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New Yorkers will discover who will be their next mayor this Tuesday, in a race that will decide who governs and protects the country's largest city at a moment when Donald Trump has threatened to deploy armed forces to the urban center.

Against that backdrop, New York has witnessed a mayoral election that has pitted two very different Democrats against each other. The election has become an acrimonious face-off, laced with accusations of racism and anti-Muslim sentiment, but it is the ideological divide between the two main candidates that could have major implications for how the party fares in next year's midterm elections.

The Rising Progressive

On the left side is the democratic socialist, the 34-year-old progressive candidate whose rapid ascent and grassroots campaign has brought international attention. On the establishment side is Andrew Cuomo, the former Democratic New York governor now campaigning independently – and enjoying the backing of ultra-rich donors and corporations.

With days to go, it is the progressive, the former longshot who defeated his opponent in the Democratic primary who is firmly installed as the leading candidate. The candidate, who has campaigned on a agenda of affordability and promised to halt rent increases for about two million city residents, has led his rival by significant margins in every poll taken in the fall, and it is very much the younger man's race to throw away.

A Bitter Contest

However, Cuomo, who stepped down as the state's leader in recent years amid allegations of sexual harassment, has stated clearly he will battle to the finish, and not necessarily in an fair fashion. He has trashed Mamdani's goals as unrealistic, and in the final stretch laughed as a broadcaster made Islamophobic remarks about Mamdani, who is Muslim. Two weeks ago, the independent was strongly criticized as racist after posting an artificial intelligence video that included a series of racist stereotypes and showed Mamdani freeing a group of criminals.

It's been a rather grubby conclusion to an race that could be critical to the path that the party, struggling in its reaction to Trump's power moves, adopts in the near future.

National Implications

If the progressive secures a clear victory, the establishment party leaders who have refused to endorse his campaign will be forced to reckon with a platform that has resonated with voters' frustration at inequality, soaring price rises and the establishment. It would be difficult for Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries not to embrace at least some of Mamdani's ambitious ideas about affordability, given the fresh face has generated an enthusiasm within the party perhaps not seen since Bernie Sanders ran for president eight years ago.

However, if Cuomo, who had been expected to win easily in the June primary, complete a remarkable comeback win, it could cement the party's existing approach of considered, lackluster resistance – a strategy that has angered grassroots members. A New York defeat of the progressive's optimistic platform could persuade Schumer and Jeffries that the best plan is to remain in the political center – even as surveys show the current iteration of the Democratic party is widely disliked nationwide.

Campaign Energy

Residents of the city seem to prefer the progressive agenda. Surveys show that his backers are much more excited about their choice than Cuomo backers, something that has been apparent throughout the campaign. The candidate's snappy videos on digital platforms, his hopeful outlook for the city and his readiness to actually get out and meet people in the city has drawn an force of more than 50,000 volunteers, many of them young or first-time voters.

Negative Tactics

However, Cuomo, in his late sixties, isn't giving up. And with the risks stacked against him, the ex-leader has resorted to ugly messaging in recent weeks.

Following extensive throwing basically everything at Mamdani to see what might resonate, the independent has concentrated on targeting the candidate directly. He has labelled his rival, who was of Ugandan origin to Indian parents, an "radical", and popped up on Fox Business for an interview with Maria Bartiromo, where Cuomo claimed the city “will not survive” his opponent as city leader. It hit bottom recently, when the former governor laughed along and said “that’s another problem” after a broadcaster said the candidate would “cheer” another terrorist incident.

Campaign Dynamics

This strategy echoes much of what Trump, who has deployed the national guard to Washington DC and warned to take similar action to NYC, has said about the progressive, and perhaps that shouldn’t come as a surprise. A set of wealthy residents, including some who donated to Trump in the last presidential race, have invested heavily into trying to elect Cuomo into office, as other influential figures have urged Curtis Sliwa to drop out from the contest.

Candidate Backgrounds

As far as the Cuomo camp, and his billionaire supporters, are concerned, it should not have reached to this point. When Mamdani, one of one hundred fifty state legislators, started his campaign for mayor in October 2024, few had heard of him, and in truth, few even paid attention.

The former governor, by contrast, entered smoothly into the race in this year and became the immediate frontrunner. He was the political heavyweight who apparently held every edge. The quintessential establishment figure, he had married a Kennedy and served in a Democratic presidency. He assumed office as New York governor in over a decade ago, seventeen years after his father, Mario Cuomo, stepped down from the same position.

Mamdani, who was voted in to the New York state assembly in recently, does not have the comparable background. But his commitment to providing no-cost transit and free childcare – along with the freeze-the-rent pledge – offer a more positive vision of the future than Cuomo’s dire warnings about “mayhem” and rising criminal activity, and his vow to hire more police officers.

Campaign Controversies

Nevertheless, the candidate has encountered some challenges in the final phase, after footage surfaced suggesting him implying the New York police department and the IDF were intertwined.

“We have to make clear that when the boot of the NYPD is on your throat, it’s been influenced by the IDF,” the candidate said in the clip, filmed at a DSA convention in recent years. The progressive, a vocal opponent of the Israeli government who has said the country is engaging in atrocities in Gaza, indicated he was questioning cooperative programs between the NYPD and Israeli forces.

Powerful Moment

With the election nearing, the candidate seems to have gained empathy and backing, however, for his response to Cuomo’s increasing rhetoric.

Mamdani addressed Cuomo’s 9/11 remarks in an emotional video. In it, the candidate remembered how, when he first campaigned for state assembly, a family member advised to him that he did not have to tell people about his religion. It was a realization, he said, that many Muslim New Yorkers had been taught “again and again”: “That safety could only be found in the shadows of our community. That it is in those shadows alone where Muslims could embrace their full identities, and that if we were to emerge from those shadows, then it is in those silence that we must leave our beliefs.”

Addressing the actions of his opponents, who has claimed Mamd