stringer said he’s seen on the streets and subways since becoming a private citizen convinced him to run for mayor, he told The Post.

He noted the decline in quality of life for New Yorkers due to the homelessness and mental health crisis, as well as surging recidivism.

“All those loopholes that were created, all those loosening of standards for repeat offenders who basically had no bail on their cases, they all went and caused havoc in the streets,” Stringer said.

“That was Andrew Cuomo and that was the legislature,” he said, pointing the finger at the ex-gov for rubber-stamping the 2019 criminal justice reforms.

Stringer was adamant that involuntary commitment should be strengthened and discovery laws needed to be changed, both of which Gov. Kathy Hochul has proposed.

He also said that the criminal justice reforms signed into law by Cuomo have to be tweaked to make at least lower-level assaults eligible for bail.

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But Stringer pulled his punches when it came to one challenger in the field: Mamdani, a darkhorse left-wing candidate who has been polling second after Cuomo.

“I have disagreements with many of these far-left candidates, some socialists like Lander and Zohran,” Stringer said.

“I don’t support the BDS movement,” he said, referring to the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement.

“I support Israel. I’m a Zionist. I’ve never been ashamed to say that.”