The New York Times will stop endorsing candidates in New York races

The New York Times editorial board will no longer make endorsements in New York elections, including in races for governor and mayor of New York City, the Times’ Opinion editor said.

The change will be immediate: The paper does not plan to take a stance in Senate, congressional or state legislative races in New York this fall, or in next year’s New York City elections, when Mayor Eric Adams is seeking a second term against a growing field of challengers.

Kathleen Kingsbury, the Times’ Opinion editor, said in a statement that the Times remained a journalistic institution “rooted in New York City.” She did not give a reason for the shift but said that “Opinion will continue to offer perspective on the races, candidates and issues at stake.”

The Times’ editorial board, the part of the Opinion section that makes the endorsements, operates separately from the Times’ newsroom. The board will continue to endorse in presidential elections, as it has since 1860.

A growing number of news outlets are moving away from political endorsements. In 2022, the second-largest newspaper operator in the country, Alden Global Capital, announced that its 200 newspapers would no longer endorse candidates in races for president, Senate and governor, saying readers were “often confused” about the distinction between news and opinion. The new owners of The Baltimore Sun said in January that they would also stop making endorsements.

In recent years, the Times has also cut back on the number of editorials it publishes. In a February 2020 note to readers, the Opinion editor said that instead of publishing multiple times a day, the editorial board would reserve its view “for matters of great significance.”

Still, the Times’ decision to end local endorsements is likely to make waves in the cutthroat world of New York politics, where the editorial board’s view has been closely watched by generations of candidates and voters.

The Times has made an editorial endorsement in every New York City mayor election since 1897, backing Democrats and Republicans. Campaigns for mayor, governor and other local offices have developed elaborate strategies to win over the board.

The endorsements have reshaped local contests, including recently. After winning the Times’ backing in the 2021 Democratic primary for mayor, Kathryn Garcia, a relatively little-known sanitation commissioner, reported a surge in fundraising and media attention that helped push her to a close second-place finish.

“The way it mattered for the city was not just it helps you designate a winner,” said Stu Loeser, a veteran adviser to Democratic candidates for mayor, governor and US Senate. “It mattered because it helped keep candidates honest, from taking cheap shots and saying what’s popular instead of what’s hard.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.