New York State Assembly Member Zohran Mamdani (D) on Tuesday said taxi drivers in the Empire State are taking part in a hunger strike to demand that the city guarantee their loans.
A handful of New York taxi drivers started a hunger strike two weeks ago to demand that the city offer a larger bailout for taxi medallions, which is the permit that gives yellow cabs the ability to pick up passengers on the street.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced in March that his government was planning to allocate $65 million to bailout city taxi drivers, many of whom are facing economic hardship because of the predatory loans they were sold in the form of medallions.
Mamdani — who is taking part in the hunger strike, which is currently on its 14th day — said during an interview on Hill.TV’s “Rising” that the drivers are essentially requesting that the city commit to covering their loans if they default.
“Fundamentally, the demand is for the city to guarantee driver’s loans. And what that means is that if a driver were to default on their payments, that the city would step up and pay the balance to the lender,” Mamdani said.
The assembly member said their demand is “critical” in two ways: it protects drivers from losing all their belongings if they default on their loans, and it eliminates risk on the loan.
“One is because when these drivers have defaulted thus far, lenders have gone after everything that they own, their car, their home, their other assets that they may have. And two is that when you guarantee a loan, it then incentivizes the lender to offer more favorable terms to the driver because the risk has been eliminated from the equation,” Mamdani said.
He said around 13 or 14 drivers are currently taking part in the hunger strike, which involves solely drinking water and other liquids with electrolytes. Mamdani said participants are seeing a doctor daily, and that some individuals have been forced to stop the hunger strike for health reasons.
Watch a clip of Mamdani’s interview above.
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