State Assembly member Zohran Mamdani is on the brink of victory as the New York City mayoral race enters its final day before Election Day.
The 33-year-old democratic socialist has revolutionized mainstream politics with his distinctive social media reach and promises to address New Yorkers' economic challenges.
Mamdani, who serves as a three-term representative of the 36th New York State Assembly District, will enter Election Day on November 4 as the favorite, leading in most racial polls.
The Democratic candidate had led independent candidate Andrew M. Cuomo and Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa during voting, which began on October 25.
A new Quinnipiac University poll, conducted Oct. 23-27, gave Mamdani 43% of the vote, followed by Cuomo with 33% and Sliwa with 14%, according to a report from AFP.
While Mamdani's opponents have repeatedly attacked him with racist and Islamophobic slurs, he has kept his campaign focused on New York's issues.
The harshest criticism came from US President Donald Trump, who called Mamdani a “communist” and threatened to withhold federal funds from the city if elected to office.
However, the 33-year-old social democrat claimed he was “fighting for the same workers” who were “betrayed” by Trump after his election as US president.
The New York mayoral race has focused on the cost of living, crime and how each candidate would handle Trump.
“Mamdani is an unusual political figure and really captures the spirit of the moment. This is a moment when a strong anti-Trump voice in America's largest city is going to make headlines,” said Lincoln Mitchell, a politics professor at Columbia University. AFP.
“Frankly, a Muslim candidate for mayor of New York is a huge story.”
Data from the New York City Board of Elections showed that 275,006 registered Democrats had cast ballots, as had 46,115 Republicans, along with 42,383 non-party-affiliated voters in the first five days of early voting, which ended Nov. 2.
Mamdani's rise has highlighted the divide between the left and center-right of the Democratic Party.
New York State Governor Kathy Hochul, a centrist, appeared at a Mamdani rally on October 26, but was drowned out by chants of “taxing the rich”, an AFP correspondent learned.
Hochul has criticized Mamdani's proposals to impose a 2% income tax on New Yorkers earning more than $1 million.
The rise of Mamdani
Mamdani's unlikely rise has been fueled by young New Yorkers who have applied, and his campaign claims 90,000 people have volunteered.
“It's really about people talking to other New Yorkers about the city we all love,” Mamdani told The Daily Show.
Teenager Abid Mahdi, a Queens native who directs canvases for Mamdani, said AFP that “when I think of Zohran, I think of what Bernie Sanders was to many Americans in 2016 and 2020. He is my Bernie Sanders in many ways.”
Mamdani appeared with leftist standard-bearer Senator Bernie Sanders at a rally in Queens on October 26.
“I'm 15 now, I'll be an adult and pay taxes at 18, right? Most of the laws will apply to me in about three years. So why should I start worrying then?” Mahdi added.
Underscoring the importance of older voters who typically go to the polls in greater numbers than younger ones, Mamdani attended a “paint and pour” session at a nursing home in Brooklyn on Thursday.
Torrential rains at the end of the week slowed the election, and the three leading candidates toured television studios in a final effort to woo undecided voters.
Before the vote, Sliwa appeared in a surreal conservative rap video wearing a suit and his trademark red beret.
Cuomo, 67, sought on Thursday to court black and Muslim voters, campaigning in Harlem with incumbent Mayor Eric Adams, a Democrat accused of corruption who dropped out and eventually endorsed his former foe Cuomo.
There was uproar during the week when a British newspaper published what purported to be an interview with former mayor and Mamdani supporter Bill de Blasio in which he appeared to question the affordability of the Democratic Socialist's spending plans.
But the article was removed after the former mayor denied having spoken to the journalist.
