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    NYC Panel Approves Rent Increases, a Key Issue for Mamdani and Adams

    Mayor Eric Adams, who appointed the Rent Guidelines Board, has attacked Zohran Mamdani’s pledge to freeze the rent if he becomes mayor.The Rent Guidelines Board approved increases of at least 3 percent for New York City’s one million rent-stabilized apartments, rejecting the call for a rent freeze that helped Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani surge to the lead in the Democratic mayoral primary last week.Mayor Eric Adams, who appointed the members of the board, has supported rent increases for rent-stabilized apartments every year since he took office. Mr. Mamdani, likely to be the Democratic nominee facing him in the general election in November, has promised not to do the same if he becomes mayor.As the city faces linked affordability and housing crises, the contrast between Mr. Mamdani and Mr. Adams added a new layer of tension to the board’s decision.On Monday night, the board, in a 5-to-4 vote, approved 3 percent increases for one-year leases and 4.5 percent increases for two-year leases. The votes against the increases came from the two members on the board representing landlords, who had wanted higher increases, and the two members representing tenants, who wanted a rent freeze.Any increases would apply to leases beginning in or after October.As in past years, the discourse around the vote reflects the rift between pro-renter and pro-landlord political interests in New York City. At the meeting on Monday, held in a theater at El Museo del Barrio in East Harlem, renters and tenant advocates chanted “Freeze the rent” and waved colorful signs that read “Stop real estate greed” and “Tenants vote.”But the board’s decision is also providing an opportunity for Mr. Mamdani and Mr. Adams to distinguish themselves from each other at a time when making the city a more affordable place to live is a key issue driving the election.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    We Shouldn’t Have Billionaires, Mamdani Says

    Appearing on “Meet the Press” days after the mayoral primary, Zohran Mamdani defended his proposals to make New York City more affordable and to increase taxes on the wealthy.Zohran Mamdani, who campaigned for mayor on the theme of making New York City more affordable, said in a major national television interview that during a time of rising inequality, “I don’t think we should have billionaires.”Mr. Mamdani, the likely winner of the Democratic primary for mayor of New York, said in an appearance on “Meet the Press” on Sunday that more equality is needed across the city, state and country, and that he looked forward to working “with everyone, including billionaires, to make a city that is fairer for all of them.”At the same time, Mr. Mamdani, a democratic socialist, asserted that he is not a communist, a response to an attack from President Trump. “I have already had to start to get used to the fact that the president will talk about how I look, how I sound, where I’m from, who I am — ultimately because he wants to distract from what I’m fighting for,” Mr. Mamdani said.But one question he continued to sidestep was whether he would denounce the phrase “globalize the intifada,” after he declined to condemn it during a podcast interview before the primary.The slogan is a rallying cry for liberation among Palestinians and their supporters, but many Jews consider it a call to violence invoking resistance movements of the 1980s and 2000s.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    How Social Media Videos Fueled Zohran Mamdani’s Success

    As a millennial politician, Zohran Mamdani is a digital native, at ease on both sides of a camera and well versed in the slangy “terminally online” lingo of those with active social media accounts. He is also the son of an Oscar-nominated filmmaker, with a sharp eye for aesthetics and moving images.So it is perhaps not surprising that Mr. Mamdani’s campaign for mayor of New York City has relied heavily on engaging social media posts. But during the Democratic primary, his high-energy videos also inspired his supporters to create their own clips, which encouraged others to respond with even more videos. Before long, Mr. Mamdani, a 33-year-old assemblyman, was not just a politician. He was a vibe. He was a meme.Among the factors in Mr. Mamdani’s stunning lead in the primary last week was his ability to translate his campaign message about making New York City more affordable to TikTok and Instagram, where clips by and about him had been going viral for months.He was on the internet talk shows Subway Takes and Gaydar. The comedians Ilana Glazer, Marybeth Barone and Sarah Sherman made videos asking voters to rank Mr. Mamdani first on their primary ballots. There were clips that used N.B.A. highlights to explain his campaign. And a video in which he spelled his name, M-a-m-d-a-n-i, set to the track “Hollaback Girl” by Gwen Stefani. There was even a clip set to a Japanese pop song in the style of a “fansub,” a phenomenon that only the extremely online would understand.

    @zohranchan ZOHRAN KWAME MAMDANI FOR NYC MAYOR!! JUNE 14-JUNE 24!! •original creds to: zohran_fansubs on insta #nycmayor #mayorzohran #zohranmamdani #princess #girlypop #princessaesthetic #voting #senpai #mayor ♬ original sound – votezahrank The more Mr. Mamdani posted, the more people posted about him, and soon, whether or not you were following the New York City mayoral race, there were Mamdani videos in your feed.

    @astorwalk Replying to @ornerybeagle253 this my mayor #mamdani #zohranmamdani #newyorkmayor #gwenstefani #hollabackgirl #edit #foryou ♬ the name is MAMDANI – lester

    @ofromqueens please go out to the polls!! the election is so tight that your vote could be the one to help us take it home. resources are in my bio love you ❤️ #nyc #newyork #nyclife #ofromqueens #queensnyc #manhattannewyork #brooklynnyc #brooklyn #statenisland #zohranmamdani #andrewcuomo ♬ magic – Medasin & MAE.SUN

    @vivienmaskara3 GO OUT AND VOTE ZOHRAN @Zohran Mamdani #zohran #nyc #zohranmamdani #nycpoles #nycapartment ♬ original sound – Vivienmaskara

    @balkanbitch420 #zohranfornyc ♬ original sound – balkanbitch420

    @chinita.paisa Y’all better vote for Zohran today you know he had the green metro card, polls are open from 6AM-9PM. ✨��️ • • • #zohran #zohranmamdani #nycvotes #nycvoting #mayor #nycmayor #nycelections #elections2025 #newyorkertest #newyorkers #nychighschool ♬ New York – Album Version (Edited) – Ja Rule

    @fleuririva feel so free but only with him as mayor #zohranmamdani #newyorkcity #mayor #edit #edits #addisonrae ♬ original sound – m We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Zohran Mamdani Returns to Harlem to Make His Pitch to Black New Yorkers

    The presumptive Democratic nominee for mayor, who has struggled to make inroads with the Black community, spoke at the Rev. Al Sharpton’s National Action Network on Saturday.Last weekend, just days before the Democratic primary for mayor of New York City, State Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani visited the Harlem headquarters of the Rev. Al Sharpton’s National Action Network hoping to gain the support of Black voters.In his remarks to the civil rights organization, he focused on his plans to solve the city’s ills by making it a cheaper place to live and work.On Saturday, Mr. Mamdani returned to the organization triumphant, appearing to have vanquished former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, a well-known figure in Harlem, in Tuesday’s primary.“What does morning look like in this city?” he asked the crowd, with Mr. Sharpton and the director Spike Lee sitting behind him.“It must be a morning where the worker comes first, a morning where a New Yorker does more than just struggle,” he said. “It must be a morning where they know if they live in that rent-stabilized apartment, they will pay the same rent next year as well, and a morning where they know that child care will be universal.”Saturday’s event underscored how some prominent Democrats in the city, including Mr. Sharpton, were beginning to rally around Mr. Mamdani. (Neither Mr. Sharpton nor Mr. Lee have officially endorsed the assemblyman.)We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Plenty of Jews Love Zohran Mamdani

    In 2023, a branch of the Palestinian restaurant Ayat opened in Brooklyn’s Ditmas Park, not far from where I live. The eatery trumpets its politics; the seafood section on the menu is headed “From the River to the Sea,” which I found clever but some of its Jewish neighbors considered threatening. An uproar grew, especially online, so Ayat made a peace offering.In early 2024, it hosted a free Shabbat dinner, writing on social media, “Let’s create a space where differences unite us, where conversations flow freely, and where bonds are forged.” Over 1,300 people showed up. To serve them all, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported, Ayat used 15 lambs, 700 pounds of chicken and 100 branzino fish. There were also sandwiches from a glatt kosher caterer, a six-foot-long challah and a klezmer band.The event captured something miraculous about New York City, which is, for all its tensions and aggravations and occasional bursts of violence, a place where Jews and Muslims live in remarkable harmony. In Lawrence Wright’s recent novel set in the West Bank, “The Human Scale,” a Palestinian American man tries to explain it to his Palestinian cousin: “It’s not like here. Arabs and Jews are more like each other than they are like a lot of other Americans. You’ll see them in the same grocery stores and restaurants because of the halal food.”Eating side-by-side does not, of course, obviate fierce and sometimes ugly disagreements. But while outsiders like to paint New York as a roiling hellhole, there’s an everyday multicultural amity in this city that’s low-key magical.I saw some of that magic reflected in Zohran Mamdani’s mayoral campaign, and especially in the Muslim candidate’s alliance with New York’s Jewish comptroller, Brad Lander. They cross-endorsed, urging their followers to list the other second in the city’s ranked-choice voting system. The two campaigned together and made a joint appearance on “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert,” and Lander was beside Mamdani when he delivered his victory speech.Mamdani’s pro-Palestinian politics have sparked enormous alarm among some New York Jews, but he’s also won considerable Jewish support. In a poll of likely Jewish voters done by the Honan Strategy Group in May, Andrew Cuomo came in first, with 31 percent of the vote, but Mamdani was second, with 20 percent. On Tuesday, he won most of Park Slope, a neighborhood full of progressive Jews, and held his own on the similarly Jewish Upper West Side.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    ‘Re-elect Eric’: Adams Kicks Off Bid to Oppose Mamdani for Mayor

    Just a few months ago, it appeared unlikely that Mayor Eric Adams of New York, who was facing federal corruption charges, would be in a position to seek a second term.With the political world in New York City and beyond still abuzz over Zohran Mamdani’s ascendance as the likely Democratic mayoral candidate, the current mayor, Eric Adams, held a news conference on Thursday to deliver a countermessage: Don’t forget about me.Mr. Adams appeared on the steps of City Hall to formally kick off an independent bid for re-election in November, with a crowd of supporters holding up “Re-elect Eric for Mayor” signs, echoing Mr. Mamdani’s campaign ads that primarily use his first name.The obstacles the mayor faces are substantial. His approval rating was at historic lows even before he was indicted last fall on charges of bribery and soliciting illegal campaign contributions from foreign nationals. He grew more unpopular after the charges were dropped by the Trump Justice Department, leading to accusations of a quid pro quo that Mr. Adams has denied.The mayor was denied public matching funds because of the charges of soliciting straw donations. His management of the city has been questioned. The diverse coalition he put together to win election in 2021 is completely fractured. And his third-party bid puts him at an immediate disadvantage in a city where Democrats outnumber Republicans six to one.As evidence of his divisiveness, the mayor’s speech was repeatedly interrupted by protesters who called him a criminal and accused him of selling out the city to President Trump. Nearby in City Hall Park, protesters blew whistles and engaged in profane chants aimed at disrupting the announcement.At the news conference, the mayor seemed to sense the skepticism.“Why am I running for re-election?” Mr. Adams said, surrounded by supporters. “Because we’ve got more to do.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Eric Adams Meets With Business Leaders Desperate to Stop Mamdani’s Rise

    Daniel Loeb, the hedge fund manager, and some other New York City business leaders are aghast at Zohran Mamdani’s success in the Democratic mayoral primary and are considering backing Mr. Adams in the general election.In a conference room in Manhattan on Wednesday night, Mayor Eric Adams and Daniel S. Loeb, the hedge fund manager, met with other business leaders and political brokers to discuss how to stop the rise of Zohran Mamdani and possibly bolster Mr. Adams’s re-election campaign.The business leaders were impressed that Mr. Adams was already staging a public fight against Mr. Mamdani, several people familiar with the meeting said. Earlier in the day, during an interview on “Fox & Friends,” Mr. Adams called Mr. Mamdani a “snake-oil salesman.”Mr. Mamdani, a democratic socialist state assemblyman from Queens, on Tuesday shocked the New York political establishment by outperforming Andrew M. Cuomo, the former New York governor, in the Democratic primary for mayor. Mr. Cuomo is now considering whether to run as an independent in the general election, or end his campaign altogether.Should Mr. Cuomo withdraw, Mr. Mamdani is poised to face off against Mr. Adams, who is running as an independent; Curtis Sliwa, the Republican founder of the Guardian Angels; and Jim Walden, a lawyer also running as an independent.The prospect of Mr. Mamdani’s campaigning as the Democratic standard-bearer in a city where Democrats outnumber Republicans by six to one has sent shivers down the spines of many New York business leaders, who recoil at his plans for expansive new government programs funded with tax increases on corporations and the wealthiest New Yorkers. Some have quickly begun to throw their support behind the incumbent mayor, despite the scandals that have tarnished his tenure.Andrew Epstein, a spokesman for Mr. Mamdani, said the businessmen at the meeting were simply scared of “our plan to tax them a little bit more to fund an agenda to lower the cost of living and improve the quality of life for all New Yorkers.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    The Mamdani Earthquake

    Zohran Mamdani’s stunning showing in the Democratic primary for mayor has reshaped the local political landscape.Good morning. It’s Thursday. Today we’ll analyze Zohran Mamdani’s upset in the Democratic primary and whether his progressive message will resonate beyond New York.Shuran Huang for The New York TimesThe results are not official. Not yet. Under the city’s ranked-choice voting system, the Board of Elections still has to do elimination-round tabulations. But Zohran Mamdani’s all-but-certain upset reshaped the political landscape locally and perhaps nationally.How did he do it? Mamdani, a democratic socialist, ran up large vote tallies in gentrifying neighborhoods. But he also did well in brownstone-lined blocks of Brooklyn, on diverse blocks in Upper Manhattan and in neighborhoods with substantial South Asian populations in Queens. His apparent defeat of former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who had led in many polls since he entered the race in March, showed why it’s hard to poll before a primary.The aftermath? Cuomo told The New York Times shortly after his concession speech that he was still considering whether to run in November as an independent. He told WCBS-TV on Wednesday that before making a decision, he would take a hard look and see “what President Trump is going to do. Who knows how he would choose to get involved.”The national implications of a local election“It’s a national election, not just a New York City election,” the Democratic strategist James Carville said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More