New York City elected Zohran Mamdani to be their next mayor Tuesday night, a direct challenge to a president who has made the risk of electing the 34-year-old Democratic Socialist abundantly clear. But the atmosphere was nothing short of electric at the Brooklyn Paramount theater, where Mamdani hosted his campaign’s election night watch party.
Hundreds of grassroots organizers, local politicians, and supporters erupted when the race was called for Mamdani, celebrating renewed evidence that the long forgotten Democratic principle of hope can and will still rally voters to the polls.
“Over the last 12 months, you have dared to reach for something greater. Tonight, against all odds, we have grasped it. The future is in our hands. My friends, we have toppled a political dynasty,” Mamdani told a roaring crowd. “I wish Andrew Cuomo only the best in private life, but let tonight be the final time I utter his name, as we turn the page on a politics that abandons the many and answers only to a few.”
“We are breathing in the air of a city that has been reborn,” he continued. “Tonight we have spoken in a clear voice: Hope is alive.”
“Hope over tyranny, hope over big money and small ideas, hope over despair. We won because New Yorkers allowed themselves to hope that the impossible could be made possible,” Mamdani said. “We won because we insisted that no longer would politics be something that is done to us. Now, it is something that we do.”
The Ugandan-born Muslim New Yorker’s meteoric rise to the top of city politics tested the Big Apple’s ability to accept its own diversity, sparking deep community reflections regarding faith, race, and political ideology. In the end, it was his ability to listen to New Yorkers and understand their needs that won him their vote.
“It’s exciting, especially as a Latino New Yorker,” said Abelardo Aleman, a representative of the Staten Island Democratic Party who lauded Mamdani’s responsiveness to different perspectives across New York. “He is giving us hope, not only for my Spanish community but for every community around the world that lives in New York. We are a melting pot.”
Ita Segev, a trans and anti-Zionist organizer with Jewish Voices for Peace, described the scene of Mamdani’s win as “moving” and a “hopeful” lesson for Democrats across the country.
Mamdani’s win “means that if enough of us come together, across movements, across the cynical divide-and-conquer tactics of the Democratic establishment and the right, that we can actually win by being unabashedly progressive, and leaving no one behind,” Segey said.
Where Mamdani went right and other Democrats have gone wrong, from Segey’s experience, was in his willingness to actually listen to the needs of New York’s various communities.
“He listened to trans leadership and actually applied that to his campaign,” Segey said. “It’s incredible. We’re so used to being gaslit, and here’s this man who listened to the people. What a concept.” (Contrast that with President Trump’s remarks earlier in the day, when he called Jewish people who vote for Mamdani “stupid.”)
Faith in the new mayor’s abilities was through the roof, but several organizers noted that their expectations were only set by local enthusiasm to work with their new leader. More than one organizer noted that Mamdani’s effectiveness will be determined by the local politicians around him—from City Hall to the outer boroughs—and their readiness to fight for change.
To musician Kyra Sims, Mamdani’s win, and his collaborative approach, means “more than hope.”
“Hope has been marred by politicians. Mamdani is so much more than hope, I think Mamdani is someone who is really going to try,” Sims said. “I would much rather have a politician try than a politician give me hope.”
