Free buses, universal child care, a rent freeze. These three pillars of Zohran Mamdani’s mayoral campaign helped him surge to victory over Independent Andrew Cuomo and Republican Curtis Sliwa in this year’s New York City Mayoral Election. This historic victory comes after a large upset in the Democratic primary in June, in which Cuomo was predicted to breeze past the young Mamdani, according to a CBS news report on several polling predictions. Mamdani, 34, is the youngest Mayor-elect the city has seen in over a century. He has also become the youngest Muslim mayor in New York City history. Mamdani’s diverse background (being born in Uganda and having South Asian roots) helped him connect with the diverse population of New York City.
The now former Queens Councilman led a strong, spirited campaign that focused on affordability for the city, an issue that has made New York less attractive since 2020. Compared to his largest opponent, Andrew Cuomo, Mamdani’s campaign was more focused on affordability overall for the people of New York City, while Cuomo’s was more focused on safety (hiring 5,000 new cops) and getting the homeless off the streets. Cuomo’s focus on affordability was building 500,000 new affordable housing units, and was much less the center of his campaign than Mamdani’s was. The issue of affordability in the city was the top issue in voters’ minds this upcoming election. Mamdani was also able to connect with younger people, specifically millennials and older Gen-Z by utilizing platforms such as TikTok to spread his campaign and message. While some criticized the posts for being “cringe”, his use of social media truly helped his campaign and helped him gain popularity among younger voters. Cuomo relied on the belief that he was governor before, so he would be a great mayor. This, ultimately, wasn’t something that persuaded voters, especially because many were unhappy with his handling of the COVID pandemic, and there was a lot of stigma surrounding him after several accusations of sexual harassment forced him to resign as governor in 2021. The third major candidate, Republican Curtis Sliwa, who received just 7.1% of the vote (compared to Cuomo’s 41.6% and Mamdani’s 50.4%), focused on public safety and decreasing crime in the city.
Now that Mamdani has won the election, it’s time to look forward. Will Mamdani’s policies actually work? Well, he certainly thinks so. Mamdani is highly confident that his taxes on the upper class will help garner enough money in order to fund these things like free buses and free childcare. Many extremely wealthy NYC residents, like Bill Ackman, have been back and forth on whether NYC will thrive under Mamdani. Ackman is a billionaire hedge fund investor and CEO of Pershing Square Capital Management, an investing company, and he has been very outspoken when it comes to political events, like this election. At first, Ackman believed that voting Mamdani was a huge mistake that no billionaires would support. Then, once Mamdani won, he seemed to soften his view, stating on X “Now you have a big responsibility. If I can help NYC, just let me know what I can do.” While it is clear that at first, billionaires were against Mamdani and his policies, many of them have seemed to soften up to him. Even President Donald Trump, someone who Mamdani constantly threw jabs at and even dissed during his commencement speech, telling him to “Turn the volume up”, met with Mamdani after the election and seemed pleased with the mayor-elect. Trump went from endorsing Andrew Cuomo to saying he is “confident that he (Mamdani) can do a very good job”. So, why are these billionaires seeming to switch up all of a sudden? It may be due to Mamdani’s natural charm while speaking, or they may actually agree with his policies. But, if Mamdani needs the support of billionaires to run his agenda, it seems like he has it (for now).