SEATTLE – Bruce Harrell has retained his lead ahead of Katie Wilson as of Wednesday afternoon in the race to be Seattle’s next mayor.
The second update of election results from King County Elections showed Harrell with 52.64% of the vote while Wilson had 46.93% of the vote — around 5.71% — with 34.77% turnout so far.
On election night, the incumbent Harrell led Wilson by around 7.14% with 23.36% of the vote counted so far.
Harrell is looking to keep his seat as Mayor of Seattle, following a second-place finish in the August primary behind Wilson.
While Harrell has the early lead, FOX 13 political analyst Sandeep Kaushik notes that last-minute voters skew progressive, and the majority of the Seattle ballots left to be counted are expected to favor Wilson.
Who is Bruce Harrell?
Harrell ran in 2021 on a platform of public safety and boosting police funding, following the 2020 George Floyd protests in Seattle. He also ran on addressing homelessness, though the Wilson campaign has accused him of grossly inflating the numbers of affordable housing units built under his watch.
Harrell helped Seattle navigate out of the COVID-19 pandemic, which saw an influx of jobs and federal dollars return to the city, as well as the sunsetting of pandemic-era policies like the eviction moratorium and mask mandates.
Before he was mayor, Harrell served as Seattle City Council President from 2016–2020, and before that as a Seattle City Councilmember from 2008–2016. He previously ran for mayor in 2013 against incumbent Mike McGinn, then dropped out to endorse Ed Murray. In 2017, in the wake of several child sex abuse allegations, Murray resigned and Harrell served as acting mayor for five days.
Harrell has been endorsed by key Democrat politicians in Washington, including Gov. Bob Ferguson, Attorney General Nick Brown, U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell, former King County Executive Dow Constantine, former mayors Jenny Durkan, Greg Nickels, Norm Rice and Wes Uhlman, and former governors Jay Inslee, Gary Locke, Christine Gregoire, as well as several labor unions.
Election Day marks only the first ballot drop of many, and county elections offices will be tabulating thousands more votes in the coming weeks.
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The Source: Information in this story comes from numbers provided by the Washington Secretary of State’s Office, the campaigns of Bruce Harrell and Katie Wilson, and previous coverage by FOX 13 Seattle.
Republican infighting crescendoed in the aftermath of California voters overwhelmingly approving a Democratic-friendly redistricting plan this week that may undercut the GOP’s control of Congress and derail President Trump’s polarizing agenda.
The state GOP chairwoman was urged to resign and former Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who championed the creation of the state’s independent redistricting commission, was called “cowardly” by one top GOP leader for not being more involved in the campaign.
Leaders of the Republican-backed committees opposing the ballot measure, known as Proposition 50, were questioned about how they spent nearly $58 million in the special election after such a dismal outcome.
Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy of Bakersfield, the once-prodigious Republican fundraiser, reportedly had vowed that he could raise $100 million for the opposition but ended up delivering a small fraction of that amount.
Assemblyman Carl DeMaio (R-San Diego), a conservative firebrand, called on state GOP Chair Corrin Rankin to step down and faulted other Republican leaders and longtime party operatives for their failure to defeat the measure, calling them “derelict of duty and untrustworthy and incompetent.”
“Unless serious changes are made at the party, the midterms are going to be a complete disaster,” DeMaio said, also faulting the other groups opposing the effort. “We need accountability. There needs to be a reckoning because otherwise the lessons won’t be learned. The old guard needs to go. The old guard has failed us too many times. This is the latest failure.”
Rankin pushed back against the criticism, saying the state party was the most active GOP force in the final stretch of the election. Raising $11 million during the final three weeks of the campaign, the party spent it on mailers, digital ads and text messages, as well as organizing phone banks and precinct walking, she said.
Former Speaker of the House and California Republican Kevin McCarthy speaks to the press at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Oct. 19, 2023.
(Samuel Corum / AFP via Getty Images)
“We left it all on the field,” Rankin said Wednesday morning at a Sacramento news conference about a federal lawsuit California Republicans filed arguing that Proposition 50 is unconstitutional. “We were the last man standing … to reach out to Republicans and make sure they turned out.”
Responding to criticism that their effort was disorganized, including opposition campaign mailers being sent to voters who had already cast ballots, Rankin said the party would conduct a review of its efforts. But she added that she was extremely proud of the work her team did in the “rushed special election.”
Barring successful legal challenges, the new California congressional districts enacted under Proposition 50 will go into effect before the 2026 election. The new district maps favor Democratic candidates and were crafted to unseat five Republican incumbents, which could erase Republicans’ narrow edge in the the U.S. House of Representatives.
If Democrats win control of the body, Trump’s policy agenda will probably be stymied and the president and members of his administration could face multiple congressional investigations.
Gov. Gavin Newsom and other California Democrats proposed Proposition 50 in response to Trump urging elected officials in Texas and other GOP-led states to redraw their congressional districts to increase the number of Republicans elected to the House next year.
The new California congressional boundaries voters approved Tuesday could give Democrats the opportunity to pick up five seats in the state’s 52-member congressional delegation.
Proposition 50 will change how California determines the boundaries of congressional districts. The measure asked voters to approve congressional district lines designed to favor Democrats for the 2026, 2028 and 2030 elections, overriding the map drawn by the state’s independent redistricting commission.
Some Republicans lamented that Schwarzenegger was not more involved in the election. The movie star championed the creation of the independent commission in 2010, his final year in office. He campaigned for the creation of similar bodies to fight partisan drawing of district lines across the nation after leaving office.
Shawn Steel, one of California’s three representatives on the Republican National Committee, called Schwarzenegger “a cowardly politician.”
“Arnold decided to sit it out,” Steel said. “Arnold just kind of raised the flag and immediately went under the desk.”
Steel said that the former governor failed to follow through on the messages he repeatedly delivered about the importance of independent redistricting.
“He could have had his name on the ballot as a ballot opponent,” Steel said. “He turned it down. So I’d say, with Arnold, just disappointing but not surprised. That’s his political legacy.”
Schwarzenegger’s team pushed back at this criticism as misinformed.
“We were clear from the beginning that he was not going to be a part of the campaign and was going to speak his mind,” said Daniel Ketchell, a spokesman for the former governor. “His message was very clear and nonpartisan. When one campaign couldn’t even criticize gerrymandering in Texas, it was probably hard for voters to believe they actually cared about fairness.”
Schwarzenegger spoke out against Proposition 50 a handful of times, including at an appearance at USC that was turned into a television ad by one of the anti-Proposition 50 committees that appeared to go dark before election day.
On election day, he emailed followers about gut health, electrolytes, protein bars, fitness and conversations to increase happiness. There was no apparent mention of the Tuesday election.
The Democratic-led California Legislature in August voted to place Proposition 50 on the November ballot, costing nearly $300 million, and setting off a sprint to Tuesday’s special election.
The opponents were vastly outspent by the ballot measure’s supporters, who contributed nearly $136 million to various efforts. That financial advantage, combined with Democrats’ overwhelming edge in voter registration in California, were main contributors to the ballot measure’s success. When introduced in August, Proposition 50 had tepid support and its prospects appeared uncertain.
Nearly 64% of the nearly 8.3 million voters who cast ballots supported Proposition 50, while 36% opposed it as of Wednesday night, according to the California secretary of state’s office.
In addition to the state Republican Party, two main campaign committees opposed Proposition 50, including the one backed by McCarthy. A separate group was funded by more than $32 million from major GOP donor Charles Munger Jr., the son of a billionaire who was Warren Buffet’s right-hand man; he bankrolled the creation of the independent congressional redistricting commission in 2010.
Representatives of the two committees — who defended their work Tuesday night after the election was called moments after the polls closed, saying that they could not overcome the vast financial disadvantage and that the proposition’s supporters must be held to their promises to voters such as pushing for national redistricting reform — did not respond to repeated requests for comment on Wednesday.
Newsom’s committee supporting Proposition 50 had prominent Democrats stumping for the effort, including former President Obama starring in ads.
That’s in stark contrast to the opposition efforts. Trump was largely absent, possibly because he is deeply unpopular among Californians and the president does not like to be associated with losing causes.
On the day after election night, Democrats are celebrating major victories in Virginia, New Jersey, California and New York City. Ed O’Keefe breaks it down.
Democrats won big in Tuesday night’s elections in New Jersey, Virginia, New York City, and California. Marianna Sotomayor, congressional reporter for The Washington Post, and Deepa Shivaram, White House correspondent for NPR, join “The Takeout” to discuss how Republicans are reacting.
Election Day 2025 was a sweeping victory for Democrats, with major wins in two gubernatorial races and the New York City mayoral contest, along with California voters approving a ballot measure to redraw congressional districts, which could give Democrats an advantage in the House of Representatives starting in 2026. It could also be a learning experience for business owners.
While political experts will be sifting through the results for days, trying to discern what this means for next year’s midterm elections and the overall state of the Democratic and Republican parties, there are also lessons to be found for entrepreneurs.
Affordability is everything
The economy was the driving force of the 2025 election. Exit polls found that in the New York City mayor race, both the New Jersey and Virginia governors’ races and the Proposition 50 battle in California, voters cited the economy as the most important issue. That likely doesn’t come as a shock to business owners. Plenty of holiday sales predictions have underlined it as well. (Deloitte, for example, forecasts U.S. consumers will spend 10% less than they did in 2024.) There’s a fine line between maintaining your company’s profitability and offering your customers a deal, but the electorate’s laser focus on their own financial situation underscores just how critical it is to thread that needle.
It’s time to learn more about Democratic Socialism
Despite opposition from big business and billionaires, Zohran Mamdani easily won the mayoral race in New York City, getting the most votes of any candidate since the 1960s. Mamdani is a democratic socialist, who made campaign promises that included free child care, free buses, and a rent freeze on rent-stabilized apartments.
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Bernie Sanders has been the face of democratic socialism until now, helping raise awareness of the party, but democratic socialists are still a small fraction of the overall voter population. As Tuesday showed, though, interest is growing fast. Voters are growing disenfranchised with their parties and looking for alternatives. Mamdani has emphasized more regulatory breaks for small businesses and fewer breaks for corporations, which could help him win over an even larger base.
Small businesses that can figure out how to communicate with and interact with that audience could find a loyal customer base. As Mamdani demonstrated, the political movement isn’t afraid to do battle with corporate entities.
There’s power in the youth market
Mamdani’s victory was fueled by the youth vote. Two-thirds of people under the age of 45 supported his campaign, according to exit polls. Young voters were also driven to the polls in California to vote on Prop 50. It was, in many ways, the first election where Generation Z had a major influence on results.
Smart business owners have had Gen Z on their radar for a while. The group makes up nearly one-fifth of the workforce and is expected to have a spending power of $12 trillion by 2030. The 2025 election underlines that they’re a market that needs to be taken seriously.
While traditional polls didn’t blow it quite as bad as they did in the 2024 elections, several made some of the high-level races seem a lot closer than they turned out to be when voting ended. Prediction markets, however, didn’t miss. That will almost certainly boost their reputation as political predictors, but business owners who study them could also get advance looks at evolving trends and coming waves. That could give them time to adapt and be ready to ride new waves in everything from tech to culture to the economy over the months and years to come.
Sometimes you have to throw out the playbook
Even with Tuesday’s victories, the Democratic party is still in the midst of an identity crisis. Mamdani’s victory could signal a change in how voters want to approach things. And California governor Gavin Newsom’s win on Prop 50 came after weeks of social media posts meant to mock Trump’s style. Whether these approaches will work on a more national level remains to be seen, but both were different than what voters were used to seeing. Both politicians saw that the status quo wasn’t working and gambled on something new, a lesson that business owners can learn from.
A Minneapolis City Council that has in recent years sparred with incumbent Mayor Jacob Frey was able to maintain its progressive majority Tuesday night, despite a loss in the western part of the city.
Katie Cashman, who represented Ward 7, was unseated by Elizabeth Shaffer, who served as a Minneapolis Park commissioner for three years and was backed by Frey and the centrist PAC All of Minneapolis.
Still, it was a solid night for incumbents, who otherwise held on to their seats.
Aside from Shaffer, the council will welcome three new faces this cycle: Soren Stevenson in Ward 8, Jamison Whiting in Ward 11 and a member in Ward 5, which had not been called as of Wednesday morning.
Pearll Warren led in the ward vacated by Jeremiah Ellison after the first round of tabulation, with Ethrophic Burnett trailing by 400 votes. Warren was endorsed by the same PAC as Shaffer.
Even if Warren wins, the progressive bloc of the council will hold seven seats, though it’s not enough to override a mayoral veto.
Stevenson picked up a seat for the progressives in a ward that was held by Andrea Jenkins, who opted not to run for reelection. Stevenson, who was endorsed by the Democratic Socialists of America, lost to Jenkins by 38 votes in 2023, but took home 2,000 more than his closest challenger Josh Bassais on Tuesday.
Whiting was also endorsed by the All of Minneapolis PAC and will represent the district held by Emily Koski, who had a brief mayoral run. Preliminary results show Whiting with 63% of the vote.
Frey held a 10-point lead over state Sen. Omar Fateh after the first round of counting, but the race has yet to be called.
Voters in Minneapolis turned out in record numbers for the 2025 municipal election, city officials said. According to unofficial results, 55% of registered voters cast their ballots, compared to the previous record of 54% in 2021.
Below are the preliminary results of the Minneapolis City Council race:
Ward 1: Council President Elliott Payne
Ward 2: Robin Wonsley
Ward 3: Michael Rainville
Ward 4: LaTrisha Vetaw
Ward 5:
Ward 6: Jamal Osman
Ward 7: Elizabeth Shaffer
Ward 8: Soren Stevenson
Ward 9: Jason Chavez
Ward 10: Aisha Chughtai
Ward 11: Jamison Whiting
Ward 12: Aurin Chowdhury
Ward 13: Linea Palmisano
To see the latest election results in Minnesota, click here.
Houston attorney Alejandra Salinas got the most votes in a crowded city council race, but she’ll have to face off against former Councilman Dwight Boykins in a December 13 runoff.
Boykins, a lobbyist and consultant, served as District D’s representative from 2014 to 2019 and made an unsuccessful bid for mayor in 2019. The winner of the At-Large Position 4 contest will fill the unexpired term of Letitia Plummer, who resigned to run for Harris County judge. The term extends through January 1, 2028.
Salinas said Wednesday morning she’s ready to move forward.
“I am incredibly grateful to those who voted for me and will work hard every day to earn the votes of those who didn’t,” she said. “No matter who we are or what part of town we live in, we all deserve better roads, safer neighborhoods, more flood protection and an affordable city with good-paying jobs.”
Boykins did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The final numbers posted Wednesday morning at Harrisvotes.com show the following results:
Alejandra Salinas: 37,942 votes (21.21 percent)
Dwight Boykins: 35,878 votes (20.06 percent)
Jordan Thomas: 28,610 votes (16 percent)
Sonia Rivera: 18,987 votes (10.62 percent)
Angie Thibodeaux: 11,719 votes (6.55 percent)
Martina Lemond Dixon: 7,923 votes (4.43 percent)
Sheraz Mohammad Siddiqui: 6,664 votes (3.73 percent)
Miguel Herrera: 5,949 votes (3.33 percent)
Kathy L. Tatum: 5,428 votes (3.03 percent)
J. Brad Batteau: 5,023 votes (2.81 percent)
Cris Wright: 3,927 votes (2.2 percent)
Ethan Hale: 3,782 votes (2.11 percent)
Al Lloyd: 3,484 votes (1.95 percent)
Adrian Thomas Rogers: 3,471 votes (1.94 percent)
At a Houston Progressive Caucus forum on October 4, Jordan Thomas, Salinas and Boykins debated local issues and shared their thoughts on recent Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids. Salinas spoke about how a relative, who is a U.S. citizen, was detained by ICE for several hours.
“It is unconscionable what is happening right now in this country,” she said. “What ICE is doing is [unacceptable]. On City Council, I will stand up every single day and speak out against it. We cannot just stay silent and hope that President Trump will not come to Houston. I will always stand up for immigrants. They are the base of our community.”
Houston Progressive Caucus, which promotes policies that support the working class, endorsed Thomas and recommended Salinas. An endorsement means the candidate is fully aligned with the HPC’s platform; a recommendation means the candidate is “clearly better for working people than the alternatives.”
Thomas, Plummer’s former chief of staff, also earned the endorsement of the Houston Chronicle editorial board, which said that “having Thomas at City Hall would help make [John] Whitmire a better mayor.”
Salinas, a partner at Susman Godfrey LLP, campaigned on making Houston a safer and more affordable place to live. She said the city’s permitting process must be streamlined in order to make housing more affordable.
“Houston families are watching their budgets with concern, unsure about inflation, job security, secure retirements, healthcare and more,” Salinas says on her campaign website. “Our city is facing the same economic uncertainty, driven in part by the chaos in Washington, D.C., and a hostile state government. Now more than ever, city leaders should level with voters and make financial decisions that are transparent and sound for the long-term health of the city.”
Boykins has touted his experience as the only candidate in the race who served as a Houston City Council member.
“You can have all these ideas about what you want to do, but you have to have a working relationship with the mayor, the agenda director and your colleagues on the city council,” Boykins said at last month’s forum. “I have that experience and I understand how to bridge coalitions between Democrats, Republicans and Independents to get your city services addressed.”
Houston ISD
Three candidates elected Tuesday to the Houston ISD Board of Trustees won’t have any voting power because the Texas Education Agency took over the school board in 2023, appointing a superintendent and a handpicked board of managers. The elected board, however, will regain power when the state takeover ends.
Two of the three candidates elected Tuesday — Maria Benzon and Michael McDonough — were endorsed by the Harris County Democratic Party, even though school board trustees are nonpartisan.
Incumbent Bridget Wade, endorsed by the Republican Party and a darling of TEA Commissioner Mike Morath, narrowly defeated Dr. Audrey Nath in the District VII race.
As predicted, Harris County Attorney Christian Menefee and former Houston City Council member Amanda Edwards are headed to a runoff in the U.S. Congressional District 18 race to fill the unexpired term of the late Sylvester Turner.
None of the 16 candidates garnered more than 50 percent of the vote, which forces the top two hopefuls to face off again early next year. The district has been without representation since Turner died in March. The late Sheila Jackson Lee represented District 18 for almost three decades and died last year.
With all 600 precincts reporting early Wednesday morning, the following results were reported by the Harris County Clerk’s Office:
Christian Dashaun Menefee, D: 21,979 votes (28.89 percent)
Amanda Edwards, D: 19,440 votes (25.55 percent)
Jolanda Jones, D: 14,524 votes (19.09 percent)
Carmen Maria Montiel, R: 5,107 votes (6.71 percent)
Isaiah R. Martin, D: 4,336 votes (5.70 percent)
Ollie J. Knox, R: 3,130 votes (4.11 percent)
Stephen Huey, D: 1,414 votes (1.86 percent)
Ronald Dwayne Whitfield, R: 1,174 votes (1.54 percent)
Carter Page, R: 943 votes (1.24 percent)
Theodis Daniel, R: 937 votes (1.23 percent)
Valencia Williams, D: 915 votes (1.2 percent)
George Edward Foreman IV, ND: 827 votes (1.09 percent)
Feldon Bonner II, D: 553 votes (0.73 percent)
Vince Duncan, ND: 407 votes (0.53 percent)
Reyna Anderson, ND: 263 votes (0.35 percent)
Tammie Jean Rochester, GRN: 135 votes (0.18 percent)
Menefee issued a statement Tuesday evening saying his campaign was “powered by community and by people who believe in fighting for something bigger than themselves.”
“Tonight’s results show what we already knew: when you fight for the people of Houston, they fight for you,” he said. “For months, as this seat sat vacant, I heard from voters who were ready for someone willing to take on Donald Trump and the far right — not just talk about change, but deliver real results. I’m proud that we’ve earned the trust and support of so many voters.”
Amanda Edwards greets voters at the Acres Homes Multi-Service Center on Tuesday morning. Credit: April Towery
Edwards said on Wednesday morning that she’s ready for the runoff.
“I’m deeply grateful to the people of the 18th Congressional District who have supported me and know that victory is right around the corner for our community,” she said in a statement. “We are entering this runoff neck and neck with the community behind us. By no means am I the establishment candidate in this race; I am the people’s candidate, and my track record for delivering results for the people will help propel me forward in this runoff.”
Menefee and Edwards filed shortly after Turner’s death and have been frontrunners throughout the race. Former Jackson Lee staffer Isaiah Martin proved to be a strong fundraiser, putting up about $1 million. Edwards raised $1.2 million and Menefee had $1.5 million in his coffers.
“I got involved in this race because I was really frustrated with the system,” Martin said in a social media video Tuesday night. “I felt as if we needed to fight back a lot harder in Congress and D.C., and I really wanted to be that person. Although it’s not going to be me on the House floor, I’m … still going to be working to defeat this failed President in D.C., because ultimately we know he’s destroying everything we’ve got.”
Texas Rep. Jolanda Jones, D-Houston, filed almost three months after the others, saying she had to stay committed to the constituents of her state House district until the session came to a close. Jones raised about $342,000 in the CD 18 race and said she expected that people would count her out. She campaigned vigorously during the 11-day early voting period and on Tuesday, earning about 19 percent of the vote and coming in third place.
“I’ve been at the polls every day, all day, from 7 to 7, because I have nothing better to do than fight for the people I represent,” Jones said in a statement Tuesday afternoon. “I’m in these streets. I’m not in an ivory tower. I’m in the streets with the people.”
Jones broke quorum this summer with several other House Democrats when a mid-decade redistricting proposal threatened to change the boundaries of several congressional districts, including CD 18, in a Donald Trump-led effort to flip five Texas seats red.
Some Democrats ultimately returned from the quorum break, although Jones did not, and the new map passed but is now being challenged in court. The Houston Press and other media outlets reported last week that some District 18 voters were confused about whether the new boundary lines would prevent them from voting in Tuesday’s election.
County Clerk Teneshia Hudspeth said that voters who cast ballots in Congressional District 18 in 2024 would be able to do so on Tuesday and again in next year’s runoff. The new boundary lines won’t take effect until the March 2026 primary election, Hudspeth said.
Christian Menefee talks to voters at Acres Homes Multi-Service Center on Tuesday morning. Credit: April Towery
Whoever wins the runoff will hold the seat until the end of 2026 but will have to immediately file again for the primary election. Longtime U.S. Rep. Al Green, who was redistricted out of his District 9 seat, is expected to announce a bid for District 18 on Friday, November 7.
Houston City Council candidate Kathy Tatum was campaigning Tuesday morning near the Acres Homes Multi-Service Center and said residents in District 18 have been without a member of Congress for almost a year and could benefit from a youthful perspective. Green is 78. Menefee is 37, and Edwards is 43.
“We don’t have nobody in CD 18 because in the Democratic Party we have loyalty to our ancestors and those who paved the way,” Tatum said. “We have had people in office who should have retired, and that’s a situation that could happen again if Al Green enters this race.”
He may not have been on the ballot, but President Trump was on the minds of voters in the 2025 elections.
He was a factor for many voters in each of the places where exit polls were conducted: Virginia, New Jersey, New York City and California. And more said their vote in these races was to oppose him, than support him.
These are historically Democrat-leaning places, and more voters here disapproved than approved of his overall job as president. They also found that his administration’s actions on immigration enforcement have gone too far.
New York City: Cost of living and bringing needed change
New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani won a decisive victory over former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo on a campaign of affordability, and the cost of living was the most important issue to voters in New York City. Mamdani handily won the majority of voters who picked it. More specifically, he focused on the cost of housing, which seven in 10 voters in New York said was a major problem where they live, and he won among renters, who made up more than half of the electorate.
Voters who made up their minds in the last month of the campaign voted overwhelmingly for Cuomo, but it wasn’t enough to make up for the majority of voters who decided on Mamdani before October.
Cuomo led Mamdani among Jewish voters — most of whom said a candidate’s position on Israel was important in their vote.
Mamdani’s coalition was led by enormous support among voters under 30 and very liberal voters, but his support extended to all voters under 45 and to those who considered themselves only somewhat liberal, while older voters, as well as moderates and conservatives, voted for Cuomo.
The Republican candidate in the New York City mayoral race, Curtis Sliwa, came in a distant third and didn’t even win self-identified Republicans (they voted for Cuomo). Had he dropped out of the race, it might not have made a difference. Though most of Sliwa’s supporters said they would have voted for Cuomo, exit polls indicate that in a hypothetical two-way race, Mamdani still would have been victorious.
Mamdani also ran on change, and that was picked as the most important quality in how voters made their decision. A changing electorate was also a hallmark of Mamdani’s win — his strongest support was not just young voters, but also those who were voting in a mayoral race for the first time and those who had moved to New York within the past 10 years.
New Jersey and Virginia: The economy, women voters
Economic issues also loomed large in the Democratic wins in the gubernatorial races in New Jersey and Virginia. In New Jersey, Jack Ciattarelli won voters who were most concerned about taxes and who said electricity was a major problem for them, but voters who said the most important issue was the economy overall voted for Sherrill. In Virginia, those “economy” voters voted for Abigail Spanberger over Winsome Earle-Sears by more than 20 points.
Women voted in big numbers for the women Democratic candidates in Virginia and New Jersey. Sherrill and Spanberger’s margins with women were far larger than Kamala Harris’ were nationally in 2024.
Independents were key, too. They swung toward Spanberger in Virginia, after Glenn Youngkin won them in 2021. Independents also backed Sherrill in New Jersey.
California Prop 50: Getting back at Republicans’ plans
The proposition, pushed by Gov. Gavin Newsom, authorizes temporary changes to the state’s congressional district maps in response to redistricting in Texas.
“Yes” voters didn’t necessarily think this ballot initiative was the best way to draw congressional district line — but they overwhelmingly said it was to counter the changes made by Republicans in other states.
Polls may have updated since this post was published.
Texas voters appeared to support all 17 constitutional amendments on Tuesday’s ballot, as each of the measures — including tax exemptions and bans, a $20 million investment into the state’s water supply, bail reform and dementia research — held strong leads late Tuesday.
With only early votes, mail-in ballots and 30 out of 600 precincts reporting in Harris County just after 11 p.m., it appeared local voters narrowly rejected Proposition 6, which bans new taxes on security transactions, and Proposition 17, a tax exemption for property involved with border security infrastructure near the Texas-Mexico line.
But it’s the statewide numbers that count, and political experts say constitutional amendments rarely fail.
Proposition 1 creates an endowment for 11 Texas State Technical Colleges, including one in Fort Bend County, to purchase loans and buildings. This measure supports a skilled workforce and broader career choices in the college system.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 68.79 percent approval.
About 66.46 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 2 prohibits the establishment of a capital gains tax on assets like real estate, investments and personal property. Critics say it protects wealthy Texans and could stunt the state’s economic growth.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 68.19 percent approval.
About 56.6 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 3 requires the denial of bail for individuals accused of violent felony offenses. The measure supports denying bail for high-risk defendants but creates a financial barrier for poor Texans, increasing the likelihood of overcrowded jails and neglect of mental health issues.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 63.66 percent approval.
About 61.01 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 4dedicates the first $1 billion per fiscal year of sales tax revenue exceeding $46.5 billion to the Texas Water Fund over the next 20 years. Voters supported funding to increase the Lone Star State’s water supply and repair aging infrastructure.
Critics expressed concerns about spending mandates in the constitution and whether the funds would be allocated fairly by a three-person board appointed by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 70.6 percent approval.
About 67.23 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 5 exempts Texans from taxes on animal feed. The amendment was advertised as potential assistance for farmers and ranchers who are already dealing with rising costs.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 65.78 percent approval.
About 52.22 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 6 bans new taxes on securities transactions and financial market operators (aimed at those who work in the stock market today or will work in the new Texas Stock Trade in Dallas). Critics said this was a tax break for the rich and would benefit only the wealthiest Texans.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 57.92 percent approval.
About 46.2 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 7 provides a property tax exemption for spouses of veterans who died in the line of duty, if the widow or widower has not remarried.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 86.92 percent approval.
About 84.32 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
As of late Tuesday evening, it appeared likely that all 17 constitutional amendments would be approved. Credit: April Towery
Proposition 8 bans taxes on estate and inheritance. Texas does not have estate taxes, and a ban would prevent future regulations that could level the playing field to shift the tax burden from working families to wealthy Texans.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 74.91 percent approval.
About 63.6 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 9 is a tax exemption for up to $125,000 worth of business inventory or equipment. The measure is viewed as an incentive for small businesses that could also help the Texas economy.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 67.1 percent approval.
About 55.88 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 10 is a temporary tax exemption for homeowners whose properties were destroyed by fire. While most property owners have home insurance, this exemption could offer extra support.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 90.18 percent approval.
About 86.87 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 11 increases school property tax exemptions from $10,000 to $60,000 for elderly and disabled homeowners. The amendment provides support for about 2 million homeowners who are likely to be on a fixed income.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 79.55 percent approval.
About 75.38 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 12 expands the State Commission on Judicial Conduct, which investigates judicial misconduct and reviews the termination of judgeships. Approval of this measure means new members would have less power than governor-appointed residents, which critics say could politicize the judicial process. Supporters say it will promote accountability.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 64.49 percent approval.
About 54.25 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 13 increases a school property tax exemption from $100,000 to $140,000 for all homeowners, saving an average of about $490 per year. The state will pay for an estimated $2.7 billion in revenue losses to school districts for the 2026-27 school year.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 81.78 percent approval.
About 76.01 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 14 will establish the Dementia Prevention and Research Institute of Texas, providing $3 billion in funding for dementia research and prevention to study brain-related conditions. Critics have said that brain research should be funded by the private sector.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 68.13 percent approval.
About 68.24 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 15 codifies “parental rights” language in the state constitution. Critics say this could weaponize the Constitution to propagate right-wing culture wars involving LGBTQ+ families, book bans, and what’s taught in public schools. Parental rights are already outlined in federal case law.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 72.23 percent approval.
About 63.85 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 16 adds citizenship requirements to the Constitution and is redundant because U.S. citizenship is already a requirement to register to vote in Texas. Critics say it is an inflammatory response aligned with anti-immigration policies and stokes fear about non-citizen voting.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 74.94 percent approval.
About 69.37 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
Proposition 17 provides a tax exemption for property involved with border security infrastructure near the Texas-Mexico line. Critics say this could incentivize support for border security infrastructure and shift the tax burden onto other property owners.
Statewide, the measure was leading with 60.86 percent approval.
About 48.08 percent of Harris County early voters supported the measure.
EVERETT, Wash. – Incumbent Cassie Franklin is currently leading the Everett mayoral race over challenger Scott Murphy, though many votes have yet to be counted.
As of 8 p.m. Tuesday, Franklin has received 52.45% (6,970) of the vote, with Murphy trailing with 47.1% (6,259).
Cassie Franklin (left) and Scott Murphy (right)
Franklin is running for another term after having served eight years as Everett’s mayor. Her top priority is public safety, highlighting accomplishments like a reduction in crime, hiring more police officers, and expanding youth safety initiatives.
Franklin is also dedicating resources towards reducing homelessness in the city, saying there’s been a drastic expansion of shelter beds and increase in available resources since she’s taken office.
The incumbent leads in the general election after losing in the primary by less than 100 votes, with Murphy coming away with 35.3% of the vote to Franklin’s 34.9%.
Ballots will continue to be tallied until election results in Snohomish County are certified on Nov. 25.
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The Source: Information in this story came from the Washington Secretary of State, Snohomish County, the campaign pages of Cassie Franklin and Scott Murphy, and FOX 13 Seattle reporting.
Incumbent Melvin Carter is leading the St. Paul mayoral race Tuesday night with two-thirds of all ballots counted in the first round. Carter holds only a three-point lead over his closest challenger, State Rep. Kaohly Her.
Voters in St. Paul headed to the polls on Tuesday in the election to decide who they want as the city’s mayor, whether to support a city measure regarding administrative citations and on a school referendum.
Live election results for the St. Paul mayoral race
Five candidates are running to be mayor of St. Paul: incumbent Mayor Melvin Carter, Yan Chen, Adam Dullinger, State Rep. Kaohly Her and Mike Hilborn.
St. Paul, like most major urban areas, faces difficulties revitalizing its downtown and other neighborhoods in the post-pandemic era.
Here are the current results for the St. Paul mayoral race.
What platforms are the St. Paul mayoral candidates running on?
Carter is vying for a third term at the position. He was elected as the city’s 46th mayor in 2017, becoming the first Black man to hold the position. He successfully ran for reelection in 2021. He played a key role in pushing Gov. Tim Walz to call back state workers to in-person work for at least half of their workweek. That has brought thousands of workers back to downtown St. Paul.
Chen is a scientist and business owner who immigrated to America at 19, according to her campaign website. Chen’s top priorities include public safety, community governance, housing and economic development, and integrating people experiencing homelessness back into the community. She previously ran for a seat on the St. Paul City Council.
Dullinger, according to his campaign website, was born and raised in Minnesota and has been a St. Paul resident for six years. He says organized labor, including unions, can benefit the “entire labor market,” and that the city needs a mayor “who truly cares and continues to promote unions.”
Dullinger is also focused on public housing, bicycle infrastructure and finding ways to reduce spending.
Her has represented St. Paul in the Minnesota House since 2019. She’s worked as a policy director for Carter for nearly four years. She was born in Laos before coming to the U.S. as a refugee when she was 3 years old. Her says the city needs safe communities, a vibrant economy, affordable and abundant housing and to defend residents against Trump administration policies that she says are “cruel and arbitrary.”
Hilborn is a lifelong resident of St. Paul and the founder of a restoration business. His mission is to bring “good that elevates everyone,” according to his campaign website. Hilborn wants to lower taxes, hold criminals accountable, support police by “providing them the tools they need,” expand homeless shelters and revitalize the downtown area.
Administrative citation measure
St. Paul residents will vote on a measure regarding administrative citations, also known as civil penalties. Unlike most cities in the state, St. Paul can only use criminal penalties to enforce ordinances.
If the measure passes, the City Charter would be amended so that administrative citations could be issued for people who violate city ordinances.
Supporters say criminal penalties are too harsh for small infractions and often let wealthier offenders delay the criminal process. Former St. Paul City Councilmember Jane Prince said the city could abuse the power to fine without limit, according to the Minnesota Star Tribune.
School referendum
St. Paul Public Schools is seeking an increase in its operating levy to $1,073 per student. The district says the referendum would generate around $37 million per year in additional revenue.
The district created a tax calculator that residents can use to see how the referendum, if passed, would impact them. According to an example officials shared, the estimated additional property tax for a $289,200 home would be around $26 per month or $309 per year.
TACOMA, Wash. – Anders Ibsen is currently leading the race for Tacoma mayor, though there are many votes left to be counted.
As of 8 p.m. Tuesday, Ibsen had 54% of the vote in the Tacoma mayoral race, with opponent John Hines trailing with 46% of total votes.
Tacoma mayoral candidates Anders Ibsen (left) and John Hines (right)
Ibsen, a Tacoma native and former City Councilmember, is battling for the seat of current mayor Victoria Woodwards, who has reached her term limit.
Having spent eight years serving on the Tacoma City Council and establishing himself in the real estate business, Ibsen placed his priorities on addressing affordable housing, developing the city’s economy, and tackling crime and homelessness.
Ibsen says his experience in local politics and as a business owner should give voters reassurance that he’s the right guy to lead Tacoma moving forward.
Ibsen’s lead in the general election follows his dominant performance in the primary, receiving 38.5% of the vote to Hines’ 19.2%.
John Hines, currently trailing, has represented Tacoma’s District 1 since 2019, and is focusing on solving the homelessness crisis, strengthening the local economy, and improving neighborhoods across the city.
Pierce County Elections projected a 34% voter turnout for the November 2025 general election.
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The Source: Information in this story came from the Washington Secretary of State, Pierce County Elections, the campaign pages of Anders Ibsen and John Hines, and FOX 13 Seattle reporting.
Democrat Abigail Spanberger, right, shares a moment with her mother after she was declared the winner of the Virginia governor’s race during an election night watch party Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2025, in Richmond, Va.
(AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)
A crowd at Spanberger’s campaign headquarters in Richmond on election night.
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LEESBURG, VIRGINIA – NOVEMBER 04: Virginia Republican gubernatorial candidate, Lieutenant Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears, joined by her husband Terence, delivers her concession speech during her election night watch party at The National Conference Center on November 04, 2025 in Leesburg, Virginia. Democratic gubernatorial candidate, former Rep. Abigail Spanberger defeated Earle-Sears to become the first female governor in the commonwealth’s history in an election that was seen as a national political bellwether leading into the midterms.
(Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
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A young girl holds up her to-do list, beginning with “vote”, outside Alexandria City Hall, Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2025, in Alexandria, Va.
(AP Photo/Allison Robbert)
A voter completes her ballot at Alexandria City Hall, Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2025, in Alexandria, Va. (AP Photo/Allison Robbert)
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Democrat Jay Jones, left, and Republican incumbent Jason Miyares shake hands at the start of the Virginia attorney general debate in Richmond, Va., Thursday, Oct. 16, 2025.
(Mike Kropf/Richmond Times-Dispatch via AP, Pool)
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Voters in Minnesota went to the polls Tuesday in the 2025 election.
Minneapolis and St. Paul both held contested races for mayor, while voters in dozens of school districts decided what will happen to requests to raise taxes to help pay for improvements to schools and programs.
Check below for the latest Minnesota election results as they come in.
With nearly all ballots counted in the first round, no Minneapolis mayoral candidate garnered enough votes to prevent second-choice votes from being a deciding factor in the race. Incumbent Mayor Jacob Frey holds a 10-point lead over his closest challenger, State Sen. Omar Fateh.
Frey was first elected mayor in 2017. During his tenure, he’s touted his investments in affordable housing and he’s also emphasized his administration’s historic pay increases for the Minneapolis Police Department, as well as his focus on downtown revitalization. Critics however, have long denounced his handling of the unrest following the murder of George Floyd, as well as his disagreements with the city council over a pay boost for rideshare drivers, the creation of a labor standards board and a city budget.
Fateh was elected to the Minnesota Senate in 2020. The Democratic Socialist passed legislation that funded free college tuition for low-income Minnesotans and authored a bill to legalize fentanyl test strips, which advocates say is a key for harm reduction. His highest-profile legislation is a law that set a minimum wage and other protections for rideshare drivers, which came together in the final hours of the 2024 session.
Davis spent over 20 years in Washington, D.C., working for three members of Congress and progressive think tanks. He then turned towards ministry, leading the Plymouth Congregational Church.
Hampton grew up in Minneapolis, is a former attorney and is an adjunct professor of law in entrepreneurial studies at St. Thomas University. He is the CEO for TurnSignl, an app that connects drivers with local lawyers when they get pulled over.
Democrat Mikie Sherrill, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives and a former Naval helicopter pilot, is set to be the next governor of New Jersey, CBS News projects, after she defeated Republican Jack Ciattarelli in a close race that turned ugly at times.
In September, a branch of the National Archives released a mostly unredacted version of Sherrill’s military records to a Ciattarelli ally. The documents contained personal details, including Sherrill’s social security number.
Later, Ciattarelli threatened to sue Sherrill over claims she made in their second debate about his former business.
Affordability was a key issue for both candidates, and Sherrill said she plans to address high property taxes in the state.
“It’s really breaking the back of too many families. So while this has been a high-cost state, and I’ve always been working hard to get rid of the state and local tax deduction cap, I will increase that first-time home buyers’ program so people can get a foot in the door,” Sherrill said.
Former President Barack Obama and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro campaigned with Sherrill in the final days of the campaign.
Ad spending on the race was projected to total around $140 million, according to Ad Impact, a company that tracks and analyzes advertising across TV, digital and streaming.
Sherrill spent almost 10 years on active duty in the Navy before attending law school and working in private practice, according to her campaign website. After working as assistant U.S. attorney in New Jersey, she was elected to the House of Representatives in 2018. Sherrill, who lives in Montclair, is a mom of four.
Sherrill’s running mate is Dale Caldwell, a pastor and president of Centenary University.
Sherrill will replace Gov. Phil Murphy, a Democrat who is term-limited.
Results are still coming in as votes are counted in closely watched elections in New York City, New Jersey and Virginia.
New York City mayor’s race
Democrat Zohran Mamdani will win the three-way race for New York City mayor, CBS News projects — defeating former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who’s running as an independent, and Republican Curtis Sliwa.
Mamdani, 34, is a democratic socialist who promised rent freezes and free buses during his campaign. Cuomo was backed by several establishment Democrats — and even by President Trump. The closely watched race is all but certain to fuel debate over Democrats’ future going into the midterms, a year after losing the presidency, the House and the Senate in 2024.
NYC mayoral candidates Zohran Mamdani (L), Andrew Cuomo (C) and Curtis Sliwa (R).
(L) Adam Gray/Bloomberg via Getty Images, (C) TIMOTHY A.CLARY/AFP via Getty Images, (R) Stephanie Keith/Getty Images
Watch the live results as they’re reported in the map below.
New Jersey governor’s race
In the New Jersey governor’s race, Democratic Rep. Mikie Sherrill defeated Republican Jack Ciattarelli, CBS News projects.
Candidates in the New Jersey governor’s race: Republican Jack Ciattarelli and Democrat Mikie Sherrill.
AP Photos
Gov. Phil Murphy is serving his second term as governor, and Sherrill’s victory means the governorship will be under Democratic control for three straight terms — the first time either party has held the governor’s seat for three terms in a row since 1961.
Here are the live results as they’re reported, county by county, in New Jersey.
Virginia governor’s race
In Virginia, former Democratic Rep. Abigail Spanberger defeated Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears to be Virginia’s next governor, CBS News projected. Spanberger is making history as the first woman to serve in the role.
Virginia Republican gubernatorial candidate Winsome Earle-Sears, left, and Democratic candidate Abigail Spanberger, right.
AP
Running as a moderate, Spanberger flipped the governorship, which is currently held by Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin. Youngkin is prohibited from running for a consecutive term under state law. The race is widely seen as a referendum on President Trump, who did not endorse Earle-Sears.
Here are the live results as they’re reported, county by county, in Virginia.
CBS News 24/7 is streaming live election coverage throughout the night. And you can go deeper with analysis and opinion from The Free Press, a Paramount publication.
NEW YORK (AP) — Zohran Mamdani was elected mayor of New York City on Tuesday, capping a stunning ascent for the 34-year-old state lawmaker, who was set to become the city’s most liberal mayor in generations.
In a victory for the Democratic party’s progressive wing, Mamdani defeated former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Republican Curtis Sliwa. Mamdani must now navigate the unending demands of America’s biggest city and deliver on ambitious — skeptics say unrealistic — campaign promises.
With the victory, the democratic socialist will etch his place in history as the city’s first Muslim mayor, the first of South Asian heritage and the first born in Africa. He will also become the city’s youngest mayor in more than a century when he takes office on Jan. 1.
Mamdani’s unlikely rise gives credence to Democrats who have urged the party to embrace more progressive, left-wing candidates instead of rallying behind centrists in hopes of winning back swing voters who have abandoned the party.
He has already faced scrutiny from national Republicans, including President Donald Trump, who have eagerly cast him as a threat and the face of what they say is a more radical Democratic Party.
The contest drove the biggest turnout in a mayoral race in more than 50 years, with more than 2 million New Yorkers casting ballots, according to the city’s Board of Elections.
Mamdani’s grassroots campaign centered on affordability, and his charisma spoiled Cuomo’s attempted political comeback. The former governor, who resigned four years ago following allegations of sexual harassment that he continues to deny, was dogged by his past throughout the race and was criticized for running a negative campaign.
There’s also the question of how he will deal with Trump, who threatened to take over the city and to arrest and deport Mamdani if he won. Mamdani was born in Uganda, where he spent his early childhood, but was raised in New York City and became a U.S. citizen in 2018.
Mamdani must now start building for his ambitious agenda Mamdani, who was criticized throughout the campaign for his thin resume, will now have to begin staffing his incoming administration before taking office next year and game out how he plans to accomplish the ambitious but polarizing agenda that drove him to victory.
Among the campaign’s promises are free child care, free city bus service, city-run grocery stores and a new Department of Community Safety that would send mental health care workers to handle certain emergency calls rather than police officers. It is unclear how Mamdani will pay for such initiatives, given Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul’s steadfast opposition to his calls to raise taxes on wealthy people.
His decisions around the leadership of the New York Police Department will also be closely watched. Mamdani was a fierce critic of the department in 2020, calling for “this rogue agency” to be defunded and slamming it as “racist, anti-queer & a major threat to public safety.” He has since apologized for those comments and has said he will ask the current NYPD commissioner to stay on the job.
Mamdani’s campaign was driven by his optimistic view of the city and his promises to improve the quality of life for its middle and lower classes.
But Cuomo, Sliwa and other critics assailed him over his vehement criticism of Israel ’s military actions in Gaza. Mamdani, a longtime advocate of Palestinian rights, has accused Israel of committing genocide and said he would honor an arrest warrant the International Criminal Court issued for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
How Mamdani won over the city while Cuomo faltered Mamdani began his campaign as a relatively obscure state lawmaker, little known even within New York City.
Going into the Democratic primary, Cuomo was the presumed favorite, with near-universal name recognition and deep political connections. Cuomo’s chances were buoyed further when incumbent Mayor Eric Adams bowed out of the primary while dealing with the fallout of his now-dismissed federal corruption case.
But as the race progressed, Mamdani’s natural charm, catchy social media videos and populist economic platform energized voters in the notoriously expensive city. He also began drawing outside attention as his name ID grew.
Mamdani ultimately trounced Cuomo in the primary by about 13 points.
The former governor relaunched his campaign as an independent candidate for the general election, vowing to hit the streets with a more energetic approach. However, much of his campaign continued to focus on attacking opponents. In the race’s final stretch, he claimed Mamdani’s election would make Jews feel unsafe.
Meanwhile, supporters packed Mamdani’s rallies, and he held whimsical events, including a scavenger hunt and a community soccer tournament.
Cuomo also juxtaposed his deep experience in government with Mamdani’s less than five years in the state Legislature. But the former governor also faced his own political baggage, as his opponents dredged up the sexual harassment allegations that led to his resignation, as well as his decisions during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Sliwa, the creator of the Guardian Angels crime patrol group, also had his moments — mostly in the form of funny quips on the debate stage — but had difficulty gaining traction as a Republican in an overwhelmingly Democratic city.
During the campaign, Mamdani liked to remind his audiences that New York is the richest city in the richest country in the history of the world, and that its government could do more for the people who live here. While his opponents described New York as broke, dysfunctional, and crime-ridden, Mamdani talked about the city as a lovely, if chaotic, place—full of tumult and injustices, yes, but also of life and possibilities. The Mamdani Cinematic Universe is a place where you can take the subway to the city clerk’s office to marry the girl you met on Hinge, where you can do Tai Chi and salsa-dance with old folks on the Lower East Side, where you can go for a polar plunge off Coney Island on New Year’s Day and walk the entire length of Manhattan on a hot summer night.
The feel-good content complemented his sharp-elbowed politics. Mamdani’s most Cuomo-esque quality is the evident pleasure he gets in public political combat—“Habibi, release your client list,” he taunted the former governor, over the mysterious legal-consulting practice that made him some five million dollars last year. When pressured to temper his criticisms of Israel, Mamdani has barely flinched. These qualities convinced many young voters, in particular, that he might have what it takes to follow through on his promises. They voted for him because they could imagine a city with free buses; because they thought that the idea of freezing rents in the city’s million or so rent-stabilized apartments sounded fair, even if they didn’t live in rent-stabilized apartments themselves; and because they liked the idea of New York being a place that offers universal child care to kids as young as six weeks old. The alternative that Cuomo offered—thoughts and prayers for high rents, more games and opaque machinations in City Hall, Democratic officials skirting around the bloodshed in Gaza—was simply too bleak.
Since the primary, senior figures in New York’s Democratic establishment have continued to hold Mamdani at arm’s length. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries put off endorsing him for so long that he embarrassed himself. Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand (the latter of whom had to apologize after suggesting on public radio that Mamdani supports “global jihad”) never came around. But former President Barack Obama saw something in Mamdani—he’s called to check in with the young guy twice since June—as has New York’s moderate governor, Kathy Hochul. At a rally in the campaign’s closing days at Forest Hills Stadium, in Queens, Hochul warmed up the crowd for Mamdani—or tried to. “Tax the rich!” the crowd jeered at her. The shy, tax-averse governor struggled to maintain her composure. “I can hear you!” she said. Mamdani appeared on the stage, strode over to Hochul, and held one of her hands in the air. The heckling transformed into a roar of approval.
When I first talked to Mamdani, two years ago, he was an Albany backbencher with few allies in the legislature. He called me a few days after October 7th, worried about Islamophobic backlash in the city. Shortly after, he got arrested while protesting for a ceasefire outside Schumer’s apartment building. He was, at that moment, about as far out on the margins of power as an elected official can be. In the past few months, Mamdani has looked more comfortable navigating the compromises and contradictions that being mayor will impose on him. He has expressed newfound appreciation for the role of private real-estate development, and has promised to ask the police commissioner, Jessica Tisch, a favorite of the city’s wealthy establishment, to stay on in his administration. “If he becomes mayor, so be it,” Jamie Dimon, the C.E.O. of JPMorgan Chase, said recently. Mamdani is untested, his network of longtime allies is small, and he lacks the connections and history in the city’s power structure that even an ambitious progressive like Bill de Blasio relied on to get things done. But that’s the point. New Yorkers didn’t want an insider with decades of experience. They wanted Zohran Mamdani.
“Do we Americans really want good government?” the muckraker Lincoln Steffens wrote in McClure’s magazine in 1903. “Do we know it when we see it?” Steffens had spent months investigating the peculiar limitations and outrages of New York City’s Tammany Hall-era bureaucracy. It wasn’t that the people of New York didn’t know that the machine was corrupt; it was that they only rarely could be bothered to care. “Tammany is corruption with consent,” Steffens wrote. “It is bad government founded on the suffrages of the people.” Occasionally, when the excesses of the machine grew “rampant,” the people were moved to throw the bosses out. An outsider mayoral candidate would put himself forward, pledging to make a “clean sweep,” organizing the various factions of the city’s political opposition, and galvanizing the city with a “hot campaign.” But it never ended well. Inevitably, the bosses were voted back to power. Steffens called this frustrating pattern “the standard course of municipal reform.”
With the exception of Fiorello LaGuardia, every liberal, reform-minded mayor since the late nineteenth century has met some dismal version of the “standard course.” Seth Low, the wonkish former Columbia University president who was mayor when Steffens was writing, was denied a second term by George B. McClellan, Jr., a favorite of the Tammany boss Richard Croker. In the sixties, John Lindsay came into office riding a wave of charisma and good feeling, and left behind frustrations and disastrous city books when he departed eight years later. David Dinkins, the city’s first Black mayor (and also the first mayor who had been a member of the Democratic Socialists of America), saw his administration undone by racial violence and concerns about crime, and was beaten by Rudy Giuliani when he ran for a second term. De Blasio, whom Mamdani considers the best mayor of his lifetime, accomplished much of the agenda that he ran on in 2013, but New Yorkers got sick of him anyway. “The good mayor turns out to be weak or foolish or ‘not so good,’ ” Steffens wrote. “Or the people become disgusted.”
