New York mayoral candidates make final push as Trump backs Cuomo over Mamdani
Published: 04 November 2025, 7:53:25
From Coney Island to the Bronx, New York City’s mayoral candidates spent Monday racing across the five boroughs in a final push before Election Day.
As the campaign entered its last hours, President Donald Trump urged New Yorkers to vote for former Governor Andrew Cuomo over Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani, saying voters “really have no choice.” The post, made on Trump’s Truth Social account, came as more than 735,000 people had already voted early — four times the total from the 2021 mayoral race.
Cuomo, running as an independent, packed his schedule with stops across the city, portraying Mamdani as a socialist threat. “Socialism didn’t work in Venezuela. Socialism didn’t work in Cuba. Socialism is not going to work in New York City,” he told supporters.
At 67, Cuomo is seeking a political comeback four years after resigning as governor amid sexual harassment allegations he denies. His campaign has focused on attracting Republican and centrist voters as a bulwark against Mamdani.
Mamdani, a state assemblymember who would become New York’s first Muslim mayor, started his day crossing the Brooklyn Bridge at sunrise and ended it rallying supporters in Queens. “With just 24 hours until polls close, let us leave everything out there on the field,” he said. His campaign has emphasized affordability and inclusion, contrasting his image with Cuomo’s establishment ties.
Republican Curtis Sliwa, founder of the Guardian Angels, spent the day meeting voters at subway stops and memorial sites, vowing that “the people are going to pick the next mayor,” not “the billionaires or insiders.”
Trump’s involvement added another twist to the race. He praised Cuomo as the “only choice” to stop Mamdani, even joking that Sliwa “looks much better without the beret.” Cuomo agreed with Trump’s argument that “a vote for Sliwa is a vote for Mamdani,” while Sliwa maintained he was staying in the race.
Mamdani criticized what he called “the MAGA movement’s embrace of Cuomo,” saying the endorsement showed where the former governor’s loyalties truly lie.
Online, the campaigns have fought a parallel battle. Cuomo released another AI-generated ad depicting a fake Mamdani trick-or-treating, following backlash over earlier videos that were removed for using fabricated imagery. Mamdani responded with a multilingual social media push, including a video of himself speaking Arabic, which he jokingly admitted “needs some work.”
Polls open Tuesday morning, marking the end of a contentious and unpredictable race for City Hall.
