Being NYC mayor historically sucks. Will that hold true for Zohran Mamdani?

The morning after Zohran Mamdani secured more than 1 million votes in the New York City general election, he stood at a podium in front of the iconic Unisphere sculpture in Flushing Meadows Corona Park with a sign that said, “A New Era.”

“The poetry of campaigning may have come to a close last night at 9 p.m., but the beautiful prose of governing has only just begun,” he said, loosely quoting former Gov. Mario Cuomo. “The hard work of improving New Yorkers’ lives starts now.”

Every incoming mayor of New York City faces immense challenges. In addition to those, Mamdani, 34, has never been in an executive role before, and has only been in the Assembly for about five years. He’ll have to regain New Yorkers’ trust in government after they watched the implosion of a corruption-scarred Adams administration. He will have to confront a hostile president, along with the possible federal funding cuts and the very real threats to immigrants that come with that. And to govern successfully, Mamdani will have to hold together the broad, already fragile coalition of Democrats who rallied behind him in the general election.

Those, too, would be challenging for any incoming mayor to take on. But Mamdani will – fairly or unfairly – be held to a higher level of scrutiny. As an overnight global sensation, the city’s first Muslim and South Asian mayor, and a card-carrying member of the Democratic Socialists of America, he’ll be in an unforgiving spotlight.

“He’ll probably do it all with a smile, because that's what he does, he smiles through it. But, yeah, it’s going to be right away,” said political strategist Lupe Todd-Medina. “I think he’s preparing himself, as he should.”

Being mayor is hard

When Bill de Blasio was sworn in on Jan. 1, 2014, he could not have known that two seemingly minor incidents occurring within the next month – a pizza dinner eaten with knife and fork and a Groundhog Day mishap – would come to define his mayoralty almost as much as universal pre-K. And before de Blasio would reach the one-year mark, an act of violence no one could have predicted would leave its own defining scar. Two police officers were murdered in their patrol car by a gunman firing at them point-blank range – a crime that shocked the city and for which de Blasio ended up absorbing blame.

“He was forced into a very defensive posture with both the press and the public,” said Amit Singh Bagga, a former de Blasio administration official. “New Yorkers historically love to hate their mayor the moment that he’s sworn in, despite the fact that Bill de Blasio had a very long list of accomplishments.”

Mayor Mike Bloomberg did not campaign for reelection on reforming the city’s Administration for Children’s Services or on creating a national program to curb illegal guns, but both became focuses after unexpected breaking news involving the death of a child who was supposed to be under ACS supervision and more high-profile shootings of cops.

“You run for office with plans, and then you’re in charge of actively managing the most dense concentration of people in the largest city in America, where lots of things happen,” said Stu Loeser, former press secretary to Bloomberg. “There are 1,000 things that can go wrong every day in New York.”

You may not be able to control everything, but the days since Mamdani won have been skillfully choreographed. His campaign let it be known that his first meeting as mayor-elect was with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. In his first post-election press conference at the Unisphere, he debuted his transition team packed with experience: former First Deputy Mayor Maria Torres-Springer, former chair of the Federal Trade Commission Lina Kahn, de Blasio alum Elana Leopold, former Deputy Mayor of Health and Human Services Melanie Hartzog and United Way President and CEO Grace Bonilla. The same day, Bloomberg (the news outlet) reported to its business-oriented audience that Jessica Tisch privately said she would stay on as police commissioner.

“People are always apprehensive when a young person takes office. … We’ve seen it in other states where mayors have been elected young and they have been successful,” said Shontell Smith, a former state legislative staffer turned consultant who worked with Cuomo’s campaign during the primary. “I don’t think we have anything to worry about, but I think it’s just important for him to set the tone with his appointments, showing governance and then getting a couple – they don’t have to be big wins – but just getting some wins.”

And if there’s anything to be learned from the Adams administration, it’s that appointments matter. Some of Adams’ greatest missteps involved appointments of top officials who tried to undermine one another. “I’ve shared with the mayor-elect my perspectives on what it means to build a low-drama culture at City Hall,” Torres-Springer said. “A low-drama culture at City Hall that prizes quiet execution, that prizes competence.”

The Trump factor

A central part of Andrew Cuomo’s pitch on the campaign trail was that he would be able to stand up to Trump in ways he said Mamdani cannot. There’s still some pessimism circulating as to whether the mayor-elect – or any mayor – is capable of that. But on election night, Mamdani defiantly addressed Trump directly. “We can respond to oligarchy and authoritarianism with the strength it fears, not the appeasement it craves,” he said. “Donald Trump, since I know you’re watching, I have four words for you: Turn the volume up.”

“Fighting with Donald Trump helps Zohran and his base, and fighting with Zohran helps Trump in his base,” said political consultant Evan Stavisky. “But ultimately, there’s a huge power imbalance there, and the mayor’s got to be able to try to navigate that.”

Trump has repeatedly threatened to cut funding to New York City under a Mamdani administration, and city officials have been bracing for an influx of federal immigration agents and possibly the National Guard like we’ve seen in Chicago and Los Angeles.

Trump’s wrath is not entirely specific to the incoming mayor, though. Not only has he threatened to impose his will over New York City under Adams – he already has. (That’s despite Adams’ vocal willingness to play ball with the president. He even attended Trump’s inauguration.) Last month, the president “terminated” $16 billion in federal funds for the Gateway rail tunnel project. He also clawed back $34 million in counterterrorism funding for the city’s subway system, though a judge recently blocked that. In September, the Trump administration pulled $47 million in grant funding for city magnet schools for keeping in place policies designed to protect transgender students. The city has sued the administration over that, even as the mayor has opposed allowing trans students to compete on the sports teams and use the bathrooms aligned with their gender identity. 

That’s just a portion of the money on the line for the city, which budgeted $9.6 billion in federal funding in its fiscal year 2025 November plan, or 8.3% of the budget. For fiscal year 2026, the city’s budget includes $7.4 billion, or about 6.4%. And other federal funding cuts will strain the state’s budget as well, meaning there will be less it can backfill for the city.

But it’s not clear exactly how Trump will behave now that Mamdani has become the mayor-elect. He indicated Wednesday that he wanted Mamdani to succeed, as long as he’s “respectful” of Washington, and The New York Times reported Wednesday that Trump has been privately complimentary of Mamdani.

“Trump clearly has an outsized interest in New York City, being a native Queens resident,” said Democratic strategist Trip Yang, who worked for a Mamdani-supportive PAC. “The president of the United States holds a lot of cards, but it’s a good test early on for Mamdani as a leader, really, if he can navigate the Trump relationship.”

Can everyone fit under this tent?

Mamdani is the furthest left mayor to be elected this century, spooking some establishment Democrats. Since his primary victory, he has carefully broadened his base of support, and many moderates have embraced him. Still, much was made of the resistance from the party leaders who avoided endorsing Mamdani after his stunning primary win, most notably, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who dragged his feet until the day before early voting began, and U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer, who never backed Mamdani.

“Jeffries, I’m not sure, brings him additional votes,” said Ana María Archila, co-director of the New York Working Families Party. “But what he does is he brings some bridge to be able to function as governing partners moving forward.” To accomplish the main things Mamdani campaigned on – freezing the rent, making buses free and providing universal child care – he’ll need the allies he gained during the general election. That tension was on display when a crowd full of DSA members started chanting “Tax the rich!” as Gov. Kathy Hochul spoke at a Mamdani event.

“Certainly to do free buses, he needs both money and cooperation from the MTA. Both of those things originate with Kathy Hochul,” Stavisky said. “Look no further to the rally where some of Zohran’s supporters were getting aggressive with the governor – he came out and raised her arm and demonstrated to his supporters that they’re in it together.”

At the same time, as Mamdani continues to work with people in the center, he also can’t forget where he came from: the left. And the left will likely be unhappy with a Mayor Mamdani who cedes what it sees as too much ground.

“We obviously have a strong foundation with Zohran that is built on years of organizing together,” said New York City DSA co-Chair Grace Mausser. “We’ve been thinking very seriously about what it will mean to fight for this agenda.” She added that for that purpose, NYC-DSA has already launched “The People’s Majority Alliance,” a formal coalition of the groups that backed Mamdani from early on, including CAAAV Voice, DRUM Beats and Jews For Racial & Economic Justice.

Next year will be politically challenging for Mamdani, as several fellow left-wing politicians are likely to primary establishment Democrats. DSA City Council Member Alexa Avilés and Comptroller Brad Lander are both mulling a challenge to Rep. Dan Goldman. Gen-Z TikTok powerhouse Chi Ossé is a rumored challenger to Jeffries. Lefties like Assembly Member Jessica González-Rojas, Christian Celeste Tate and Eon Huntley are eyeing seats in the state Legislature as well. All of these fights are likely to get ugly, and many are likely to complicate Mamdani’s alliances.

And then there’s Hochul. She faces a left-leaning primary challenge from Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado. While some on the left might want Mamdani to back Delgado, that would be tricky – he’ll need a strong partner in Hochul to pass his ambitious agenda. Simultaneously, Hochul has a more difficult challenge ahead of her next November, when she’d likely face off against Rep. Elise Stefanik. Stefanik and her allies would probably attack Hochul for working with someone they call a communist – and already have. Hochul therefore may not want to appear to be too close to Mamdani. It’s a tough spot.

Mamdani as a global figure

The press line to get into Mamdani’s election night party stretched around the block. The campaign said more than 300 journalists were there, and hundreds more had requested access. It was a clear illustration that people from all over the world are watching.

This puts more pressure on Mamdani to deliver, but it’s also leverage.

“I don’t know that he should stop campaigning,” Archila said. “Zohran has built this incredible apparatus of both volunteers and also an apparatus to communicate with people, and he can continue to do that.”

“He’s probably one of the best communicators we’ve seen in a while,” Smith said. “So, yeah, public sentiment may turn on him, but … most people, when public sentiment turns on them, usually they hide, or they hide from the press, or they hide from the public. I don’t see him doing that.”

When it comes to governing, Mamdani has not attempted to lower expectations for himself. He has articulated clear policy goals – and he’s determined to stick to them.

“Oftentimes, this job is described in the language of burden, responsibility, pressure. And those things are true,” Mamdani said Wednesday. “But what is lost is opportunity.”