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Schwarzman Brings Mnuchin to Library on Election Eve

Schwarzman Brings Mnuchin to Library on Election Eve

(Bloomberg) -- Steve Schwarzman, who’s declined to say which presidential candidate he’s voting for, spent Monday night two seats away from Trump finance chair Steven Mnuchin, a possibility for treasury secretary if Trump wins.

The setting was the New York Public Library’s Library Lions gala, where the Rose Main Reading Room’s tables were covered in gold cloth, the place mats were made of gold paper laser-cut to resemble the rosettes on the room’s ceiling, and the books were lit with spotlights.

Schwarzman Brings Mnuchin to Library on Election Eve

Steven Mnuchin, Louise Linton, Jing Wang and Steve Schwarzman

Photographer: Amanda Gordon/Bloomberg

Mnuchin was Schwarzman’s guest -- an experience sort of like hanging with Donald Trump in Trump Tower: The gala took place in the library’s Stephen A. Schwarzman Building. The New York Public Library includes this flagship center for collections and exhibitions, as well as more than 80 branch libraries where children learn to read, teens do homework and job-seekers work on their resumes.

"It feels good, it’s going to be close," Mnuchin, chief executive officer of Dune Capital Management, said of his mood the night before the election. He scanned the room with its share of Clinton supporters, including Senator Chuck Schumer, as a smile went across his face.

Schwarzman, CEO and chairman of Blackstone Group, said he’ll spend Tuesday night watching election returns at home.

"There are a lot of parties. I like the quiet," Schwarzman said. "With so much time, effort and money spent, it’ll be interesting to see the outcome, to see which polls were right." As for his intent with his guest list: "The library is non political, open to one and all," he said.

Schwarzman Brings Mnuchin to Library on Election Eve

Tali and Boaz Weinstein with Gayatri Devi

Photographer: Amanda Gordon/Bloomberg

Boaz Weinstein, founder of Saba Capital Management, said he would vote at 68th Street/Hunter College and has turned down invitations to watch the returns.

"I’ll shiver and huddle with my wife at home, hoping 80 percent-chance events do come true," Weinstein said.

Weinstein and Schwarzman were among the co-chairs of the gala, which raised almost $2.5 million and inducted Harry Belafonte, Hilary Mantel, Javier Marias, Peggy Noonan and Colm Toibin as Library Lions for their contributions to arts and letters.

Schwarzman Brings Mnuchin to Library on Election Eve

Ryan and Ethan Hawke

Photographer: Amanda Gordon/Bloomberg

Library trustee, actor and writer Ethan Hawke said he was set to vote in Chelsea, though lamented he could not vote in Texas where he was born and where it would count more. He’d like to see Trump on the cover of Time magazine with the word, "Loser," he said.

Schwarzman Brings Mnuchin to Library on Election Eve

Alexandra Munroe and Robert Rosenkranz

Photographer: Amanda Gordon/Bloomberg

"The only happy outcome is Hillary wins and the Republicans hold out in the Senate," Robert Rosenkranz, CEO of Delphi Capital Management, said. He’d already voted by absentee ballot from East Hampton.

Evan Chesler, the chairman of the New York Public Library and of Cravath Swaine & Moore, said he’d be voting at the Scarsdale Public Library.

Schwarzman Brings Mnuchin to Library on Election Eve

Evan Chesler, chairman of the New York Public Library

Photographer: Amanda Gordon/Bloomberg

"Could there be a more fitting place?" Chesler said. "Libraries are pillars of democracy." As such, they may hold a key for getting past an election marked by vicious rhetoric.

"The way the wounds created will be healed will be the power of the word, whoever wins," Chesler said.

Actor Chris Noth held a copy of Marias’s novel "Thus Bad Begins" during dessert in Astor Hall. "We’re all worried. I’m worried the Senate won’t go Democrat and there won’t be enough Democrats in Congress to make a difference," Noth said. He plans to watch the returns at a bar.

Esther Fein, wife of New Yorker editor David Remnick, said, "I am worried about the erosion of institutions of democracy," from the questioning of the electoral system to throwing into doubt whether the President would be allowed to select a Supreme Court justice.

On Wednesday morning, "It won’t be over," said Veronica Kelly, wife of former New York City Police Commissioner Ray Kelly. "I’ll be looking for an aspirin."

"It’s almost like the eve of war," said Susan Solomon, CEO of the New York Stem Cell Foundation.

Representative Carolyn Maloney said she would vote at 9 a.m. at the 92nd Street Y for Clinton. "The library is about the future, and so is this election," the New York Democrat said.

To contact the reporter on this story:
Amanda Gordon in New York at agordon01@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Peter Eichenbaum at peichenbaum@bloomberg.net