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democratic primary
'Wow. Just Wow': New Poll Has Mamdani Ahead of Cuomo in NYC Mayoral Primary
"Everyone who is serious about defeating Andrew Cuomo needs to endorse Zohran Mamdani immediately," wrote one Democratic state senator.
Jun 12, 2025
A June survey from Public Policy Polling shows New York City mayoral candidate and democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani ahead of opponent and former Democratic New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo as the city's Democratic primary draws near. Primary day is June 24 and early voting begins June 14.
Cuomo has been the consistent front-runner in the race, though Mamdani, a state assemblymember who is running on an affordability platform, has risen from long-shot candidate to serious contender.
"All gas, no breaks," wrote Mamdani on X on Wednesday of the poll results.
"When you run a disciplined, grassroots campaign relentlessly focused on an agenda to address the crises in working people's lives, these are the results," Andrew Epstein, spokesperson for Mamdani, toldPolitico, which was first to report on the results of the poll on Wednesday.
Mehdi Hasan, editor-in-chief and CEO of the outlet Zeteo,wrote on X: "Wow. Just wow."
New York Democratic state Sen. Jabari Brisport reacted to reporting on the poll by writing that "everyone who is serious about defeating Andrew Cuomo needs to endorse Zohran Mamdani immediately."
The poll was conducted for the campaign of candidate for city comptroller Justin Brannan, a Democrat, and surveyed 573 likely Democratic primary voters between June 6-7. On June 9, Mamdani posted a video asking New Yorkers to donate to Brannan's campaign.
The relevant question in the poll lists eight Democratic candidates running in the race and asks respondents who they would vote for among them.
Thirty-five percent of respondents said Mamdani, while 31% said they would support Cuomo. The other candidate options listed did not break above 10%, and 11% of respondents said they were not sure.
The poll, however, does not include how the candidates would fare in a ranked-choice voting simulation. New York City uses ranked-choice voting for certain elections, including primary and special elections for mayor. The system allows voters to rank multiple candidates on their ballots.
"As you know, we have had a poll in the field at the same time and our poll showed a race with us maintaining what has now been a consistent double digit lead for more than three months—which is rare for any NYC mayoral race in recent memory," Cuomo spokesperson Rich Azzopardi told Politico. The poll Azzopardi was speaking of is from Expedition Strategies and showed Cuomo leading Mamdani by 12 points after eight rounds of voting.
In response to reporting on the latest survey that shows Mamdani ahead, some observers cast doubt on the quality of Public Policy Polling's polls.
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Bowman’s Loss Reveals the Dangers of Unregulated ‘Dark Money’ Funds in Primaries
If left unchecked, America’s democracy, already distorted by big money, will be swamped and destroyed by billionaires who will make elections their game in which to manipulate voters at will.
Jul 02, 2024
Last week, New York Democratic Representative Jamaal Bowman was defeated in his bid for a third term in Congress. In describing the outcome, newspaper headlines and media analysts only scratched the surface of why and how this happened and the consequences this contest would have on future elections.
For their part, pro-Israel groups, while acknowledging that they spent a combined $25 million dollars to defeat Bowman, tried to play it two ways. On the one hand, they gloated that their involvement was decisive proof that “being pro-Israel was good policy and good politics.” Like gangsters of old they wanted to send a message of fear to other candidates that “if you cross us, we’ll get you too.” On the other hand, they attempted to downplay their role suggesting that Bowman’s loss was due to his “radicalism,” with voters demonstrating their preference for the more “centrist” candidate, negatively comparing Bowman’s passion with the staider demeanor of his opponent, County Executive George Latimer.
The lessons the media deduced from all of this were that pro-Israel groups indeed won, progressives lost, and that supporting Palestinian rights was an electorally dangerous proposition. This, however, ignored the deeper story that played out in this election.
If the party doesn’t address this issue, they may lose a sufficient number of their base who are resentful of the party establishment’s failure to both stop the genocide in Gaza and to defend progressive champions like Jamaal Bowman.
First and foremost, it was about the huge amounts of money spent, why and how it was used, and the impact it had on the contest. The $25 million pro-Israel groups spent to defeat Bowman was by far the most ever expended in a congressional primary, used mainly for negative advertising and direct mail attacks smearing Bowman’s character and criticizing his style. Virtually no mention of Israel was made in these ads.
During some points in the campaign, voters were nightly subjected to more than a half-dozen of these attack ads. The impression created was that Bowman was a flawed individual and an unworthy candidate. One observer told me that “if Jamaal’s mother had stayed at home watching this negative onslaught, she wouldn’t have voted for her son either.” That’s the role of negative ads: to damage the candidates being attacked so that they are defined as so flawed that their supporters are discouraged from voting on Election Day. This tactic is simply an expensive form of voter suppression.
In reality, Latimer outpaced Bowman in “radicalism” by making outrageous, racially tinged comments that could have been used against him. But Bowman didn’t have $25 million to define and destroy Latimer’s character. And so, the impression was created that Bowman was a loose cannon and Latimer was the responsible candidate. To be sure, racism played a role in all of this as the contest became “the angry, frightening young black man versus the calm, thoughtful older white guy.”
How the money was used is one thing, but why it was raised is something else to consider. Pro-Israel groups are running scared. They are losing the public debate over policy—especially among Democrats. Most Democrats are deeply opposed to Israeli policies in Gaza and the Occupied Palestinian lands. Majorities want a cease-fire and an end to settlements. And they want to stop further arms shipments to Israel.
Knowing this, pro-Israel groups never make their campaigns a referendum on Israel. Instead, they focus their attention on the character of their opponents. When they win, they claim that it was a victory for Israel and support for its policies, when it most decidedly isn’t and never was.
There was another factor in this contest that was largely ignored by commentators. Bowman’s congressional district had been redistricted last year (by a statewide committee that included Latimer). The new district removed many of the areas that had been more favorable to Bowman and included new areas that were more favorable to Latimer. This made Bowman vulnerable, providing pro-Israel groups with the opportunity to play in this race and make it look like they won on the merits.
Historically this is how they’ve done their work—only going after vulnerable candidates. It’s why they left alone other equally strong pro-Palestinian, but less vulnerable, members of Congress. It’s a cowardly approach, to be sure, but it gives them bragging rights they can use to cower others into thinking they are invincible.
Examining who the donors to these pro-Israel campaigns were, we find that while they are largely supporters of Israel, many of the very large contributors are billionaire Republicans who take great pleasure in meddling in a Democratic primary helping to defeat progressive candidates. The use of unregulated “dark money” that is increasingly playing a role in primaries ought to set off alarms. Twice I tried and failed to get the Democratic Party to ban such “dark money” funds. My warning then was that if this tactic can be used by pro-Israel groups now, why won’t other powerful lobbies make use of this approach in the future. If left unchecked, America’s democracy, already distorted by big money, will be swamped and destroyed by billionaires who will make elections their game in which to manipulate voters at will.
One final observation for Democrats: While Bowman was defeated, support for Palestinian rights continues to grow. And the resentment of voters who favored Bowman and other targeted members of Congress will also continue to grow. These are Democratic voters that U.S. President Joseph Biden will need to win in November. If the party doesn’t address this issue, they may lose a sufficient number of their base who are resentful of the party establishment’s failure to both stop the genocide in Gaza and to defend progressive champions like Jamaal Bowman. Seen in this light, “Israel’s win” in the Bowman contest may negatively impact Democrats’ chances for victory in November.
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Biden Intervention in Democratic Primaries Is a Show of Weakness
Having his way with the Democratic National Committee is a slam dunk because Biden supplies the ball, hires the referees, owns the nets, and controls the concession stands.
Jan 31, 2023
When the Democratic National Committee convenes its winter meeting on Thursday in Philadelphia, a key agenda item will be rubber-stamping Joe Biden’s manipulation of next year’s presidential primaries. There’ll be speeches galore, including one by Biden as a prelude to his expected announcement that he’ll seek a second term. The gathering will exude confidence, at least in public. But if Biden were truly confident that Democratic voters want him to be the 2024 nominee, he wouldn’t have intervened in the DNC’s scheduling of early primaries.
New polling underscores why Biden is so eager to bump New Hampshire from the first-in-the-nation spot that it has held for more than 100 years. In the state, “two-thirds of likely Democratic primary voters don’t want President Joe Biden to seek re-election,” the UNH Survey Center found. “Biden is statistically tied with several 2020 rivals, including Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, all of whom are more personally popular than Biden among likely Democratic primary voters in New Hampshire.”
Dismal as Biden’s showing was in the new poll, it was a step up from his actual vote total in New Hampshire’s 2020 primary, when he came in fifth with 8 percent of the vote. No wonder Biden doesn’t want the state to go first and potentially set primary dominoes falling against him.
Keen to reduce the chances of a major primary challenge next year, Biden sent a letter to the DNC in early December insisting on a new schedule -- demoting New Hampshire to a second spot, alongside Nevada, while giving the leadoff slot to South Carolina. Democratic Party energy and funds will be squandered in that deep-red state, which is about as likely to give its electoral votes to the 2024 Democratic ticket as Ron DeSantis is likely to donate the money in his campaign coffers to the Movement for Black Lives.
But South Carolina, the state with the lowest rate of unionization in the country, offers the singular virtue of having rescued Biden’s presidential hopes with its 2020 primary. As the Associated Press explained last week, Biden is “seeking to reward South Carolina, where nearly 27 percent of the population is Black, after a decisive win there revived his 2020 presidential campaign following losses it suffered in Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada.”
The president’s rationalization for putting South Carolina first is diversity. Yet the neighboring purple state of Georgia, which has an activist Democratic base, is more racially diverse -- and it’s a crucial swing state, where the party’s general-election prospects would benefit from being the first-in-the-nation presidential primary.
Biden’s intervention has created a long-term political mess for Democrats in New Hampshire, where he’s now less popular than ever due to undermining the state’s first-primary status. Even New Hampshire’s normally compliant Democratic senators and representatives in Congress have been denouncing the move. Biden’s maneuver has boosted the chances that the Democratic ticket will lose the state’s four electoral votes this time around.
But Biden having his way with the Democratic National Committee is a slam dunk because he supplies the ball, hires the referees, owns the nets and controls the concession stands. While cowed DNC members dribble at his behest, substantial concerns will echo outside the range of officials’ whistles.
As a Don’t Run Joe full-page ad in The Hill newspaper pointed out last week (full disclosure: I helped write it), “There are ample indications that having Joe Biden at the top of ballots across the country in autumn 2024 would bring enormous political vulnerabilities for the ticket and for down-ballot races.”
But so far, like the Democrats in Congress, members of the DNC have indicated much more concern about avoiding the ire of the Biden White House than avoiding the probable grim outcome of a Biden ’24 campaign. By the time the DNC adjourns on Saturday, news reports will be filled with on-the-record statements from members lauding Biden’s leadership with next year’s elections on the horizon. Conformity prevails.
But warning signs are profuse. Among the latest are results of a YouGov poll released days ago: “Just 34 percent of Americans describe Biden as honest and trustworthy -- a new low for his presidency. That's an 8-point drop from when this question was last asked in December 2022, prior to the public revelation that classified documents had been found in Biden's possession.”
This is the electoral horse that Democrats are supposed to be riding into battle against the extremist Republican Party next year. The national Democratic Party is locked into operating at the whim of a president now believed to be “honest and trustworthy” by only one-third of U.S. adults.
How all this will play out at the DNC meeting is hardly a mystery. Yet many members surely know that Biden is likely to be a weak candidate if he goes ahead with proclaimed plans to run for re-election. The hope is that the GOP will defeat itself as an extremist party in disarray. But it would be irresponsible to gamble on such a scenario by rolling dice loaded with Biden.
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