

Food — so much food — at an Uber driver rally in New York's Queensbridge Park on Tuesday afternoon (Emily Badger).

NEW YORK — In a Queens park here on the East River, the tech giant Uber has set up the kind of company picnic you hold when nearly all of your workers are independent contractors — unknown to each other, no bosses among them — and when your company, as it happens, is embroiled in a political war.

On two long rows of tables covered in Uber-black cloth, there is enough catered food to feed a couple thousand drivers. It looks chosen with an eye for a crowd of immigrants from the outer boroughs: fried plantains and chicken stew, black-eyed peas and collard greens, chicken shawarma, falafel and hummus.

This event Tuesday was billed to drivers in New York as a chance for the company to celebrate its "partners" with free food, music and Uber T-shirts. To the media, though, it was also couched as the kickoff to a citywide "jobs tour" — a public showcase for the kind of jobs Uber says will be killed if the New York City Council votes later this week to temporarily restrain the company's growth here.

The city council is poised to decide on a pair of laws that would limit Uber to adding about 200 new drivers this year — to an existing pool of around 26,000 — while the city studies the impact of new app-based transportation services on traffic congestion. Mayor Bill de Blasio has called the cap a "short pause" while the city ponders how to handle a massive influx of new drivers-for-hire. Uber has called it an existential threat to its business model in the company's most prized market.

The confrontation, several weeks in the making, has escalated into a bare-knuckled political fight. Uber has taken out TV ads suggesting, not so subtly, that de Blasio is defending his "big taxi donors" at the expense of minority communities that rely on Uber for jobs and transportation. Uber is blanketing parts of the city with mailers and leaflets denouncing city council members who support the legislation. The company has even updated its app in New York with a "de Blasio" tab that warns of what service could look like if the bills pass, turning whole neighborhoods into Uber deserts.

Now, a few days ahead of the expected vote, the company is also holding what looks an awful lot like a political rally.

Beneath a pair of Uber-black tents, several company employees (the full-time kind) are waiting with tablets and laptops to register new drivers for the platform, or to credit existing drivers who've brought their friends as new recruits.

Diant Christian, a 55-year-old driver originally from the Caribbean island of Dominica, looks confused. Uber sent him a text message: "Diant, we hope to see you at today's partner appreciation event, any time until 1:30." But now he's not sure if he's supposed to sign up for something before he can get in line for his free lunch.

"Good afternoon, New York City!" an Uber emcee in a black Uber T-shirt bellows from a stage the company has erected in the park. "I need everyone who's not signing up for a job right now to come over here!"

The music stops, and Josh Mohrer, Uber's general manager in New York, comes to the podium.

"Every day, you all are out there ensuring that people make it to work, or school, or the doctor, or that important job interview. The service you provide is vital," Mohrer says into the microphone, a row of loud speakers in front of him. "And that's why we're so disappointed with the mayor's plan. With 25,000 new riders every week, a 1 percent cap on growth would mean that only 200 of you could join over the next year. Look around. That's about 1 in 10 people here right now."

He urged the drivers and would-be partners to call their representatives, to tell them how much they love Uber, to enlist their friends and family to the fight. Then Michael Blake, a New York state assemblyman who represents the South Bronx, took the stage, the first of a string of local politicians who join Uber in opposing the legislation.

"We are here today because Uber is about justice in our communities," Blake declared. "Uber is about creating opportunities in our communities. This is not just about getting someone a ride — this is about getting someone a chance."

This argument — central to Uber's campaign — casts the company as a defender of minority jobs, de Blasio as a destroyer of them.

"It always seems that communities of color are the ones that have to suffer the most," Blake said. "So if you’re ready to fight with us, and stand with us, we need to make sure you’re encouraging your council member today that this is a bad deal!"

Much about this fight has quickly become surreal. Progressives are lining up on both sides of it. The mayor who ran on lifting up the "other" New York of the outer boroughs and minority neighborhoods is now being accused of sacrificing minority jobs. After Uber this week challenged the mayor to a live-streamed debate over the legislation, de Blasio had to explain that the mayor of New York doesn't debate companies.

The tech company in question, meanwhile, has increasingly come to resemble a sophisticated political operation, capable of texting thousands of drivers on a moment's notice, adept at riling them up into a political force.

"I think what we learned after doing this for a few years — the opposition that we found all over the world, it all kind of smells the same — is that we actually are in a political campaign," Mohrer said after the speeches were over and most of the leftover food had been packed up. "The taxi industry, unfortunately, is our opponent."