Zohran Mamdani promises ‘new era’ for New York City in first speech as mayor | Zohran Mamdani
Zohran Mamdani vowed to “reinvent” New York City in a speech on his first day as mayor on Thursday, promising a “new era” for America’s largest city and an ambitious start to his term.
The 34-year-old political star and democratic socialist, who was an almost unknown state councilor a year ago, is the city’s first Muslim mayor, the first of South Asian descent and the first to be born in Africa. He is also the first person to swear to use the Quran.
Mamdani added that “a moment like this rarely comes, and even rarer when it is the people themselves who have their hands on the levers of change.”
The mayor said he was advised to lower expectations when writing his remarks. “I won’t do anything like that,” he said. “The only expectations I am trying to reset are small expectations. From today onwards we will govern broadly and boldly. We may not always succeed, but we will never be accused of lacking the courage to try.”
Mamdani did not shy away from his socialist politics. “I was elected as a democratic socialist and I will govern as a democratic socialist. I will not abandon my principles for fear of being called radical,” he said to loud cheers from the gathered crowd.
He concluded: “The work has just begun.”
The speech was the second of a two-part ceremony after he was sworn in at a disused subway station at midnight on Thursday; Next to him were New York attorney general Letitia James and her husband, 28-year-old designer and illustrator Rama Duwaji.
On the steps of city hall on a bitterly cold January day, the newly elected mayor was introduced by Bronx Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a democratic socialist ally who is close to running for the White House in 2028.
“We chose courage over fear. We chose prosperity for the many over the spoils of the few,” Ocasio-Cortez said in her speech. “We chose to create a new future for all of us, we elected a mayor who is relentlessly committed to making life not only possible but aspirational for working people…we chose that over the distractions of bigotry and the barbarism of extreme inequality.”
Mamdani was later formally sworn in by Vermont independent senator Bernie Sanders, another political ally whose bid for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016 in many ways laid the foundation for Mamdani’s affordability agenda.
That effort, widely seen as frustrated by former secretary of state Hillary Clinton’s allies within the party’s national political organization, has now borne fruit, and with it the core political message of economic rights, the economic rights bill.
Addressing the crowd, Sanders said Mamdani seized power “at a time when we’re seeing so much hatred, so much divisiveness, so much injustice” and called for “a government that works for everyone, not just the rich and the few.”
He added that Mamdani took on the Democratic and Republican establishments, “the president of the United States and some extremely wealthy oligarchs, and you defeated them in the greatest political defeat in modern American history.”
Mamdani is now embarking on one of the most ruthless jobs in American politics as one of the nation’s most-watched politicians, whose platform promises free child care, free buses, rent freezes for nearly 1 million households and pilots of urban grocery stores.
But finding the estimated $10 billion cost of providing these services can be difficult. Mamdani has promised to raise taxes on the wealthiest New Yorkers and raise corporate taxes. But as a city under state government in Albany, it will need legislative support from Gov. Kathy Hochul, who will run for re-election next year.
He will also have to deal with Donald Trump, who has labeled the new mayor a “communist” and threatened to withhold federal funds from the city. But a friendly meeting of citizens in New York’s outer boroughs last month that agreed to build more housing in the city surprised many who were expecting a political fireworks display.
“I want him to do a great job, and I’m going to help him do a great job,” Trump said.
Mamdani also faces skepticism from some New York Jews who are concerned about his criticism of the Israeli government and his failure to definitively distance himself from the phrase “river to sea,” but Mamdani has said he will no longer use the phrase.
The extent of these sensitivities became apparent during Mamdani’s transition, when the appointing director, Cat da Costa, resigned after tweets emerged in which she described Jewish people as “money hungry” and called a train in Far Rockaway a “Jewish train.”
Mamdani’s transition team described the error as “unacceptable oversight in the review process, failing to meet the Mayor-elect’s standards for this transition or new administration.”
But Mamdani also sought to ease tensions by persuading the city’s police commissioner, Jessica Tisch, to remain in her post to avoid appearing to lose her Jewish police chief while also ensuring continuity for the city’s strained police force.
New York mayors are often judged on their ability to provide basic services such as picking up trash, preventing the city’s rat infestations, fixing potholes and keeping the subways running smoothly.
Before ending his term as mayor on Wednesday, Eric Adams praised his administration’s crime-fighting efforts, crediting them with historically low numbers of homicides and shootings. There were 301 murders in the city in 2025; This number is 79 fewer than in 2024.
Adams said the New York police department has taken 25,000 illegal guns off the city’s streets in the past four years, and drive-by shootings are down 55%.
Mamdani and Duwaji will now give up their one-bedroom, rent-stabilized apartment in Astoria, Queens, to reside in the palatial mayoral residence of Gracie Mansion, built in 1799, on Manhattan’s Upper East Side.
Last month, Adams warned Mamdani that the mansion was haunted. “As long as you’re near the city, it’s a friendly ghost,” he said. “If you don’t go towards the city, it turns into a ghost.”
