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Zohran Mamdani faces a daunting task: making his campaign pledges a reality

After more than a year of repeating ambitious promises about freezing rent and making childcare free, Zohran Mamdani will wake on Wednesday with a daunting task ahead of him: make those things reality for New York City.

The 34-year-old democratic socialist ran New York’s most ambitious mayoral campaign in years, attracting hundreds of thousands of supporters with bold promises to make the largest US city affordable.

It was a campaign that made Mamdani a global sensation and invigorated many New Yorkers like never before, attracting almost 100,000 volunteers. Mamdani rejuvenated the left beyond New York’s borders, encouraging other progressives to run for office across the US, and could yet influence the Democratic party ahead of next year’s midterm elections.

The flip side, however, is clear: the residents of New York have had their hopes set incredibly high, and now Mamdani has to deliver.

That will begin in January, when Mamdani takes residence in Gracie Mansion, the sprawling official mayoral residence on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, but in the immediate term, he can celebrate giving many New Yorkers something lacking under the scandal-strewn reign of Eric Adams, the incumbent mayor.

“I think for New Yorkers, it is a small light in what has been an overwhelming era of darkness,” said Usamah Andrabi, communications director at the progressive Justice Democrats organization.

It’s been a light for others too. More than 10,000 people signed up with the leftwing organization Run for Something in the two months after Mamdani won the Democratic primary, each with an interest in running their own insurgent campaign. In New York, Mamdani’s accessible, social media-friendly campaign captivated young and first-time voters – officials say the city saw its largest-ever turnout for early voters in a non-presidential election.

“Democratic voters – New Yorkers included – have had entrenched, corporate politicians like Andrew Cuomo stuffed down their throats as the only possible alternative to Republican representation,” Andrabi said.

“I think what Zohran’s win proves is that you can take on the real estate corporations, the Israel lobby, Republicans and the billionaires robbing everyone blind, and voters will want that, will unite behind that and will reward you for that.”

The race pitted Mamdani against Cuomo, the 67-year-old former New York governor, in what many will see as a test of the future of the Democratic party. Cuomo, a centrist who came to be seen as the epitome of the Democratic establishment, was financially backed by New York’s ultra-wealthy, including Republicans, and huge corporations, but was handed a resounding defeat.

That presents a dilemma for party leaders. Chuck Schumer, the senior Democrat in the Senate, didn’t even endorse Mamdani in the election. Hakeem Jeffries, his counterpart in the House, offered tepid backing just a week before the vote. But polls show the current iteration of the Democratic party is deeply unpopular nationwide and there is clearly an appetite for the party to do something different – which will become increasingly difficult for the establishment to ignore.

In the meantime, though, Mamdani will have to get to work. He made big commitments, on housing, transport and childcare, and the question now is whether he can deliver. In a city that prides itself, among other things, on its fast pace of life, how much patience will New Yorkers have as Mamdani settles into office?

“I think it’s an open question whether they have patience at all,” said Grant Reeher, a political science professor at Syracuse University’s Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs.

“Mamdani’s got to get his ideas realized in policy, and New York is notoriously difficult to govern. It’s arguably the second hardest political job in the United States, after the president. So whatever he’s able to accomplish, it won’t be easy.”

A strength of Mamdani’s campaign was that he didn’t just make promises – he told people how he would pay for them. He plans to fund his affordability agenda by raising the corporate tax rate in New York City and introducing a 2% tax on the very wealthiest New Yorkers. But that will involve working with the New York state legislature – he will step down from his position as a state assembly member to take on his new role as mayor – and negotiating with Kathy Hochul, the New York governor who has said she opposes new income taxes.

The presence of Donald Trump will loom, too. The president, a former New Yorker himself, has threatened to withhold funding from the city if he wins – not to mention threatening to deport Mamdani – so there will be a lot to overcome. But there might be some sympathy if Mamdani starts running into roadblocks.

“If there’s a standoff on policy, Mamdani may not be held completely accountable,” Reeher said.

“It depends on who gets blamed. If he runs into trouble and it’s because of the governor not cooperating, or having to deal with a full-on press from the White House, that’s likely not to blow back on him.”

Mamdani will enter office with good will, however: certainly more than Adams has enjoyed. He has been a constant presence on New York’s streets for more than a year, running scavenger hunts and soccer tournaments, but also salsa dancing and practicing tai chi at a senior center in Manhattan.

He has spoken about the pain of Islamophobia in the face of comments from his opponents, and not shied away from releasing campaign videos in which he speaks in Spanish, Urdu and Hindi. Mamdani has energized many New Yorkers, in other words, as he has since he launched his campaign in a video last October.

In that clip, Mamdani lamented the cost of living in New York: the struggles people face with paying rent and for childcare, the battle to make ends meet.

“Life doesn’t have to be this hard,” he told voters.

As he prepares to take on the challenge of turning campaign pledges into results, there could be times when Mamdani thinks the same thing about being mayor.

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