Some are saying that Zohran Mamdani’s win is indicative of what’s to come for the Democratic Party, but New York City is too unique for his victory to mean much for national politics, says a Cornell University expert.
Richard Bensel, a Cornell University professor of government who specializes in American politics, parties, and elections, says that despite Mamdani’s win and broad coalition, he expects this victory will not reshape national politics.
Bensel says: “Zohran Mamdani has cleared a majority of the votes in the mayoral election. This is not a surprise given the weakness of his major opponent, Andrew Cuomo. However, the very late endorsements of Cuomo by Donald Trump and Elon Musk do seem to have moved some Republican voters into Cuomo's column.
“There are two major takeaways from the New York City election. First, Mamdani has clearly created a broad coalition because he won four of the city's boroughs by significant margins, losing only relatively tiny Staten Island. This is impressive with respect to New York City, but he would have had to do better than he apparently did if he was to represent the wave of the future in national politics. New York City is just too unique for this relatively minor victory to mean much in national politics.
“Second and perhaps much more important, Donald Trump, the leader of the Republican Party, threw his party's candidate under the bus in a fruitless quest to defeat Mamdani. Trump is not building a party machine in national politics but, instead, using his charismatic hold on his followers to satisfy his own, somewhat quixotic, ambitions. The Republican Party has not been a strong force in New York City politics for decades, but Trump has now made it clear that he does not care whether or not it disappears altogether. Republicans elsewhere will learn a painful lesson from this.”
