Bill de Blasio has managed in less than a decade to inflict as much damage on New York City as multiple Democrat mayors did in the 1960s through the 1980s.  He's the overachiever of awful.  And with his administration winding down in a matter of weeks, he decided to lob one more bomb at his beleaguered city.  The mayor announced that any children over five who wish to participate in indoor activities must be double-vaccinated.  And if attacking NYC's children isn't bad enough, he also mandated that all private-sector workers must be vaccinated by December 27.  It's all in the name of omicron, which has shown itself to be unaffected by the vaccine.

Here's a précis, from the Daily Mail, explaining the vaccine mandate:

• All private employers will have to subject in-person employees to a vaccine mandate
• There is no testing opt-out included
• Mandate will apply to an estimated 184,000 businesses in New York
• More information on the requirement will be revealed on December 15 
• Children aged five an older will require proof of vaccination to dine indoors, or enter fitness and entertainment venues
• Full vaccine sequence is required to meet mandate, either two doses of Pfizer or Moderna vaccine or one shot of J&J vaccine
• Mandate will go into effect on December 27
• School children aged five and older who want to take part in sports, dance, band or orchestra activities will also have to receive at least one vaccine shot by December 14 

New Yorkers are not pleased. The word one sees popping up all over the internet is "blindsided."  The New York Post summarized those responses:

Kathryn Wylde, head of the business group Partnership for NYC, blasted the mayor's announcement.

"There's no forewarning, no discussion, no idea about whether it's legal or who he expects to enforce it," she said. "There's been no consultation.

"We were blindsided," a clearly enraged Wylde said.

She also questioned if de Blasio has the legal ability to implement the vaccine rule for private entities. 

"It's unclear by what authority the mayor is doing this," said Wylde. 

Some elected officials also trashed the broad mandate. 

"Mayor de Blasio can't leave fast enough. He has crushed small business, the economy and quality of life. How many more New Yorkers does he want to see move to the free state of Florida?" fumed Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-NY), who represents Staten Island and parts of Brooklyn. 

"I'm hopeful the incoming mayor will roll back these arbitrary mandates," said Long Island Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-NY), who is running for governor. He predicted the mandate would cost New York City jobs. 

(You can see more reactions here.)

I'm sorry to say that I'm not as sympathetic to New York City residents as I should be.  A minute percentage of people turned out to vote in the two mayoral elections that put de Blasio in Gracie Mansion and then kept him there for a second term.  In 2013, out of a city with over 8 million people, only slightly more than 1 million bothered to vote.  Those 7 million New Yorkers who couldn't be bothered to vote effectively voted him into office.  The same thing happened in 2017.

It's to be hoped that the incoming mayor, Eric Adams, immediately puts the kybosh on this mandate.  Indeed, he should be out there now, assuring people that his first act in office will be to reverse this mandate.  So far, according to the same New York Post article quoted above, a representative for Adams held off from saying anything useful:

"The mayor-elect will evaluate this mandate and other COVID strategies when he is in office and make determinations based on science, efficacy and the advice of health professionals," said spokesman Evan Thies.

In other words, he created a culture of uncertainty that will leave businesses uncertain about which risk to take: running afoul of the mandate or losing employees.  Adams is just more of the same in Democrat New York politics.

Image: Bill de Blasio by Gage Skidmore.  CC BY-SA 3.0.

To comment, you can find the MeWe post for this article here.