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New Yorkers will discover who will be their new city leader this election day, in a race that will determine who governs and defends the country's most populous metropolis at a moment when Donald Trump has threatened to deploy armed forces to the city.

Against that backdrop, New York has experienced a mayoral election that has pitted two distinctly opposing Democrats against each other. The contest has become an increasingly bitter showdown, marked by alleged racial bias and anti-Muslim sentiment, but it is the political differences between the two main candidates that could have major implications for how the party performs in next year's congressional races.

The Rising Progressive

On the left side is Zohran Mamdani, the young progressive candidate whose meteoric rise and people-powered movement has attracted global notice. Representing the old guard is Andrew Cuomo, the former Democratic New York governor now running as an independent – and benefiting from the support of ultra-rich donors and big business.

With days to go, it is the progressive, the former longshot who beat his opponent in the Democratic primary who is solidly positioned as the frontrunner. Mamdani, who has campaigned on a agenda of economic justice and promised to halt rent increases for about 2 million city residents, has led his rival by significant margins across all surveys conducted in October, and it is very much the younger man's race to lose.

The Controversial Campaign

However, the former governor, who resigned as governor in recent years amid accusations of misconduct, has made it clear he will fight to the end, and not necessarily in an fair fashion. He has trashed his opponent's goals as unachievable, and in the final stretch chuckled along as a radio host made anti-Muslim comments about Mamdani, who is Muslim. Recently, Cuomo was strongly criticized as racist after posting an artificial intelligence video that featured a slew of racial caricatures and showed his opponent freeing a convicts.

This represents a rather grubby end to an race that could be key to the path that the party, struggling in its reaction to Trump's power moves, adopts in the coming years.

Broader Consequences

Should the progressive secures a clear victory, the establishment party leaders who have declined to support his bid will be compelled to address a message that has resonated with voters' frustration at inequality, inflation and the establishment. It would be difficult for Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries not to adopt at least a portion of Mamdani's progressive proposals about economic justice, given the fresh face has created an excitement within the Democratic ranks arguably not seen since Bernie Sanders campaigned for the White House eight years ago.

Conversely, should the former governor, who had been expected to sail to victory in the Democratic primary, achieve a remarkable riches-to-rags-to-riches win, it could cement national Democrats' existing approach of considered, lackluster resistance – a tactic that has infuriated the party base. A NYC defeat of the progressive's optimistic platform could persuade Schumer and Jeffries that the best plan is to stick to the political center – even as polls show the current iteration of the party is deeply unpopular nationwide.

Campaign Energy

Residents of the city seem to prefer the Mamdani vision. Surveys show that Mamdani supporters are much more excited about their candidate than Cuomo backers, something that has been evident during the race. Mamdani's engaging content on digital platforms, his hopeful outlook for New York and his willingness to actually get out and meet people in the metropolis has drawn an army of more than 50,000 volunteers, many of them young or first-time voters.

Negative Tactics

However, the former governor, 67, isn't giving up. And with the stakes stacked against him, the ex-leader has turned to negative campaigning in recent weeks.

After spending months throwing basically everything at his opponent to see what might stick, the independent has narrowed his focus on attacking Mamdani directly. He has called his rival, who was born in Uganda to South Asian heritage, an “extremist”, and appeared on Fox Business for an interview with Maria Bartiromo, where Cuomo asserted the city “will not survive” Mamdani as city leader. It reached a nadir recently, when Cuomo laughed along and said “that’s another problem” after a broadcaster said the candidate would “cheer” another terrorist attack.

Campaign Dynamics

This strategy echoes much of what the former president, who has sent the military reserves to the capital and warned to take similar action to New York, has said about the progressive, and perhaps that shouldn’t come as a surprise. A set of wealthy residents, including some who donated to Trump in the last presidential race, have invested heavily into trying to elect Cuomo elected, as other influential figures have urged Curtis Sliwa to drop out from the race.

Candidate Backgrounds

For the his team, and his billionaire supporters, are worried, it should never have come to this point. When Mamdani, one of 150 state legislators, launched his mayoral bid in October 2024, not many had known him, and in truth, barely anyone even paid attention.

Cuomo, by comparison, eased his way into the race in this year and became the immediate frontrunner. He was the political heavyweight who apparently held every edge. The quintessential establishment figure, he had wed a Kennedy and worked in a Democratic presidency. He became New York governor in 2011, 17 years after his father, Mario Cuomo, left office from the identical role.

The progressive, who was elected to the state legislature in 2020, does not have the comparable background. But his commitment to providing free buses and free childcare – along with the rent control promise – present a brighter outlook of the city's direction than his opponent's dire warnings about “mayhem” and rising criminal activity, and his promise to increase police presence.

Campaign Controversies

Still, Mamdani has encountered difficulties in recent days, after video surfaced appearing to show him suggesting the New York police department and the IDF were intertwined.

“We have to make clear that when the pressure of the police is on your throat, it’s been influenced by the IDF,” the candidate said in the clip, recorded at a Democratic Socialists of America convention in recent years. The progressive, a longtime critic of Israel who has said the country is committing genocide in the Palestinian territory, suggested he was questioning joint training exercises between the NYPD and IDF.

Powerful Moment

As the race closes, the candidate seems to have gained empathy and backing, however, for his reaction to Cuomo’s increasing rhetoric.

Mamdani addressed Cuomo’s 9/11 remarks in an emotional video. In it, the candidate remembered how, when he first campaigned for the legislature, a family member advised to him that he did not have to tell people about his religion. It was a lesson, Mamdani said, that many Muslim New Yorkers had been taught “again and again”: “That safety could only be found in the shadows of our city. That it is in those hidden spaces alone where followers of Islam could express their full identities, and that if we were to step out from those shadows, then it is in those silence that we must set aside our faith.”

Addressing the behavior of Cuomo and Sliwa, who has claimed Mamd