Zohran Mamdani’s Rise to Winning Mayor of New York City

Zohran Mamdani was elected mayor of New York City on Oct. 4, 2025, and is now the first-ever Muslim and the youngest person in over a century to hold the position. Mamdani ran as a Democratic Socialist against former NYC Governor Andrew Cuomo, who ran as an independent, as well as Curtis Sliwa, who ran as a Republican. The win for Mamdani was widely celebrated across NYC, especially among Gen Z and Millennial Democrats — but before the win, there was a significant amount of campaigning targeted at these two demographics so that Mamdani could bring something new to New York City.

Madami first started in NYC politics as a campaign manager for Khadeer-El-Yateem and Ross Barken in 2018, and later was elected to the New York State Senate in 2020. Soon enough, in Oct. 2024, Mamdami announced his candidacy for NYC mayor in support of making the city’s buses fare-free, freezing stabilized rents, providing universal childcare, increasing the minimum wage by 2030, and raising taxes on wealthy New Yorkers and big corporations. 

At the beginning of his candidacy, Mamdani was seen as a protest candidate with little chance of victory; in a poll that Emerson College did in Feb. 2025, Mamdani came in at 1% of voters’ first choice at the time. But there was one thing that Mamdani had in his back pocket: knowing his target audience, and using social media and marketing to make that known. 

“Zohran wasn’t dominant through text posts on X—it was videos and visuals. The graphic design in that campaign was beautiful—the colors, the whole thing,” said The New York Times’ Ezra Klein in a conversation with MSNBC’s Chris Hayes. Mamdani’s campaign signs, “Zohran for New York City,” stood in storefronts across the city, with their bright blue and bold orange letters standing out against all of the other red, white, and blue political campaign signs. 

Aneesh Bhoopathy, the graphic designer behind all of the visuals within Mamdani’s campaign, said that her inspiration for the design stemmed from the vividness and distinctness of yellow cabs, bodegas, and hot dog vendors. “They evoke the working-class fabric of New York City: the bodegas, taxi cabs, and halal carts that not only sustain the city but also reflect its cultural richness,” Bhoopathy said to ABC. Through interviewing local bodegas and taxi drivers and posting it on TikTok, Mamdani has reached the hearts of NYC locals, as well as young and first-time voters, as Mamdani showcases on platforms his dedication to the city and represents those who support them. 

Mamdani’s win brings Democrats an embrace of possibly more progressive candidates in the future across the U.S., as well as hope restored in younger democratic voters in NYC who feel represented by someone who is concerned with their future. 

“Let the words we’ve spoken together, the dreams we’ve dreamt together, become the agenda we deliver together. New York, this power, it’s yours. This city belongs to you,” said Mamdani, closing his speech.

Sources: NPR, ABC, Wikipedia, Brookings, The Hill, The Guardian, CNN