What to know about Zohran Mamdani and what he wants to do as New York City mayor

It's official: America's largest city has its first Muslim and first South Asian mayor.

Since Democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani first entered the race for New York City mayor, the 34-year-old state legislator from Queens has rocketed from near obscurity into the national spotlight.

His bold left-wing platform has energized progressives, shaken up his Democratic Party and drawn sharp criticism from President Donald Trump and other Republicans.

“Today we made it clear: hope lives on,” Mamdani told his supporters after winning the contest.

Unlike his more established opponents, Mamdani's new perspective, youth and new leftist platform excited and ultimately won over voters hungry for a fresher politician.

“Let City Hall, with our compassion, our conviction and our clarity, be the light that our city and our nation so desperately need,” Mamdani said the week he was elected.

Mamdani was born in Uganda and moved to New York with his family at the age of seven. He attended the Bronx High School of Science and then received a degree in Africana studies from Bowdoin College, where he co-founded the campus chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine.

The millennial progressive draws on his roots in a diverse city. He also made his Muslim faith a prominent part of his campaign. He regularly visited mosques and released a campaign video in Urdu on the cost of living crisis in the city.

“We know that coming out publicly as a Muslim also means sacrificing the security we can sometimes find in the shadows,” he said at the rally.

Mamdani and his wife, 27-year-old Brooklyn-based Syrian artist Rama Duwaji, met on the dating app Hinge.

His mother, Mira Nair, is a famous film director, and his father, Professor Mahmoud Mamdani, teaches at Columbia University. Both parents are graduates of Harvard University.

Before entering politics, he worked as a housing consultant helping low-income homeowners in Queens fight evictions.

Like his opponents, Mamdani's mayoral campaign focused on making the city safer and more accessible.

But he has proposed more radical ways to achieve those goals, some of which would be uncharted territory for New York.

Part of Mamdani's success during his campaign was because younger voters perceived him as authentic on social media, said Jane Hall, a communications professor at American University.

“You don't have to be young to be able to do this, but I think you have to seem genuine and talk about what people care about in a way that is fashionable and makes people want to be on the bandwagon,” Professor Hall said.

Mamdani's critics say he doesn't have enough experience to effectively lead the largest U.S. city.

Trump has tried to portray him as a radical, repeatedly calling him a communist, although Mamdani has often rejected that label. The president also threatened to withhold federal funds from Mamdani's administration.

After declaring victory in the mayoral election, Mamdani addressed the president directly: “Donald Trump, since I know you are watching, I have four words for you: Turn up the volume. To get to any of us, you have to go through all of us.”

Trump immediately wrote on social networks: “…AND THIS IS HOW IT BEGIN!”

Andres Bernal, a former political adviser to New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, says Democrats can learn from Mamdani's ability to connect with people.

“Today's Republicans are shaping public discourse and trying to shape political consciousness in this country,” Bernal said. “Even though Democrats just assume that people have strong beliefs, they look at the polls and say, OK, how do we match what we say to what we think people believe?”

The high cost of housing is one of the most common complaints from residents of the city that never sleeps.

According to the website RentHop, the average rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Manhattan in November 2025 will be $4,778 (£3,666), up almost 20% from three years earlier. And in Brooklyn, according to RentHop, the average rent for a one-bedroom apartment is $3,625, up about 5%.

One of the most debated parts of Mamdani's housing plan is a four-year rent freeze on the city's one million rent-stabilized apartments.

“This is a city where one in four people live in poverty, a city where 500,000 children go to bed hungry every night,” Mamdani told the BBC in the summer. “And ultimately, this city risks losing what makes it so special.”

But researchers at Maverick Real Estate Partners say a four-year rent freeze would be “catastrophic” for many building owners, permanently reducing their net operating income.

Mamdani campaigned to make the most expensive city in the United States affordable for its residents beyond just housing.

One of his newest ideas is creating a network city ​​grocery stores in the five boroughs of New York City, expanding with six city-owned stores. Shopping in such stores will cost customers less.

But critics say Mamdani's proposal ignores the complex logistical realities of the food supply chain.

He also wants to do public buses free – the current fare for most passengers is $2.90 – and he plans to make them faster. Although Mamdani estimated that his plan would cost the city $630 million a year, the MTA chairman told the website Gothamist that the amount would be closer to $1 billion.

Also on Mamdani’s agenda is a reduction cost of child careciting the experiences of friends who told him they were leaving the city because of the high costs.

To pay for his plans, Mamdani wants to raise corporate tax rate to 11.5%, which is at the high end of New Jersey's range. New York's corporate tax rate currently stands at 7.25%.

He also wants to impose a flat 2% tax on New Yorkers earning more than $1 million a year. The campaign said the increases would raise $9 billion, but how it would be raised remains a question. Kathy Hochul, the governor of New York, also said she would not support the new mayor's plan to increase taxes on the rich.

Mamdani wants to raise the level of the city minimum wage – currently $16.50 per hour – up to $30 per hour by 2030.

But critics say it will put many low-skilled workers out of work and force them to leave the city.

Quality of life is another major concern for New Yorkers: Only 34% rated the city excellent or good in 2025, compared with 51% in 2017, according to a Citizens Budget Commission survey.

The flagship element of Mamdani's platform is the creation of a public safety department that would expand the city's mental health services, including creating a system for mental health workers to respond to appropriate 911 calls instead of the police.

Mamdani's Republican opponent, Curtis Sliwa, criticized the plan, saying it was unrealistic and unsafe for social workers to respond to potentially violent situations.

Mamdani's strong support for the Palestinians and strong criticism of Israel goes further than most of the Democratic establishment.

As an assemblyman, he introduced a bill to eliminate tax exemptions for New York charities associated with Israeli settlements that violate international human rights law.

He said he believes Israel is committing genocide in the Gaza Strip, is an apartheid state and that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should be arrested. Israel categorically denies accusations of genocide and apartheid.

Mamdani was repeatedly pressured by the press in interviews to state whether he supported Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state. In response, he said: “I am not comfortable supporting any state that has a hierarchy of citizenship based on religion or anything else, I think the way we have it in this country, equality should be enshrined in every country in the world.” Israel says all religions have equal rights before the law.

Mamdani also said there is no place for anti-Semitism in New York, adding that if elected, he would increase funding to combat hate crimes.

Rachel