🔗 Share this article

New Yorkers will find out the identity of their next mayor this election day, in a contest that will determine who governs and protects the nation's most populous metropolis at a time when Donald Trump has vowed to deploy military troops to the urban center.

Against that backdrop, New York has witnessed a mayoral election that has pitted two distinctly opposing Democratic figures against each other. The election has turned into an acrimonious showdown, laced with accusations of racism and Islamophobia, but it is the political differences between the two leading candidates that could have significant consequences for how the party fares in next year's congressional races.

The Progressive Challenger

In the progressive corner is Zohran Mamdani, the 34-year-old democratic socialist whose rapid ascent and grassroots campaign has brought international attention. On the establishment side is the former governor, the ex- Democratic New York governor now running as an independent – and benefiting from the backing of ultra-rich donors and corporations.

With days to go, it is Mamdani, the one-time underdog who beat Cuomo in the party primary who is firmly installed as the leading candidate. The candidate, who has run on a agenda of affordability and pledged to halt rent increases for about 2 million city residents, has outpaced his rival by double-digits in every poll taken in October, and it is very much the progressive's election to lose.

A Bitter Contest

However, the former governor, who resigned as governor in recent years amid accusations of sexual harassment, has made it clear he will battle to the end, and not necessarily in an above-the-belt fashion. He has criticized Mamdani's goals as unrealistic, and in the final stretch laughed as a broadcaster made anti-Muslim comments about Mamdani, who is a Muslim. Two weeks ago, Cuomo was strongly criticized as racist after posting an AI-generated ad that included a series of racial caricatures and showed Mamdani releasing a convicts.

This represents a rather grubby end to an election that could be key to the direction that the party, struggling in its response to Trump's authoritarian grabs, adopts in the coming years.

National Implications

If the progressive secures a clear victory, the party establishment who have declined to support his bid will be forced to reckon with a platform that has appealed to voters' frustration at inequality, soaring price rises and the political elite. It would be difficult for the Senate leader and Hakeem Jeffries not to adopt at least a portion of the candidate's progressive proposals about affordability, given the newcomer has created an enthusiasm within the party perhaps not seen since Bernie Sanders ran for president in 2016.

However, if the former governor, who had been expected to sail to victory in the Democratic primary, complete a surprising riches-to-rags-to-riches win, it could cement the party's current model of considered, lackluster resistance – a strategy that has infuriated the party base. A New York defeat of the progressive's optimistic platform could convince party leaders that the wisest course is to remain in the center – even as surveys show the current iteration of the Democratic party is widely disliked across the country.

Campaign Energy

Residents of New York seem to prefer the Mamdani vision. Surveys show that Mamdani supporters are much more excited about their choice than his opponent's supporters, something that has been apparent throughout the campaign. The candidate's engaging content on social media, his hopeful outlook for New York and his willingness to actually get out and meet people in the city has attracted an army of more than 50,000 volunteers, many of them youth or first-time voters.

Negative Tactics

However, Cuomo, in his late sixties, isn't giving up. And with the risks against him, the former governor has resorted to ugly messaging in recent weeks.

Following extensive throwing basically everything at his opponent to see what might resonate, the independent has narrowed his focus on attacking Mamdani personally. He has called Mamdani, who was born in Uganda to Indian parents, an "radical", and appeared on Fox Business for an interview with a rightwing host, where the candidate claimed the city “will not survive” Mamdani as city leader. It hit bottom recently, when Cuomo chuckled and said “that’s another problem” after a broadcaster said Mamdani would “cheer” another terrorist incident.

Political Landscape

This strategy mirrors much of what the former president, who has sent the national guard to the capital and warned to take similar action to New York, has said about the progressive, and perhaps that is expected. A group of billionaire New Yorkers, including some who donated to Trump in the last presidential race, have invested heavily into trying to elect Cuomo into office, as other influential figures have pressured the Republican candidate to drop out from the race.

Candidate Backgrounds

For the his team, and his wealthy backers, are worried, it should never have come to this point. When Mamdani, one of one hundred fifty New York state assembly members, started his campaign for mayor in last year, few had known him, and in reality, few even paid attention.

The former governor, by contrast, eased his way into the race in March 2025 and became the immediate frontrunner. He was the political heavyweight who seemingly held every edge. The quintessential establishment figure, he had married a political dynasty member and worked in Bill Clinton’s administration. He became New York governor in 2011, 17 years after his father, the former governor, left office from the same position.

The progressive, who was elected to the New York state assembly in recently, does not have the same political heritage. But his dedication to providing free buses and affordable child services – along with the rent control promise – offer a more positive vision of the future than Cuomo’s dire warnings about “mayhem” and unfettered crime, and his promise to increase police presence.

Campaign Controversies

Still, Mamdani has faced difficulties in the final phase, after video emerged suggesting him suggesting the New York police department and the IDF were intertwined.

“We have to make clear that when the boot of the NYPD is on your neck, it’s been influenced by the Israeli military,” the candidate said in the recording, filmed at a Democratic Socialists of America convention in 2023. Mamdani, a longtime critic of the Israeli government who has said the country is committing genocide in Gaza, suggested he was questioning joint training exercises between the city police and Israeli forces.

Emotional Response

With the election nearing, the candidate appears to have won sympathy and support, however, for his reaction to Cuomo’s increasing rhetoric.

Mamdani addressed Cuomo’s 9/11 remarks in an emotional video. In it, Mamdani remembered how, when he first campaigned for state assembly, a Muslim uncle suggested to him that he did not have to tell people about his Muslim faith. It was a lesson, he said, that many local Muslims had been taught “again and again”: “That security could only be found in the shadows of our community. That it is in those hidden spaces alone where Muslims could express their full identities, and that if we were to emerge from those seclusion, then it is in those silence that we must set aside our beliefs.”

Addressing the behavior of Cuomo and Sliwa, who has alleged Mamd