🔗 Share this article

Residents of the Big Apple will learn the identity of their next mayor this Tuesday, in a race that will determine who runs and protects the country's most populous metropolis at a moment when the former president has threatened to deploy military troops to the city.

In this context, New York has witnessed a mayoral election that has pitted two distinctly opposing Democratic figures against each other. The contest has become an increasingly bitter showdown, laced with accusations of racial bias and anti-Muslim sentiment, but it is the ideological divide between the two main contenders that could have significant consequences for how the Democratic party fares in next year's congressional races.

The Rising Progressive

In the progressive corner is the democratic socialist, the young democratic socialist whose rapid ascent and people-powered movement has brought global notice. On the establishment side is Andrew Cuomo, the ex- 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 former longshot who beat Cuomo in the party primary who is firmly installed as the leading candidate. The candidate, who has run on a platform of economic justice and promised to halt rent increases for about two million city residents, has led Cuomo by significant margins across all surveys conducted in October, and it is very much the progressive's race to lose.

The Controversial Campaign

Yet, Cuomo, who stepped down as the state's leader in recent years amid accusations of misconduct, has made it clear he will fight to the finish, and not necessarily in an fair fashion. He has trashed Mamdani's objectives as unachievable, and in the final stretch laughed as a radio host made anti-Muslim comments about Mamdani, who is a Muslim. Recently, the independent was strongly criticized as racist after posting an AI-generated ad that featured a slew of racial caricatures and showed Mamdani freeing a group of criminals.

It's been a particularly ugly end to an election that could be key to the path that the Democratic party, struggling in its reaction to the former president's power moves, takes in the coming years.

Broader Consequences

If the progressive secures a clear victory, the establishment party leaders who have declined to support his campaign will be forced to reckon with a message that has appealed to Americans' anger at inequality, soaring price rises and the political elite. It would be hard for Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries not to adopt at least a portion of Mamdani's ambitious ideas about affordability, given the newcomer has generated an excitement within the Democratic ranks arguably not seen since Bernie Sanders campaigned for the White House in 2016.

However, should the former governor, who had been predicted to win easily in the June primary, complete a surprising comeback win, it could cement the party's existing approach of cautious, lackluster resistance – a strategy that has angered grassroots members. A NYC rejection of Mamdani's optimistic platform could persuade party leaders that the wisest course is to stick to the center – even as surveys show the present version of the Democratic party is deeply unpopular across the country.

Voter Enthusiasm

Voters in the city appear to favor the Mamdani vision. Polls show that his backers are much more excited about their choice than Cuomo backers, something that has been evident 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 connect with voters in the city has drawn an force of more than 50,000 volunteers, many of them young or first-time voters.

Negative Tactics

However, the former governor, 67, isn't giving up. And with the risks stacked against him, the ex-leader has resorted to negative campaigning in the final days.

After spending months throwing basically everything at his opponent to see what might resonate, the independent has concentrated on targeting the candidate directly. He has called his rival, who was of Ugandan origin to South Asian heritage, an “extremist”, and popped up on conservative media for an interview with Maria Bartiromo, where Cuomo asserted the city “will not survive” Mamdani as mayor. It reached a nadir recently, when Cuomo chuckled and said “that’s another problem” after a radio host said Mamdani would “cheer” another 9/11-style attack.

Campaign Dynamics

This strategy mirrors much of what the former president, who has deployed the military reserves to Washington DC and threatened to do the same to NYC, has said about the progressive, and maybe that is expected. A group of billionaire New Yorkers, including some who contributed to Trump in the 2024 election, have pumped millions into trying to elect Cuomo elected, as other powerful voices have pressured the Republican candidate to withdraw from the race.

Candidate Backgrounds

As far as the Cuomo camp, 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 October 2024, few had heard of him, and in truth, few even paid attention.

Cuomo, by comparison, entered smoothly into the contest in March 2025 and became the immediate frontrunner. He was the big beast who apparently held all the advantages. The classic establishment figure, he had married a Kennedy and served in Bill Clinton’s administration. He assumed office as New York governor in over a decade ago, seventeen years after his father, the former governor, stepped down from the same position.

The progressive, who was voted in to the state legislature in recently, does not have the comparable background. But his dedication to providing no-cost transit and free childcare – along with the freeze-the-rent pledge – present a brighter outlook of the future than his opponent's pessimistic predictions about “mayhem” and unfettered crime, and his promise to increase police presence.

Campaign Controversies

Nevertheless, the candidate has faced difficulties in the final phase, after video surfaced suggesting him suggesting the New York police department and the Israel Defense Forces were intertwined.

“We have to make clear that when the pressure of the police is on your throat, it’s been laced by the Israeli military,” Mamdani said in the recording, filmed at a Democratic Socialists of America convention in 2023. Mamdani, a longtime critic of Israel who has said the country is committing genocide in Gaza, indicated he was criticizing cooperative programs between the city police and Israeli forces.

Powerful Moment

With the election nearing, the candidate appears to have won empathy and backing, however, for his response to his opponent's increasing rhetoric.

The progressive addressed the independent's terrorism comments in an emotional video. In it, the candidate remembered how, when he first ran for the legislature, a family member suggested to him that he did not have to disclose about his religion. It was a lesson, he said, that many Muslim New Yorkers had been taught “again and again”: “That safety could only be found in the shadows of our community. That it is in those shadows alone where Muslims could express their true selves, and that if we were to emerge from those shadows, then it is in those silence that we must set aside our faith.”

Addressing the behavior of his opponents, who has claimed Mamd