Poll: For Some Strange Reason, Not All New Yorkers Hate The New Mayor

Yet.

The bumps and bruises afflicting his young administration have lowered Mayor Bill de Blasio’s stature among New Yorkers over the past two months, and there is a sharp racial divide in voters’ optimism about the city’s future, according to a new poll released Tuesday.

More than twice as many voters, 34 percent, now disapprove of Mr. de Blasio’s job performance than did in mid-January, when 13 percent disapproved, according to the survey, by Quinnipiac University.

Forty-five percent of respondents approve of the new mayor, down from 53 percent two months ago. Twenty percent of respondents said they did not have an opinion.

Mr. de Blasio has grappled with a series of minor controversies, over snowstorms, charter schools, the driving habits of his police-chauffeured sport utility vehicle, a tough legislative fight with the governor in Albany and a late-night phone call he placed to police officials after a political supporter was arrested.

There is a note of optimism in the Times‘ analysis of this poll, as if the “minor controversies” were merely transitional bumps in the road and not harbingers of things to come. Being a thug who places public school indoctrination over safety and opportunity for the city’s children doesn’t seem to faze them. It looks as if Hizzoner is going to have to do something really dastardly like close a bridge lane for a few hours to get their attention.