🔗 Share this article

Only two days before the NYC mayoral election, Michael Lange made a significant electoral prediction – not just who would win overall, but precinct by precinct. The analyst, an expert in elections born and raised in the city, devoted more than ten years in left-leaning activism and emerged as something of a well-known figure recently for his deep dives into city data and voter surveys.

He released his highly detailed prediction map – accurately predicting that Zohran Mamdani was victorious while failed to predict Andrew Cuomo’s solid showing – on his Substack, the Narrative War. He possesses a talent for clever terms. He pointed out, as an example, the split between the progressive stronghold, running from one neighborhood to Bushwick to a third locale, where he forecasted (correctly) that the left-wing candidate would win by large leads, and the “capitalist corridor” on affluent parts of Manhattan. In those areas, “the Free Press and financial newspapers surpass the New York Times” in audience and most voters favored the independent, who ran as a conservative-courting independent.

Election Night Patterns and Unexpected Results

How was your election night?

It was necessary since they were adding approximately 200K votes into the tally frequently! I was actually a little nervous initially: Mamdani was ahead the initial ballots by 12 points, but came large groups of votes added after that and the advantage went from 12% to 8%. I was worried.

You know, there was a world in which election day turned out kind of poorly for him, in which Cuomo would have basically doubling his votes from the earlier contest. But Mamdani gained 500,000 votes to his initial base, and this was critical why he won. He went out and greatly broadened his support from the first round.

Expanding Support

Where did the mayor-elect get those extra votes from?

He assembled the alliance that progressives always wanted to build: diverse racially, it’s young, it’s renters and it’s people facing cost pressures. He improved significantly with Black and Hispanic voters, everyday New Yorkers, relative to the primary. Additionally he boosted his base of left-leaning activists, youthful radicals, and Muslims and south Asians. He couldn’t have won without expanding his appeal.

He built the alliance that the left long aimed for: diverse, youthful, renters and people squeezed by affordability

Additionally, there were a number of Trump/Mamdani voters – is that a big trend?

It’s definitely a genuine phenomenon, confined to working-class Latinos, Asian communities and Islamic voters. Electors in immigrant strongholds that supported Trump previously backed Zohran now. However it’s not that he was winning over white working-class voters and Maga voters.

Voter Participation and Impact

A major development of the election was the sky-high participation. Who did that help?

Both sides. Turnout was significantly higher than anticipated. I thought we might go over two million, but it’s closer to 2.3M – which is a lot of darn voters. Existed a decent opposition group, who were motivated, but his supporters was equally driven, and that sufficed to win.

You predicted he’d exceed half the ballots. Is he likely for that?

Currently you would say he’s likely to surpass 50%. He’s at 50.4% but remain probably 200,000 votes left to report at that time. Thus it’s not certain, but I think probable, and I wish he does so then no one can say Sliwa was a disruptor.

Republican Collapse

Curtis Sliwa, the Republican candidate, is the other big story. His vote plummeted.

He lost any district in any borough. Including one neighborhood in Staten Island, which is like an 88% Trump area. That truly was unexpected. Cuomo held very white areas, very wealthy areas and very religiously Jewish areas, and then added many conservatives on the island who had a high participation. I believe there was significant tactical voting by GOP voters. This happened prior to the former president tweeted his support for the candidate, but that definitely helped. It might have changed the outcome if the winning alliance failed to expand.

The “Commie Corridor”

Regarding your much mentioned left-wing base – did backing for the candidate overwhelming in those parts of the boroughs?

In my view existed a little dilution of the progressive zone in some areas like neighborhoods that have older Caucasian residents. In Astoria, instance, the Greek landlords and homeowners all went for the independent. Thus there existed a little resistance. But overall, mostly the leftist base is another huge reason why Mamdani won – he was polling between 77% and 83% in specific neighborhoods.

Community Support

In the lead-up to the vote there was coverage on whether the candidate was making inroads with Jewish New Yorkers. Any indication that he did?

There are areas with a lot of non-religious and left-inclined voters – like specific locales – where he performed strongly. But in the wealthy Jewish communities such as the Manhattan area, his Middle East stance definitely mattered in those places. Similarly in the more middle-class Jewish areas like Forest Hills, Rego Park, or Spuyten Duyvil and Riverdale – they all leaned the independent. And also, you have Jewish immigrants from the former Soviet Union in the borough, they were pretty staunchly Cuomo. Therefore it’s unclear if there were crazy narrative-busters here, but Mamdani retained more progressive Jewish neighborhoods and even parts of the another locale by big margins.

Long-Term Significance

Has Mamdani rewritten what New York means politically? Will progressive base become a launch pad for progressive contenders?

Absolutely, it’s not accidental that some of the biggest political leaders from progressives hail from a handful of neighborhoods in Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx. I’m sure that we’ll see additional examples – candidates will come from these neighborhoods to be promoted to higher office.

However I believe that each urban center in the US can have similar progressive hubs. Cities are the centers of leftwing power in the nation – because they’re young, people rent and they represent locales where individuals struggle by the disparities exist.