How Far Left Can Voters Go and Stand to Live with the Results?
Right now, it looks like New York City residents had best get ready for "Mr. Mamdani’s Wild Ride."
Fox News reports according to the latest Siena poll of registered voters Mamdani is leading in a field of four. Mamdani has 44%; former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who lost the Democrat primary to Mamdani, is the closest at 25%; perennial Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa breaks into double digits at 12%; and incumbent mayor Eric Adams trails the field at 7%.
Keep in mind that polls of registered voters aren’t as accurate as polls of likely voters, who have a history of voting, but likely voter polls are much more expensive these days.
If you total the vote of all the candidates except Mamdani their share of the vote is 44%, which exactly equals Mamdani’s 44%.
This leaves 12% undecided.
In a normal election Cuomo would be a hopeless candidate.
Siena pollster Steven Greenberg described him thusly, "Cuomo has an underwater favorability rating with City voters, 37–54 percent."
When you look at Cuomo as the lesser of three evils he starts to improve. Cuomo could possibly coalesce the anti–Mamdani vote.
He could run as the sane middle candidate — or what passes for middle in zany Democrat politics. He might have a chance to win as the anti–Mamdani.
And if Gotham doesn’t face another flu outbreak, New Yorkers might be in for a four–year period of relatively normal government under Mayor Cuomo.
Out of control political egos are preventing even that slim chance.
If these three men really cared about the future of New York City, they would throw their support to the candidate with the best chance of winning and that, unfortunately, is Cuomo.
Sliwa has never been elected to anything.
The only time people pay attention to him these days is when he appears in the news as a candidate. That’s good for his profile and fund raising, but bad for the city he claims to love.
Mayor Eric Adams, the third candidate, is hopelessly tainted by the corruption investigation that was started under the Biden administration and ended by President Trump's U.S. Department of Justice.
His campaign can't break into double digits and he’s the incumbent mayor!
If Sliwa and Adams dropped out of the race, gritted their respective teeth and endorsed and campaigned for Cuomo, they might have a chance of beating Mamdani.
Their withdrawals could be made almost heroic. Hypothetically, "I’m withdrawing from this race because my personal political success is secondary to the future of this great city we all love Electing Zohran Mamdani would be a disaster for New York.
"Andrew Cuomo is the best chance we have of averting disaster and continuing New York as a great city and not a socialist lab experiment.
"I urge all my supporters to join me in voting for Andrew Cuomo for mayor in November."
Unless this happens — and the chances are vanishingly small — there won’t be a head-to-head race between Mamdani and a single alternative, because New York City doesn’t have runoff elections.
Mamdani’s 44%, less than a majority, is more than enough to win.
Bad for the Big Apple, but good for those of us who are curious to see just how far left voters can go and stand to live with the results.
Michael Reagan, the eldest son of President Ronald Reagan, is a Newsmax TV analyst. A syndicated columnist and author, he chairs The Reagan Legacy Foundation. Mr. Reagan is an in-demand speaker with Premiere Speaker's Bureau. Read Michael Reagan's Reports — More Here.
Michael R. Shannon is a commentator, researcher for the League of American Voters, and an award-winning political and advertising consultant with nationwide and international experience. He is author of "Conservative Christian's Guidebook for Living in Secular Times (Now with Added Humor!)" Read Michael Shannon's Reports — More Here.