🔗 Share this article

Residents of the Big Apple will learn who will be their next mayor this Tuesday, in a race that will decide who governs and protects the nation's largest city at a moment when the former president has vowed to send military troops to the urban center.

Against that backdrop, New York has witnessed a race for mayor that has pitted two very different Democrats against each other. The contest has become an acrimonious showdown, marked by alleged racism and anti-Muslim sentiment, but it is the ideological divide between the two leading candidates that could have significant consequences for how the party performs in next year's congressional races.

The Rising Progressive

On the left side is Zohran Mamdani, the young progressive candidate whose rapid ascent and grassroots campaign has brought global notice. Representing the old guard is Andrew Cuomo, the ex- New York governor now campaigning independently – and benefiting from the backing of ultra-rich donors and big business.

With days to go, it is Mamdani, the former longshot who beat his opponent in the Democratic primary who is solidly positioned as the frontrunner. Mamdani, who has campaigned on a agenda of affordability and pledged to halt rent increases for about 2 million New Yorkers, has led Cuomo by significant margins across all surveys taken in October, and it is very much the progressive's race to lose.

The Controversial Campaign

However, Cuomo, who resigned as governor in 2021 amid allegations of misconduct, has made it clear he will fight to the end, and not necessarily in an fair fashion. He has criticized Mamdani's objectives as unrealistic, and in the final stretch laughed as a radio host made Islamophobic remarks about the candidate, who is a Muslim. Two weeks ago, the independent was widely condemned as racist after posting an AI-generated ad that included a slew of racial caricatures and showed his opponent releasing a convicts.

This represents a rather grubby conclusion to an race that could be critical to the path that the party, struggling in its reaction to Trump's authoritarian grabs, takes in the near future.

National Implications

Should the progressive secures a clear victory, the establishment party leaders who have declined to support his campaign will be forced to reckon with a platform that has resonated with voters' frustration at inequality, soaring price rises and the establishment. It would be hard for Chuck Schumer and the House leader not to adopt at least a portion of the candidate's ambitious ideas about economic justice, given the fresh face has created an excitement within the party arguably not seen since the Vermont senator campaigned for the White House in 2016.

However, should the former governor, who had been expected to sail to victory in the Democratic primary, complete a surprising riches-to-rags-to-riches victory, it could reinforce national Democrats' current model of cautious, uninspiring opposition – a tactic that has angered grassroots members. A New York defeat of the progressive's progressive, positive message could convince party leaders that the best plan is to remain in the political center – even as polls show the present version of the party is deeply unpopular nationwide.

Campaign Energy

Voters in New York appear to favor the progressive agenda. Surveys show that Mamdani supporters are far more enthusiastic about their choice than his opponent's supporters, something that has been evident throughout the campaign. Mamdani's engaging content on social media, his optimistic vision for the city and his readiness to actually get out and connect with voters in the metropolis has attracted an army of over fifty thousand volunteers, many of them young or first-time voters.

Personal Attacks

Yet, Cuomo, 67, isn't giving up. And with the risks against him, the former governor has turned to negative campaigning in the final days.

Following extensive throwing basically everything at his opponent to see what might stick, the independent has narrowed his focus on attacking the candidate personally. He has labelled Mamdani, who was born in Uganda to Indian parents, an “extremist”, and appeared on Fox Business for an interview with a rightwing host, where the candidate claimed New York “will not survive” his opponent as mayor. It hit bottom last week, when Cuomo laughed along and said “that’s another problem” after a broadcaster said Mamdani would “cheer” another terrorist attack.

Campaign Dynamics

The line of attack echoes much of what Trump, who has deployed the national guard to Washington DC and threatened to do the same to NYC, has said about the progressive, and perhaps that shouldn’t come as a surprise. A set of billionaire New Yorkers, including some who donated to Trump in the 2024 election, have invested heavily into trying to get the independent elected, as other influential figures have pressured Curtis Sliwa to drop out from the race.

Candidate Backgrounds

For the Cuomo camp, and his billionaire supporters, are concerned, it should never have come to this. When Mamdani, one of one hundred fifty New York state assembly members, launched his campaign for mayor in last year, not many had heard of him, and in reality, few even paid attention.

The former governor, by comparison, eased his way into the contest in March 2025 and became the immediate frontrunner. He was the big beast who apparently held every edge. The quintessential establishment figure, he had wed a Kennedy and served in Bill Clinton’s administration. He assumed office as the state's leader in 2011, seventeen years after his parent, Mario Cuomo, stepped down from the identical role.

The progressive, who was voted in to the state legislature in 2020, does not have the same political heritage. But his commitment to providing no-cost transit and free childcare – along with the rent control promise – present a brighter outlook of the city's direction than Cuomo’s dire warnings about “mayhem” and unfettered crime, and his vow to increase police presence.

Campaign Controversies

Nevertheless, Mamdani has encountered difficulties in recent days, after footage surfaced suggesting him suggesting the NYPD and the Israel Defense Forces were intertwined.

“We have to make clear that when the boot of the police is on your neck, it’s been laced by the IDF,” Mamdani said in the clip, filmed at a Democratic Socialists of America convention in recent years. Mamdani, a longtime critic of the Israeli government who has said the country is engaging in atrocities in Gaza, suggested he was questioning cooperative programs between the city police and IDF.

Powerful Moment

As the race closes, the candidate seems to have gained sympathy and support, however, for his reaction to his opponent's increasing rhetoric.

Mamdani addressed Cuomo’s 9/11 remarks in an emotional video. In it, Mamdani recalled how, when he first ran for the legislature, a family member advised to him that he did not have to disclose about his Muslim faith. It was a lesson, Mamdani said, that many Muslim New Yorkers had been told “again and again”: “That security could only be found in the shadows of our city. That it is in those hidden spaces alone where followers of Islam could embrace their full identities, and that if we were to emerge from those seclusion, then it is in those shadows that we must leave our faith.”

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