Mayor-Elect Zohran Mamdani Makes History in New York City

"Ana minkum wa alaikum" declared Zohran Mamdani, the mayor-elect of New York City in his victory speech on November 4, 2025. The phrase translates to "I am from you and  and I am with you".  "New York will remain a city of immigrants, a city built by immigrants, powered by immigrants and, as of tonight, led by an immigrant", he added. Mamdani is the first Muslim and first immigrant of South Asian descent elected  New York City Mayor. At 34, he is not only the youngest but also the first mayor of the Big Apple who was born in Africa. 

Zohran Mamdani Speaking Outside the Bronx Islamic Center

With his landslide victory in the mayoral race, Mandani will join London Mayor Sadiq Khan to become the second Muslim mayor of a major western city.  Mamdani became the first New York mayoral candidate to win over a million votes since the 1960s — more than Rudy Giuliani or Mike Bloomberg ever received. Mamdani has received 50.4% of the votes counted so far. Cuomo is at 41.6%. Republican Curtis Sliwa is at 7.1%. Mayor Sadiq Khan is serving his third term as the mayor of London. He is of Pakistani descent, as are mayors of several other major British cities. 

Zohran Mamdani beat former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo twice, first in the primary and then in the general election, to win on Tuesday. He won in spite of the fact that many prominent Democrats, including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, the New York senator, refused to endorse him. Mamdani was also vastly outspent by Cuomo, who was backed by a group of Zionist billionaires. President Trump endorsed Cuomo and repeatedly threatened to cut off federal funds to New York if Mamdani won.

Mandani received strong support from Muslims in Silicon Valley and elsewhere. Muhammad Javed of AppLovin tech firm donated $251,500 to New Yorkers for Lower Costs, a super-PAC backing Zohran Mamdani. Omer Hasan gave $250,000 to this super PAC. Other Mamdani super PAC donors include Liz Simons, Philanthropist, and daughter of hedge-fund billionaire Jim Simons, who gave $250,000 and Unity & Justice Fund, the political arm of the Council on American-Islamic Relations CAIR, that gave $100,000. But the biggest support has come from small donors to the Mamdani campaign. It has received a lot more money from small-dollar donors.  In August 2025, Mamdani's campaign had raised over $1 million from more than 8,600 private donors, with half of the individual donations being less than $25. His campaign also got millions in public matching funds due to this strong small-dollar donor support. 

Mamdani was attacked by his opponents for his Muslim faith. In one appearance, Cuomo agreed with a racist radio host who suggested a Muslim elected official would ‘cheer’ another 9/11. In response, Mamdani made an emotional speech outside a mosque in which he said:  "I will not change who I am. I will not change how I eat. I will not change the faith that I am proud to belong to. But there is one thing I will change: I will no longer look for myself in the shadows".

It is particularly noteworthy that Zohran Mamdani, a pro-Palestinian candidate who accuses Israel of carrying out genocide in Gaza, won in New York City which has the world's second largest population Jews after Tel Aviv. During his mayoral campaign, the Zionist-dominated US media kept asking him and other candidates whether Israel would be their first foreign visit if they got elected. Mamdani said no, he would stay in New York City to serve the people. All other candidates in the race pandered to the powerful Israel lobby by saying Israel would be their first foreign visit. Mamdani's win shows that total unqualified support of Israel is not essential to win elections in the United States. 

Among the most vocal opponents of Mamdani are Zionist and Hindutva groups in America. This opposition is based on his strong criticism of Indian Prime Minister Modi and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu.  He has called Modi a "war criminal," drawing parallels between him and Netanyahu. He has repeatedly vowed that, if elected mayor, he would order the New York Police Department (NYPD) to arrest Netanyahu should the Israeli Prime Minister travel to New York. 

Related Links:


Haq's Musings

South Asia Investor Review

Muslim-Americans in San Francisco Bay Area

Gaza Genocide

Islamophobia in America

Silicon Valley Pakistani-Americans

Pakistani-American Leads Silicon Valley's Top Incubator

Silicon Valley Pakistanis Enabling 2nd Machine Revolution

Modi and Netanyahu: Two Sides of the Same Coin

Pakistani-American Ashar Aziz's Fire-eye Goes Public

Sadiq Khan Elected Mayor of London

Pakistani-American's Game-Changing Vision 

Minorities Are Majority in Silicon Valley 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Pakistan Among World's Largest Food Producing Countries

Image
Pakistan's agriculture output is the 10th largest in the world. The country produces large and growing quantities of cereals, meat, milk, fruits and vegetables. Currently, Pakistan produces about 38 million tons of cereals (mainly wheat, rice and corn), 17 million tons of fruits and vegetables, 70 million tons of sugarcane, 60 million tons of milk and 4.5 million tons of meat.  Total value of the nation's agricultural output exceeds $50 billion.  Improving agriculture inputs and modernizing value chains can help the farm sector become much more productive to serve both domestic and export markets.   Top 10 Countries by Agriculture Output. Source: FAO Pakistan has about 36 million hectares of land under cultivation. Wheat and rice are grown on more than half of it. Fruits and vegetables each account for only about 3% of the cultivable land.  Since year 2001, the country's cereal production, mainly wheat, corn and rice, has grown about 45% to  38 million tons...
Read more

India in Crisis: Unemployment and Hunger Persist After Waves of COVID

Image
India lost 6.8 million salaried jobs and 3.5 million entrepreneurs in November alone. Many among the unemployed can no longer afford to buy food, causing a significant spike in hunger. The country's economy is finding it hard to recover from  COVID waves  and lockdowns, according to data from multiple sources. At the same time, t he Indian government has reported an 8.4% jump in  economic growth  in the July-to-September period compared with a contraction of 7.4% for the same period a year earlier.   This raises the following questions: Has India had jobless growth? Or its GDP figures are  fudged ? If the Indian economy fails to deliver for the common man, will Prime Minister Narendra Modi step up his anti-Pakistan and anti-Muslim rhetoric to maintain his popularity among Hindus? Labor Participation Rate in India. Source: CMIE Unemployment Crisis: India lost 6.8 million salaried jobs and its labor participation rate (LPR) slipped from 40.41% to  4...
Read more

Digital Pakistan 2022: Broadband Penetration Soars to 90% of 15+ Population

Image
The year 2022 was a very rough year for Pakistan. The nation was hit by devastating floods that badly affected tens of millions of people. Macroeconomic indicators took a nose dive as political instability reached new heights. In the middle of such bad news, Pakistan saw installation of thousands of kilometers of new  fiber optic  cable, inauguration of a new high bandwidth  PEACE  submarine cable connecting Karachi with Africa and Europe, and millions of new broadband subscriptions. Broadband penetration among 140 million (59% of 236 million population) Pakistanis in  the15-64 years age group reached almost 90%. This new digital infrastructure helped grow technology adoption in the country.  Internet and Mobile Phone Banking Growth in 2021-22. Source: State Bank of Pakistan Fintech:  Mobile phone banking and internet banking grew by 141.1% to Rs. 11.9 trillion while Internet banking jumped 81.1% to reach Rs10.2 trillion.  E-commerce tra...
Read more