Transcript: Mayor de Blasio Appears on the Daily Show with Trevor Noah

March 3, 2016

Trevor Noah: Welcome back. My guest tonight is the Mayor of New York City. Please welcome, Mayor Bill de Blasio. 

[Applause] 

How do you do, Mayor?

Mayor Bill de Blasio: Well, it’s very good to see you, Trevor. 

Noah: How do you address a mayor? Is there like a formal – do you just say, Mayor?

Mayor: I think you did really well.

Noah: That’s it?

Mayor: Yeah.

Noah: How do you do, Mayor?

Mayor: How do you address Trevor Noah?

Noah: Oh, you just say, what’s up?

Mayor: Okay, there you go. 

Noah: That’s it – what’s up?

[Laughter]

Mayor: What’s up?

Noah: So, what’s up, Mayor? Thank you so much for being here. 

Mayor: My pleasure.

Noah: This is fun because I live in your city.

Mayor: And we are happy you’re here.

Noah: I’m one of your citizens – this is great. I have so many questions – what’s up with the rats?

[Laughter]

Noah: No – no, let’s start at the top, and I know this sounds like a simple, stupid question, but what does a mayor actually do?

Mayor: I’m still trying to figure that out.

[Laughter]

But you’ve got to make a lot of decisions every day that affect people’s lives. For example, one of the things I came into office saying we were going to do is provide full-day pre-k for every child in this city at pre-k age.

Noah: Yes.

[Applause]

Mayor: And that was the first day of my mayoralty. Getting it done – a lot of meetings, a lot of convincing people to do what they might not do otherwise, moving the bureaucracy –

Noah: Yes.

Mayor: – Endlessly pushing a vision. So, that’s what a mayor does a lot of the days – try and get someplace where you haven’t been before.

Noah: Well, I mean, the pre-k thing – everyone I talk to loves that idea. Everyone goes – it was so expensive to have your child before that time and pre-k was such a powerful move. But you have challenges that you have to face every day as mayor, and, I mean, from all different sides. For instance, you spend a lot of time up against new app companies – is what I’m always fascinated by – like Airbnb, and Uber. Like, they don’t – like, they don’t make your life easy do they?

Mayor: No. But look, the sharing economy is part of our lives now – and certainly a lot of benefits to it – but, let’s face it, a lot of it was created without trying to figure out what was fair for the places it was going to be.

Noah: Yes.

Mayor: And we’re the City government, we’re concerned about safety. We’re concerned about making sure people are treated fairly. In the case of, say, Uber, we want to make sure that folks with disabilities have access to the vehicles. We want to make sure that there’s revenue that comes from these activities, because everyone else is paying taxes – they should too so we can have police, and schools, and all the things. But it’s a new world, and it’s going to take a new set of rules, and there’s been a certain amount of, you know, trying to find our way.

Noah: Well, I mean, let’s say, as an app user, it’s always easy for me to go, why would you be up against these people? It seems like the City just doesn’t want to move into the new age. It seems like the City is, you know, sort of not in the pockets of – but I’ll say in the pockets of hotels, and, let’s say, taxi companies. 

Mayor: No, it’s a new world – it’s a new world. And, again, many advantages – a set of challenges. You know, Airbnb – again, something that is very good for a lot of people, but has come with some new problems that we didn’t have before.

Noah: Such as?

Mayor: Well, I mean, some people unfortunately have taken advantage of it and decided to create de facto hotels, you know, and gotten a lot of apartments, and constantly rent them out, and, basically, it’s a business, not a residence. If you’re a business, you should be registered as business, you should pay taxes like a business, you should go through safety inspections like a business. Other people, of course, just rent out a room once in a while – that’s fine, that’s not a big deal. But trying to figure out what those rules are – what those ground rules and limits are – it’s like everything else in the world. The goal of government, or the role of government, is to make sure that what happens with business is fair to people, is fair to workers, is fair to consumers, is safe. And with a sharing economy, those ground rules still don’t really exist on a consistent basis. 

Noah: It’s such a difficult job, I imagine, because you are the face of what everyone wants to complain about – like, let’s say, the subway, for instance. 

Mayor: So, you have been to New York City.

[Laughter]

Noah: But you are – like, the subway, you know? And I think it’s because your name is so nice to shout as well. Every time a train is delayed – de Blasio!

[Laughter]

It’s just like a – you know? Are you supposed to be doing everything about everything?

Mayor: My ancestors really should have thought about that. 

Noah: They should, right?

Mayor: It is very yell-able.  

[Laughter]

Well, the State of New York actually runs our subways. But, of course, if someone comes across me, they’ll express they’re frustrations. We – look, one thing when you go into this kind of job – and I feel that mayors all over the country talk to me about this – that we know – we’re like the complaint desk, right? We’re like the go-to for whatever people are going through, but that is also part of the beauty of the job. You’re close to the ground. You’re working to help people, and they’re going to tell you their problems. And look, a lot of people don’t feel the government’s treating them fairly. For years and years, a lot of – and this is especially why, as you know, I’m very involved in the issue of addressing income inequality. And, you know, it’s amazing, you see the national discussion – like, why are people angry? Why are they frustrated? Because they’ve been screwed. Because for decades they’ve seen their incomes go down. They’ve seen their economic reality decline, and they wonder if their kids are going to have anywhere near as good a life as they had. Would you be content? The anger and frustration are the natural way people should feel when they go through that, and then they take that frustration out on a government that they feel has let them down. 

Noah: That has let them down, especially when it comes to income inequality. It’s funny you bring that up, because you are big on income inequality, which seems like a Bernie Sanders supporter, and, yet, you’ve endorsed Hillary, which we’ll talk more about. TV time is up – we’ll be talking more on the web and on the app. But, for now, we’ll be right back – Mayor Bill de Blasio, everyone.