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New Yorkers will discover the identity of their new city leader this Tuesday, in a race that will determine who runs and defends the country's most populous metropolis at a moment when the former president has threatened to send armed forces to the city.

In this context, New York has witnessed a mayoral election that has matched two distinctly opposing Democratic figures against one another. The contest has become an increasingly bitter showdown, laced with alleged racial bias and Islamophobia, but it is the ideological divide between the two main contenders that could have significant consequences for how the party fares in next year's midterm elections.

The Rising Progressive

On the left side is Zohran Mamdani, the 34-year-old democratic socialist whose meteoric rise and people-powered movement has brought international attention. Representing the old guard is Andrew Cuomo, the former Democratic New York governor now running as an independent – and enjoying the backing of wealthy contributors and big business.

With days to go, it is Mamdani, the one-time underdog who defeated his opponent in the party primary who is solidly positioned as the leading candidate. The candidate, who has campaigned on a platform of economic justice and pledged to halt rent increases for about two million New Yorkers, has outpaced Cuomo by significant margins across all surveys conducted in October, and it is very much the progressive's race to throw away.

The Controversial Campaign

However, Cuomo, who resigned as the state's leader in recent years amid accusations of sexual harassment, has stated clearly he will battle to the end, and not necessarily in an above-the-belt manner. He has trashed Mamdani's objectives as unrealistic, and in recent days laughed as a radio host made Islamophobic remarks about Mamdani, who is a Muslim. Recently, the independent was widely condemned as racist after sharing an artificial intelligence video that included a slew of racist stereotypes and showed his opponent releasing a convicts.

It's been a particularly ugly end to an election that could be critical to the path that the Democratic party, floundering in its response to the former president's authoritarian grabs, takes in the coming years.

National Implications

If Mamdani wins convincingly, the establishment party leaders who have refused to endorse his campaign will be forced to reckon with a message that has resonated with voters' frustration at economic disparity, inflation and the establishment. It would be hard for the Senate leader and the House leader not to embrace at least a portion of the candidate's ambitious ideas about affordability, given the newcomer has generated an excitement within the Democratic ranks arguably not seen since the Vermont senator ran for president in 2016.

However, if the former governor, who had been expected to win easily in the Democratic primary, complete a surprising comeback win, it could cement national Democrats' current model of cautious, lackluster opposition – a tactic that has angered grassroots members. A NYC rejection of Mamdani's progressive, positive message could persuade Schumer and Jeffries that the wisest course is to remain in the political center – even as polls show the current iteration of the Democratic party is widely disliked nationwide.

Campaign Energy

Residents of the city appear to favor the Mamdani vision. Surveys show that Mamdani supporters are far more enthusiastic about their candidate than Cuomo backers, something that has been evident throughout the campaign. Mamdani's engaging content on social media, his hopeful outlook for New York and his readiness to actually venture out and connect with voters in the metropolis has drawn an force of over fifty thousand supporters, many of them youth or new participants.

Negative Tactics

However, the former governor, 67, continues to fight. And with the stakes against him, the ex-leader has turned to ugly messaging in the final days.

After spending months throwing basically everything at his opponent to see what might resonate, the independent has narrowed his focus on targeting the candidate personally. He has labelled his rival, who was of Ugandan origin to Indian parents, an "radical", and appeared on conservative media for an interview with Maria Bartiromo, where Cuomo asserted the city “will not survive” his opponent as city leader. It hit bottom recently, when the former governor laughed along and said “that’s another problem” after a broadcaster said Mamdani would “cheer” another 9/11-style attack.

Political Landscape

The line of attack mirrors much of what the former president, who has deployed the national guard to Washington DC and threatened to do the same to NYC, has said about Mamdani, and maybe 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 into office, as other influential figures have urged Curtis Sliwa to drop out from the contest.

Candidate Backgrounds

For the Cuomo camp, and his wealthy backers, are worried, it should not have reached to this point. When the assemblyman, one of 150 state legislators, started his mayoral bid in October 2024, not many had known him, and in truth, few even noticed.

Cuomo, by comparison, entered smoothly into the contest in this year and became the instant favorite. He was the political heavyweight who seemingly held every edge. The classic political insider, he had married a Kennedy and worked in a Democratic presidency. He assumed office as the state's leader in 2011, seventeen years after his parent, the former governor, left office from the same position.

Mamdani, who was elected to the New York state assembly in recently, does not have the comparable background. But his commitment to providing free buses and free childcare – along with the rent control promise – offer a brighter outlook of the city's direction than Cuomo’s dire warnings about “mayhem” and rising criminal activity, and his promise to hire more police officers.

Campaign Controversies

Nevertheless, the candidate has encountered some challenges in the final phase, after video emerged appearing to show him implying the NYPD and the Israel Defense Forces were intertwined.

“We have to make clear that when the boot of the police is on your throat, it’s been influenced by the IDF,” the candidate said in the clip, recorded at a DSA convention in 2023. The progressive, a vocal opponent of the Israeli government who has said the country is committing genocide in Gaza, indicated he was criticizing cooperative programs between the NYPD and IDF.

Powerful Moment

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

Mamdani responded to the independent's terrorism comments in an emotional video. In it, Mamdani recalled how, when he first campaigned for the legislature, a Muslim uncle advised 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 told “again and again”: “That safety could only be found in the margins of our city. That it is in those hidden spaces alone where Muslims could express their true selves, 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 actions of his opponents, who has claimed Mamd