Incumbent Mayor David Dinkins ran for re-election to a second term, but lost in a rematch with Republican Rudy Giuliani.

The rally quickly devolved into a riot, with nearly 4,000 off-duty police officers storming the City Hall and blocking traffic on the Brooklyn Bridge.

[6] Herman Badillo ran a short-lived campaign for mayor, his sixth in seven elections, but dropped out on May 13 citing poor fundraising.

[8] After Stein withdrew, the primary largely became an afterthought; Innis and Ruano-Melendez were unfamiliar to most voters, and the mayoral primary became an afterthought relative to the Comptroller and Public Advocate races, where Giuliani allies (Badillo and Susan Alter, respectively) who had already secured the Republican and Liberal endorsements ran against established Democrats in hopes of establishing a cross-party fusion ticket.

"[citation needed] During his own campaign, Innis also appeared at fundraising events for the Republican candidate Rudolph Giuliani.

"[9] Jimmy McMillan, the founder of the Rent Is Too Damn High Party, made his first run for political office in this election.

[12] Citing broken windows theory, Giuliani promised to focus the police department on shutting down petty crimes and nuisances as a way of restoring the quality of life: It's the street tax paid to drunks and panhandlers.

It's the trash storms, the swirling mass of garbage left by peddlers and panhandlers, and open-air drug bazaars on unclean streets.

[16] On election day, Giuliani's campaign hired off-duty cops, firefighters, and corrections officers to monitor polling places in Manhattan, Brooklyn, and The Bronx for cases of voter fraud.

[18] Giuliani says that when then-Attorney General Janet Reno questioned the tactic, he responded by saying "What civil rights did we violate?