Incumbent Democratic Mayor Jimmy Walker, who was a member of Tammany Hall, won reelection in the 1929 election against Republican nominee Fiorello La Guardia.
The Fusion Conference Committee, a group of reformers and Republicans, was formed to select a candidate to oppose Tammany Hall in the mayoral election.
The main leaders of the committee were former governor Charles Seymour Whitman, J. Barstow Smull, Joseph M. Price, and Maurice P.
[9] The committee then considered Raymond Ingersoll, John C. Knox, George Vincent McLaughlin, Richard Cunningham Patterson Jr., Clarence J. Shearn, and Straus for the nomination,[11] but Straus declined, stating that he was afraid of increasing anti-Semitism if both the governor of New York (Herbert H. Lehman) and the mayor of New York City were Jewish.
[12] Having failed to recruit a Democratic candidate, the committee narrowed its choices to Fiorello La Guardia, Robert Moses, and John F. O'Ryan.
[16] When a majority of the Republican mayoralty committee voted to support La Guardia on August 4, he secured the City Fusion nomination as well.
Whitman introduced a resolution to endorse O'Ryan, but it was filibustered by Ed Corsi, Stanley M. Isaacs, Vito Marcantonio, and Charles H. Tuttle.
[17][18] Samuel S. Koenig, the leader of the Republican Party in Manhattan and a political machine, was defeated in the September primaries and replaced by Chase Mellen, a reformist who supported La Guardia.
It was the first time in the history of New York City that the four highest positions had Italian, Irish, Jewish, and WASP candidates on the same ticket.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt sent James Farley and Edward J. Flynn to convince McKee to run in the election as O'Brien was predicted to easily lose to La Guardia.
McKee announced that he would run for mayor on the ballot line of the Recovery Party on September 30, with Harry M. Durning as his campaign manager.
[24] McKee's late entry into the race placed him at a serious disadvantage, and the Recovery Party was unable to nominate a full slate of candidates or lead a voter registration campaign.
[26] Ed Corsi, Leonard Covello, and Vito Marcantonio were tasked by the La Guardia campaign with outreach to the Italian community.
[28] To appeal to Jewish voters, who composed around twenty-five percent of the New York City electorate, McKee tied himself to Governor Herbert H. Lehman and sought to tie La Guardia to Seabury, who had criticized Lehman in multiple speeches, which McKee supporters attributed to prejudice.
President Roosevelt also withdrew an invitation for McKee to visit the White House, intended as an unofficial show of support, and Al Smith declined to endorse any candidate.
[29] Roy W. Howard's New York World-Telegram offered its support to McKee in early 1933, but now opposed "the present effort to boost him over the back fence".