As he heads into November’s general election for New York City mayor, Democratic candidate Zohran Mamdani has a warning: If he loses, the next mayor could be in Donald Trump’s pocket.
Mamdani has launched a “five boroughs against Trump” tour to draw attention to the president’s agenda and how the administration’s impact has already been felt throughout the city — from threats to food stamps and healthcare to immigration raids and courthouse arrests.
“There is no borough that will be free from Donald Trump’s cruelty,” Mamdani told supporters in Manhattan Monday.
But he’s also using the tour to tie his opponents — former Governor Andrew Cuomo, current mayor Eric Adams, and Republican challenger Curtis Sliwa — to the president.
The race for the Democratic primary saw Mamdani relentlessly focus his campaign around affordability, including no-cost childcare, freezing rent in tens of thousands of rent-controlled apartment units, boosting taxes on corporations and the wealthiest residents to fund free buses, and creating city-owned grocery stores in one of the country’s most expensive places to live.
That platform remains at the center of his campaign, but Mamdani is ringing alarm bells about the future of the city under the Trump administration with an ill-equipped mayor at the helm — or, worse, one that works in concert with the president.
“We see far too many parallels between Donald Trump and Andrew Cuomo, far too many stories that make clear that both administrations have been characterized by corruption, by a sense of impunity,” Mamdani told reporters Monday at the offices of the 1199SEIU labor union, which had endorsed Cuomo in the primary but is now backing Mamdani.
“We know a fraud when we see one,” he said.
Cuomo, who resigned from the governor’s office under a cloud of sexual misconduct allegations, conceded to Mamdani in the Democratic primary after losing by nearly 13 points. Then, he entered the general election as an independent, arguing that he faced off against Trump as governor and can do it again as New York City mayor.
“Trump will flatten him like a pancake,” Cuomo recently wrote on X. “There’s only one person in this race who can stand up to Trump: the one who already has, successfully and effectively.”
Trump and Cuomo spoke directly about the mayor’s race on a recent phone call, according to The New York Times. Both Trump and Cuomo have denied speaking to one another, though the president has been briefed by allies about how best to keep Mamdani out of the race.
Mamdani said the call is “disqualifying” and a “betrayal of New Yorkers.”
“While housing experts are ringing the alarm, Andrew Cuomo is ringing Donald Trump’s cell,” Mamdani told supporters in Brooklyn Tuesday.
In a recent meeting with New York business leaders, Cuomo also said he was not “personally” looking for a fight with the president and said their relationship was more like a “dysfunctional marriage.”
