Latest news with #RCV
News18
5 days ago
- Politics
- News18
Zohran Mamdani's Victory Shows Power Of Ranked Choice Voting. Here's How It Works
Last Updated: The United States ranked choice voting (RCV) system is an electoral method where voters rank candidates by preference rather than selecting just one Zohran Mamdani, the rising star of the American Left, engineered a massive political upset in New York City after he defeated his nearest rival, former New York governor Andrew Cuomo, and won the Democratic primary for mayor by a strong margin. According to a ranked-choice tabulation, the Queens assembly member reached 56 per cent of the vote in the third round of counting, giving him a win over Cuomo and nine other candidates. An article in the Gothamist said the ranked-choice results showed that a campaign asking voters not to rank Cuomo anywhere on their ballots was effective, as Mamdani picked up another 99,069 votes from candidates who were eliminated. So, what is ranked-choice voting? The United States ranked choice voting (RCV) system is an electoral method where voters rank candidates by preference rather than selecting just one. Instead of picking a single candidate, voters list their first, second, third choices, and so on. Here's how it works. Voters first rank candidates in order of preference on the ballot. If a candidate receives more than 50 per cent of the first-choice votes, they win outright. If no candidate gets a majority, the candidate with the fewest first-choice votes is eliminated. Votes for the eliminated candidate are then redistributed to the remaining candidates based on those voters' next preferences. This process of elimination and redistribution continues until one candidate has a majority. What are the benefits? • Ensures majority support since winners typically have broader support because they must earn more than 50 per cent through ranked preferences. • It reduces the need for runoff elections by consolidating multiple election rounds into one. • Voters can express preferences for more than one candidate without 'wasting" their vote. What are the cons? • Some voters find ranking candidates unfamiliar or complex, especially first-time users. • Tabulation takes longer, particularly in races with many candidates and rounds. • If a voter's ranked choices are all eliminated and no further preferences are marked, their ballot becomes 'exhausted" and stops counting. • To work well, RCV needs strong outreach and explanation, especially in diverse or multilingual communities. What are the other voting systems? Plurality Voting (First-Past-the-Post): Each voter selects one candidate. The candidate with the most votes wins, even if they don't have a majority. The key issues with this system are that a candidate can win with far less than 50 per cent support. Vote-splitting can allow unpopular candidates to win and this often discourages third-party or independent candidates. Runoff Elections: If no candidate gets over 50 per cent of the vote, the top two finishers advance to a second election (a runoff), where voters choose between them. While this guarantees a majority winner, it is costly and time-consuming, often sees lower turnout in the runoff round, and delays results. Approval Voting: Voters can vote for (i.e., 'approve of") as many candidates as they like. The candidate with the most approvals wins. This method is simple to understand and supports consensus candidates. However, it doesn't allow voters to indicate preference order and can lead to strategic voting. Score Voting (Range Voting): Here, voters rate each candidate on a scale (e.g., 0–5 or 0–10). The candidate with the highest average (or total) score wins. This works as voters can show intensity of support but it is more complex to explain and tabulate. How is ranked choice voting different from India's voting system? In India, voters select only one candidate on the ballot. The candidate who receives the most votes wins, even if they don't have more than 50 per cent. This means that in multi-cornered contests, a candidate can win with just 30–40% of the vote, as long as it's more than anyone else. By contrast, in ranked choice voting, voters rank multiple candidates in order of preference (first choice, second choice, and so on). In RCV, if no candidate gets a majority of first-choice votes, the one with the fewest votes is eliminated, and their votes are transferred to the next preferred candidate on those ballots. This process continues in rounds until a candidate crosses the 50 per cent threshold. So, while a majority is not required in India's system, it is essential in RCV, making the result more representative of overall voter support. Additionally, vote redistribution is not part of India's electoral process, but it is central to how RCV works. This makes separate runoff elections unnecessary in RCV, because the 'instant runoff" is built into the counting process. In India, there are no runoffs, and elections are decided in a single round. The spoiler effect—where two similar candidates split the vote, allowing a third, less popular candidate to win—is common in India's system. In RCV, however, this effect is greatly reduced, since votes for eliminated candidates can still help others based on voter preferences. Lastly, strategic voting is often seen in India, where voters may choose a 'winnable" candidate over their genuine preference to avoid 'wasting" their vote. RCV reduces this pressure, allowing voters to honestly rank their favorites without fear of helping elect their least preferred option. How did RCV help Mamdani? In Mamdani's case, his strategic alliances played a crucial role. Candidates like Brad Lander and Adrienne Adams, who were eliminated in earlier rounds, had endorsed Mamdani, encouraging their supporters to rank him as their second choice. This endorsement strategy proved effective, as Mamdani received a substantial number of redistributed votes, propelling him to victory over Cuomo. While Cuomo had strong name recognition and likely led in first-choice votes early on, he failed to gain enough second-choice support from voters whose first-choice candidates were eliminated. His controversial record and more centrist positioning made him a less likely fallback for progressive voters. As the rounds progressed, Mamdani closed the gap and eventually overtook Cuomo as votes were redistributed. Mamdani's campaign focused on grassroots outreach, especially among younger voters, immigrants, and working-class communities—groups that may have felt more energized by RCV. These voters could confidently rank Mamdani first without worrying about 'wasting" their vote, since their ballot would still count toward other candidates if he were eliminated (which he wasn't). About the Author Apoorva Misra Apoorva Misra is News Editor at with over nine years of experience. She is a graduate from Delhi University's Lady Shri Ram College and holds a PG Diploma from Asian College of Journalism, Chennai. More Get Latest Updates on Movies, Breaking News On India, World, Live Cricket Scores, And Stock Market Updates. Also Download the News18 App to stay updated! tags : Andrew Cuomo New York United states Zohran Mamdani Location : New York, United States of America (USA) First Published: July 05, 2025, 17:26 IST News explainers Zohran Mamdani's Victory Shows Power Of Ranked Choice Voting. Here's How It Works
Business Insider
6 days ago
- Business
- Business Insider
The US Army's done with Humvees and the Robotic Combat Vehicles. Here's what leaders want instead.
US Army leaders say Humvees and Robotic Combat Vehicles aren't useful for future fights, but the Infantry Squad Vehicle is. Ongoing decisions about what stays and what goes are part of a larger transformation initiative that has the Army reviewing its force structure and cutting certain programs it deems no longer necessary for the kinds of wars the US military wants to be ready to fight should worse come to worst. Secretary of the Army Daniel Driscoll and Gen. James Rainey, the commanding general overseeing Army Futures Command, talked to Business Insider about some of what is getting axed and why. Driscoll pointed to the Robotic Combat Vehicle, or RCV, program, which launched in 2019 with the goal of integrating autonomous and remotely operated capabilities into the Army's ground systems. Three versions were initially planned — an expendable light variant, a durable medium variant, and a lethal heavy variant designed for combat against an enemy armored vehicle. But the development of the RCV hit snags. "We know we need autonomy, we know that we need the ability to move things in a way that is not controlled by human beings," Driscoll said. But the requirements the Army put together for it ended up making it just this "incredibly large, incredibly heavy, incredibly expensive, relatively exquisite tool," he said. By the time the Army went to purchase them, the threats to the RCV, like small, hostile drones, had grown substantially. In Ukraine, slow, heavy, expensive vehicles have been prime targets for cheap exploding drones. "It might have been there in the beginning and we got it wrong from the very beginning," he said, "but at a minimum, by the time it came due for us actually purchase a lot of these and get them into formations, it just no longer made sense anymore." He called the move to end the program "a hard decision." The Humvee, or High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle, is also being phased out. "It's 40 years old. It was useful in its time," Rainey said. "If you look at the ubiquitous sensing drones just in Ukraine and Russia, the survivability of a wheeled vehicle is very low." The Army also recently ended the M10 Booker Mobile Protected Firepower program just before it was set to go into full-rate production and after spending well over a billion dollars on the project. The decision was made in response to ongoing global conflicts "and in support of the strategic objectives outlined in the Army Transformation Initiative," according to a memo issued by Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth earlier this year. The memo outlined the focal points, timelines, and priorities of the Army going forward, including reducing and restructuring attack helicopter formations and augmenting them with unmanned aircraft, putting thousands of drones into the hands of soldiers, and focusing on the Indo-Pacific theater and China. The efforts in the directive are estimated to cost around $36 billion over the next five years and represent one of the largest Army overhauls since the end of the Cold War. Army officials have said it's designed to increase lethality and readiness in the service and is focused on the needs of individual warfighters. In the interview with BI, Driscoll and Rainey identified one platform that represents what it wants more of. "We have a requirements and acquisitions success story with the Infantry Squad Vehicles," Rainey said. The relatively new M1301 Infantry Squad Vehicle entered service in 2020. Rainey said that the platform was designed well and requirements were useful and thoughtful. "We went fast, but we iterated with soldiers continually through the process. We ended up with a very useful vehicle," he said. Driscoll said that in conversations with soldiers, the Army learned that they wanted a vehicle to prioritize speed and all-terrain driving over protection. It speaks to, the service secretary said, the Army "trying to build a menu of offensive and defensive solutions." For some missions, something like the Infantry Squad Vehicle will be more effective. And for others, a heavier, more armored platform could still be valuable and available. Much of what Driscoll and others say they're focused on comes out of efforts to be smarter and more cost-effective in Army purchases. "We feel a large enough existential threat, and it is important enough that we can no longer make decisions simply based off where jobs might exist or what private companies may benefit from our decisions," he said. "Instead, we have to optimize for soldier lethality in the fight ahead." Lethality is a guiding principle for the US Department of Defense under Hegseth and the Trump administration. It was a core objective for the Biden administration and first Trump one, as well as past administrations, though the interpretations were different. Generally, it serves as a subjective measuring stick for DoD programs and projects, the aim being to be able to effectively defeat an enemy. Right now, that long-standing Pentagon buzzword is the deciding factor for what the Army and other services prioritize.
Politico
01-07-2025
- Politics
- Politico
Mamdani makes RCV boring
Presented by the Coalition for a Better Times Square With help from Amira McKee Today's tabulation of ranked-choice votes could've been HUGE — the day we finally found out who won New York City's wild mayoral primary. Instead, we got a definitive Zohran Mamdani win on election night that few people predicted. So hot takes have already been published, the data has already been analyzed and general election endorsements have already been made — the latest, a shrug from City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams. The Board of Elections plans to publish the RCV results on its website today at noon. That will effectively be the final results for all the city's primary races. The only votes that won't be tabulated yet are late-arriving absentee ballots. Those mail-in votes will be included in another RCV tabulation next week, before the election results are certified later this month. But those few remaining votes are highly unlikely to shift the outcome in any races. When the numbers drop today, we'll be checking what share of City Comptroller Brad Lander's votes go to Mamdani, what share go to former governor Andrew Cuomo — and what share of those ballots are exhausted, going to neither. Pre-primary polling showed people who preferred Lander splitting their lower-ranked votes between Mamdani and Cuomo. If a bunch more now go to Mamdani, it'll highlight the power of cross-endorsements in an RCV scenario. It could also keep feeding the rumors that Lander might challenge Rep. Dan Goldman in a 2026 primary, as City & State reports. Cuomo's team insists they don't have much interest in the RCV numbers. 'We don't expect the final tabulations tomorrow to be all that revelatory,' campaign spokesperson Rich Azzopardi said. They're looking at polling instead, and trying to predict the electorate in November to gauge whether he'll bother running a serious general election campaign on the independent 'Fight and Deliver' ballot line. Mayor isn't the only race in town. A handful of City Council races were too close to call on election night, and candidates on the east side of Manhattan, western Queens and central Queens are all hoping to be this year's Kristin Richardson Jordan, who pulled off a come-from-behind victory four years ago. RCV got a lot of hate in 2021. Mayor Eric Adams slammed it as 'voter suppression,' and there were widespread concerns that voter education was lacking. This year, 96 percent of city voters said their ballot was simple to complete, and 81 percent said they understood RCV 'extremely well' or 'very well.' That's according to a SurveyUSA exit poll of 991 Democratic primary voters conducted for government reform groups Common Cause New York and FairVote, which both support RCV. We'll get official numbers from the BOE, but 69 percent of voters say they ranked three or more candidates. 'Voting is becoming ranking in the nation's largest city,' said Deb Otis, director of research and policy at FairVote. 'Voters get more choice, more competition, and a majority winner without a costly, low-turnout July runoff.' The clear election night victory was a clear public relations victory for RCV too. There would have been a lot of grumbling from some stressed out New Yorkers this week otherwise. — Jeff Coltin IT'S TUESDAY. HAPPY FISCAL NEW YEAR IN NEW YORK CITY: Got news? Send it our way: Jeff Coltin, Emily Ngo and Nick Reisman. WHERE'S KATHY? In Erie County making a housing announcement, and then meeting with middle-class parents and announcing 'investments in New York families.' WHERE'S ERIC? In New York City meeting with senior administration officials, making a public safety-related announcement with NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch and signing legislation related to insurance coverage for city-licensed vehicles. QUOTE OF THE DAY: 'It's not every day you see a pig, the Mayor, @NMalliotakis,@Curt i sSliwa, and me all on the same side — but here we are. Lucy stays with her family, as she should!' — City Council Member Frank Morano on a pet pig permitted to stay with her Staten Island family. ABOVE THE FOLD THE FRAUGHT POLITICS OF RENT HIKES: The promise of a rent freeze was a central tenet of Zohran Mamdani's winning campaign in last week's Democratic primary for mayor. But for now — at least — New York City's rent-regulated tenants will see another rent hike by the Rent Guidelines Board. The panel voted Monday night to raise rents by 3 percent on one-year leases and 4.5 percent on two-year leases in regulated housing. It's the fourth consecutive rent hike under Mayor Eric Adams, whose predecessor Bill de Blasio oversaw three rent freezes and otherwise very modest increases during his eight-year tenure. The landlord lobby still considers the Adams-era rent increases insufficient, this year's included. But some owner advocates — perhaps bracing themselves for a Mamdani mayoralty — praised the panel on Monday for rejecting a rent freeze. 'While we are disappointed that the RGB once again adjusted rents below inflation, we appreciate that they stood up to political pressure calling for rent freezes that would accelerate the financial and physical deterioration of thousands of older rent-stabilized buildings,' Kenny Burgos, CEO of the New York Apartment Association, said in a statement. Following the vote, Adams sought to distance himself from the board's decision. 'I am disappointed that [the panel] approved increases higher than what I called for,' he said in a statement. He had previously urged the board to 'adopt the lowest increase possible.' Mamdani, for his part, pledged Monday that 'change is coming.' 'As voters showed last Tuesday, New Yorkers are ready for a city government that lowers costs instead of padding real estate profits,' he said in a statement. Tenant activists were optimistic: 'This will be the last rent hike New Yorkers ever see from a mayor bought and paid for by real estate,' said Cea Weaver, director of the New York State Tenant Bloc. — Janaki Chadha CITY HALL: THE LATEST 'BEST BUDGET EVER': The New York City Council passed next fiscal year's $115.9 billion budget with unanimous approval on Monday — the council's first uncontested budget vote in years. 'This is the first time I will be voting yes on this budget, because we have finally surpassed the bare minimum,' democratic socialist City Council Member Alexa Avilés said Monday. She voted no the last three years to show opposition to budget cuts pushed by Mayor Eric Adams. Touted as a way to 'Trump-proof' the city, the election year budget is the largest in city history. Despite the record spending — or perhaps because of it — City Hall officials say the negotiations were relatively painless. The final spending blueprint, which Adams has touted as the 'best budget ever,' includes $10 million to pilot a cost-free childcare program and $74.7 million for immigrant legal services. City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams celebrated the budget agreement as a victory and the culmination of a three year tug-of-war with the mayoral administration. 'We really did become what we never should have become, and that was the council of restoration instead of the council of building. Now, in this fourth budget, I believe that we have a clear vision,' she told Playbook. 'It's a monumental thing … finally putting forth … many of the things that should have been done years ago.'— Amira McKee & Jeff Coltin More from the city:— Eric Adams broke the law when he refused to implement elements of a city law severely restricting the use of solitary confinement in the jails, a state judge ruled. (Daily News) — A lease for city office space in a building owned by a billionaire Adams donor is moving forward, even as an investigation into the deal continues. (THE CITY) — Across New York City, political comebacks failed. (City & State) NEW FROM PLANET ALBANY SIENA POLL BLOWOUT: There's good and bad news for Gov. Kathy Hochul in today's Siena College poll. On the positive side: She's leading her likely Democratic primary opponents and potential Republican foes by double digits. On the not-so-great side: Hochul doesn't surpass 50 percent in either race. The survey is an indication the governor's bid for a second full term next year stands to be an unpredictable race — even in a deep blue state. Hochul would easily defeat Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado and Rep. Ritchie Torres — who is yet to declare whether he will run — by a blowout margin in a Democratic primary. Hochul received 49 percent, compared to Delgado's 12 percent and Torres' 10 percent. In potential general election matchups, Hochul would beat Rep. Elise Stefanik 47 percent to 24 percent, Rep. Mike Lawler 44 percent to 24 percent, and Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman 44 percent to 19 percent. None of the potential GOP candidates have formally entered the race. Hochul's numbers, however, remain middling. Only 42 percent of voters have a favorable view of her, while 47 percent do not — virtually unchanged since the same poll last month. Hochul has arguably had a successful year. She won approval of a budget that included her measures to address affordability with taxpayer rebate checks and a ban on cellphones in schools — a measure that's drawn national interest. The governor still has a lot of work to do with crucial suburban and independent voters. While 55 percent of New Yorkers prefer 'someone else,' that desire is even stronger in the bellwether suburbs (62 percent) and among voters not enrolled in either party (63 percent). She is also yet to unleash her campaign war chest, which stood at more than $15 million in January. Hochul has been steering cash to the state Democratic Committee with a plan to use the party's political infrastructure to her advantage next year. The poll of 800 registered voters was conducted from June 23 to June 26. It has a 4.4 point margin of error. — Nick Reisman MORE ON THE GOV'S RACE: Blakeman is joining a long list of Republicans trying to leverage campaign donations from Mamdani's Democratic mayoral primary victory. Blakeman's Nassau County executive campaign sent a fundraising email Monday to donors that warned what happens in the city will impact the suburbs. 'The results of the New York City mayoral race have made one thing clear: the political tides in our region are shifting fast,' the email stated. 'The choices made in the city ripple out to every surrounding community. Policies on public safety, taxes, and quality of life are on the ballot every day — not just in NYC, but here too.' — Nick Reisman More from Albany: — Hochul's creation of a gun violence office was approved as a Trump rebuke. (Times Union) — In Auburn, regional GOP leaders urge 'battle-tested' Rep. Mike Lawler to run for governor. (The Citizen) — Western New York is trying to get back into Canada's good graces. (Buffalo News) KEEPING UP WITH THE DELEGATION TRUMP'S TAKE ON MAMDANI: Donald Trump isn't on board with Tennessee Rep. Andy Ogles' call for Mamdani to be stripped of citizenship and deported, but that doesn't mean the president is at all a fan of the democratic socialist, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Monday. 'I haven't heard him call for that, but certainly he does not want this individual to be elected,' Leavitt told reporters. 'I was just speaking to him about it and [Mamdani's] radical policies that will completely crush New York City, which is obviously a city that the president holds near and dear to his heart.' Trump has threatened to withhold federal funding from his hometown if Mamdani doesn't 'do the right thing' if elected mayor in November. He hasn't yet gone as far as Ogles, a Republican who called Mamdani 'little muhammad' and urged Attorney General Pam Bondi to remove him from the country. Mamdani was born in Uganda, but moved to New York at age 7. Several Democrats rushed to Mamdani's defense and condemned the Islamophobic attacks, including New York House moderates who've otherwise been critical of the candidate. Leavitt said Monday that general election voters in New York City should choose wisely, calling Mamdani a communist. Mamdani has clarified that he is a socialist. — Emily Ngo More from the delegation: — Elon Musk said he would follow through on threats to form a third party if Trump's 'big, beautiful bill' is enacted by Congress. (POLITICO) — Brad Lander calls Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand's comments about Mamdani 'awful.' (WNYC) — A GOP city real estate developer says his experience with war in his native Kosovo will help him topple Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. (New York Post) NEW YORK STATE OF MIND — The echoes of a crisis inside the Roosevelt Hotel in Manhattan, a former migrant shelter. (New York Times) — Efforts intensify to make the Plattsburgh airport a port of entry. (Times Union) — Legal Aid Society lawyers in New York City were locked in a struggle for higher pay after authorizing their union to strike. (New York Times) SOCIAL DATA HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Diane Ravitch … former state Sen. Charles J. Fuschillo Jr. … Mike Schweinsburg of the 504 Dems … OCME's Persephone Tan … Julie Shiroishi of Eleanor's Legacy … NBC's Kristen Welker … Sally Quinn … Brett Zongker … Mike Czin of SKDK … Bloomberg's Olivia Alafriz … (WAS MONDAY): Noam Lustiger ... Abbey Taub Missed Monday's New York Playbook PM? We forgive you. Read it here.
Yahoo
26-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
What Democrats can (and can't) learn from Zohran Mamdani's triumph
It's hard to overstate how much this was not supposed to happen. On Tuesday night, Zohran Mamdani — a 33-year-old socialist and state lawmaker — trounced former Gov. Andrew Cuomo in New York City's Democratic mayoral primary. This was remarkable on a few different levels. For Mamdani, merely becoming Cuomo's main competitor would have been an improbable achievement, since doing so required the newcomer to leapfrog a thick field of (heretofore) more prominent progressives. Once Mamdani established himself as the left's standard-bearer, his victory became plausible. But most observers envisioned the socialist winning in a very specific way: Although Mamdani would surely lose the first round of balloting to Cuomo, the conventional wisdom went, he might ultimately eke out the nomination thanks to New York City's ranked-choice voting (RCV) system. Under RCV, voters can stipulate their second, third, fourth, and fifth choices, and then their votes are reallocated as low-polling candidates are gradually eliminated. As of Monday morning, the betting site Polymarket had given Mamdani just a 6.7 percent chance of winning the first round outright. In reality, Mamdani defeated Cuomo in that round by more than 7 points, leading the governor to concede even before the electorate's backup votes were considered. Mamdani will still need to win November's general election to become mayor, where he will face an independent run from incumbent Eric Adams, among other potential rivals. But the socialist assemblyman is now the overwhelming favorite to become the next mayor of New York City, which is overwhelmingly Democratic. All this makes Tuesday's outcome a great news story — and useful fodder for anyone who wishes to declare that the traditional rules of politics are obsolete. Some on the left have suggested that Mamdani's victory proves Democrats do not need to moderate their party's image to compete for national power. This argument does not make much sense. To secure a Senate majority in 2026, Democrats will need to win multiple states that backed Donald Trump over Kamala Harris by double digits. And even if Democrats give up on winning Senate control next year and shoot for doing so in 2028, they will still need to win in states that voted for Trump all three times he was on the ballot. According to some political scientists, pollsters, and pundits, doing this will require Democrats to moderate their national reputation, since modern voters tend to judge candidates less by their own idiosyncratic positions than by their party's general image. In this analysis, acquiring the power necessary for advancing even incremental progressive change federally requires the Democratic leadership to observe strict ideological discipline. So long as the party's brand is toxic to the median voter in Ohio — who backed Trump every single time he's been on the ballot — Democrats will have no prayer of passing ambitious federal legislation or confirming liberal Supreme Court justices. This theory could very well be wrong. But a socialist winning 43.5 percent of the vote in a Democratic primary in New York City does not tell us much about its validity one way or another. As a general rule, one should not try to extract timeless laws of political physics from the results of an off-year municipal elections in overwhelmingly Democratic cities. And this seems all the more true of a mayoral race as idiosyncratic as this year's, in which moderate Democrats chose to line up behind a scandal-plagued former governor who'd resigned in disgrace. That said, Mamdani's resounding victory remains an extraordinary event that few anticipated. It's therefore worth considering what it could tell us about where Democratic politics is going and what effective campaigning in 2025 looks like. Any attempt to extrapolate national political trends from a single municipal election should be tentative. But if there are portable lessons from Mamdani's triumph, these strike me as the most plausible: This one might go without saying. But in both 2020 and 2024, the Democratic Party nominated presidential candidates who struggled to coherently and comfortably explain their policy views in unstructured conversations. Relatedly, both Joe Biden and Kamala Harris also maintained highly limited media availability. By contrast, Mamdani appeared to accept virtually every media opportunity available to him. In addition to incessantly shooting and releasing his own shortform videos to social media, Mamdani appeared on such varied programs as the morning radio show The Breakfast Club and wonky finance podcast Odd Lots. By making himself ubiquitous over every channel available to him, Mamdani was able to overwhelm Cuomo's large advantage in paid media. The former governor's $25 million super PAC proved no match for the socialist assemblyman's viral videos and affable interviews. Of course, this 'flood the zone' strategy only worked because Mamdani is a gifted politician with a quick mind and endearing affect. Unfortunately, these traits are not as common among the Democratic political class as they should be. The importance of being able to eloquently communicate and perform authenticity — across a wide array of media formats — in today's environment was already apparent before Tuesday night. But Mamdani's win underscores the power of such fundamental political skills. Mamdani emerged out of a New York City left that has championed some unpopular social causes. At one time, Mamdani endorsed defunding the police and abolishing the standardized test that determines admission to the city's elite public high schools. But during his 2025 campaign, Mamdani moderated on both those fronts, while putting rhetorical emphasis on his plans for increasing affordability. His pledge to contain costs for ordinary New Yorkers — while combating the well-heeled interests that inflated them — enjoyed pride of place on his campaign's website and in its advertisements. Mamdani's platform was radical in many respects. His calls for fare-free buses, public grocery stores, and a $30 minimum wage put him sharply to the left of mainstream Democrats. And yet, there was a remarkable amount of overlap between Mamdani's messaging and Kamala Harris's most effective appeals in 2024. According to the Democratic data firm Blue Rose Research, this was Harris's best-testing ad in last year's campaign: Here is the top of Mamdani's campaign platform: The commonalities between these two messages are plain: In both cases, the candidate argues that things are too expensive, your rent is too high, and they will bring your costs down by building housing and cracking down on abusive landlords. Further, in their own very different ways, both Harris and Mamdani spoke to the public's concern over high grocery prices. To reiterate, we should be very cautious about assuming a tight overlap between the kind of politics that succeeds in a New York mayoral primary and that which sells in a general presidential election. But sophisticated ad-testing already indicated that simple, populist messaging about increasing affordability plays well with swing voters. The fact that such messaging also helped Mamdani catch fire in New York City should increase our confidence in the potency of such rhetoric. Mamdani's opponents focused much of their attacks on his left-wing views about the Israel-Palestine conflict. Mamdani is a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement, which seeks to coerce the Israeli government into honoring its obligations under international law — including the government's withdrawal from occupied Palestinian territories and recognition of the right of Palestinian families displaced in 1948 to return to their ancestral homes within Israel. These demands could entail an end to Israel's existence as a Jewish-majority state. Mamdani refused to express any commitment to the preservation of such a state, suggesting that he was supportive of any resolution to the conflict that ensured 'equal rights for all,' whether that involved the formation of a single democratic binational state throughout Israel and Palestine, or a two-state solution. Mamdani was also harshly critical of Israel's war crimes in Gaza and vowed that as mayor, he would arrest Benjamin Netanyahu, were the Israeli prime minister ever to step foot in New York City. These stances put Mamdani at the far-left pole of the Democratic Party's debate over Israel-Palestine. Cuomo and his supporters saw this as a great vulnerability and made it the centerpiece of much of their negative messaging. And yet, in the most Jewish city in the United States, such attacks didn't pack the punch that Cuomo had hoped. This may be indicative of a broader shift in the politics of Israel within the Democratic Party. The Netanyahu government's utter contempt for Palestinian life in Gaza — its years-long bombardment of its civilian infrastructure, obstruction of humanitarian aid, and avowed interest in ethnically cleansing the territory — have taken a toll on the state's standing within an increasingly diverse Democratic coalition. In 2022, 40 percent of Democrats sympathized more with the Israelis than the Palestinians in Gallup's polling, while 38 percent said the opposite. Three years later, Democrats now sympathize with the Palestinians over the Israelis by an unprecedented 59 percent to 21 percent margin. Finally, it is easier to picture Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez winning the Democratic Party's 2028 presidential nomination today than it was yesterday. Mamdani just demonstrated the power of youth, charisma, good looks, and the avid support of a mass-membership political organization in a Democratic primary. Those personal qualities — combined with the organizational and social media heft of the Democratic Socialists of America — enabled Mamdani to prevent any other progressive rival from gaining oxygen. Among young, college-educated New Yorkers eager for progressive change, there was no serious competition. Were Ocasio-Cortez to run in 2028, she would take all these same advantages into the primary. To be sure, Mamdani's showing also illustrated the potential challenges that any progressive will face in seeking to become Democratic standard-bearer. Even while stomping to victory, Mamdani lost majority-Black areas by 18 percentage points, according to the New York Times. Further, Democratic voters are liable to worry more about the electability of a staunch progressive in a presidential primary than a New York City mayoral one. Nonetheless, over the past 24 hours, Ocasio-Cortez gained 2 points in the betting market for the 2028 Democratic nomination. Ultimately, Ocasio-Cortez's future political prospects — along with those of socialists and progressives more broadly — may depend in no small part on Mamdani's governing performance, should he win in November. A socialist mayor in America's media capital will be heavily scrutinized. And making good on his promises to increase affordability and improve public services will likely require Mamdani to demonstrate ideological flexibility: Some of the biggest drivers of unaffordability in NYC involve regulations that benefit politically connected interest groups at the broader public's expense. In any case, the future trajectory of Democratic politics remains uncertain, and the party's best bet for reclaiming national power remains contested. Tuesday's returns cannot settle any argument about where Democrats must go from here. But Mamdani's extraordinary success should inform that debate.
Newsweek
25-06-2025
- Politics
- Newsweek
New York Mayor's Race Shows Us a Better Way To Run Elections
We all know American politics needs a redesign. Too many politicians are unaccountable to the voters and act like they know it. We want more choices and consensus, but have been ground down by toxic campaigns. The good news is that change is not only possible but already happening, if you know where to look. Anyone looking for a good example of progress that matters should check out the Democratic mayoral primary in New York City. We'll get a nominee who represents a majority of us, and we're getting a campaign where candidates are working together instead of just tearing each other down. This year marks the second time New York City voters will select mayoral nominees with ranked-choice voting (RCV), and that has made a huge difference. You don't have to be a math person to see how RCV has created different incentives and made the campaign better. Take it from someone who has run in races with and without ranked-choice voting: It's working for New York and would do the same in cities and states across the nation. Our primary is the kind of race that would be a mess without RCV: 11 candidates, representing a range of ideologies, backgrounds, and neighborhoods. In most places, such crowded primaries could be won with as little as a quarter of the vote as candidates go on a negative blitzkrieg against anyone they see as a threat. That drives up the candidates' negatives and everyone else's frustration. Such negativity won't work here. In a ranked-choice election, voters have the power to name their second and third choices. If no one has 50 percent of voters' first choices, the lowest candidates are dropped. If your first choice is eliminated, your vote counts for your second choice. This process continues until someone wins a majority. Essentially, we turned the primary into an instant runoff that everyone can participate in, and that produces a winner with the widest and deepest support. This explains why the New York mayoral race is seeing campaigns that otherwise might look—well, a little weird. Queens assemblyman Zohran Mamdani—running second behind former governor Andrew Cuomo in most polls—urged his supporters to donate to one of his opponents, council speaker Adrienne Adams. Mamdani and Brad Lander, running third, cross-endorsed each other two weeks ago and encouraged their followers to rank them one-two, in whatever order. Mamdani, Adams, Lander, and Zellnor Myrie have locked arms and done multiple campaign events together. All because voters can express support for multiple candidates. In a ranked-choice system, you can't write off voters who support another candidate—instead, it pays to talk to them, explain where you have common ground with their first-choice candidate, and ask to be their second choice. Newspapers, unions, community groups, and even star politicians are getting in on the fun, too—endorsing several candidates, in order of preference. NEW YORK, NEW YORK - JUNE 24: People vote in the mayoral primary election at the Park Slope Armory YMCA on June 24, 2025 in the Brooklyn borough of New York City. NEW YORK, NEW YORK - JUNE 24: People vote in the mayoral primary election at the Park Slope Armory YMCA on June 24, 2025 in the Brooklyn borough of New York RCV, we'd be seeing a completely different final few weeks of this campaign. Instead of debating issues, candidates would be demanding that those behind them in the polls drop out or risk playing spoiler. I've seen the difference firsthand. When I sought the Democratic nomination for president in 2020, I stood on the debate stage and watched allies take sledgehammers to each other. First they ran to the Left, then they ran over each other. Kamala Harris pounded Joe Biden over his stances on busing from the 1970s—a long-ago dispute that even became fodder for J.D. Vance in 2024. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, chasing the same progressive voters, made tiny distinctions into huge tempests. Then, when I ran for mayor of New York in 2021—the first time the city used RCV—everything felt different. I lost, but the race was better. Don't get me wrong: All of us wanted to win. But when the election wasn't a zero-sum game, most of us took quite different paths that were much more voter-friendly. For example, I urged my supporters to rank Kathryn Garcia as their second choice. Kathryn and I spent the last weekend before the election campaigning together. No one had to drop out, and voters got to decide. Some people accused us of trying to game the system—and have said the same about candidates and organizations that are "cross-endorsing" this year. That's silly. We were trying to engage more voters, right out in the open. That's not a game; it's what campaigns are supposed to be about. Ranked choice encourages candidates to go out and talk to more voters. Of course, not everything in a ranked-choice campaign is sunshine and roses. There are still sharp elbows. As this campaign ends, the two leading candidates will draw sharp distinctions. The race is also seeing some trends that we see in almost every Democratic primary—activists from the Left and the center both trying to pull the party their way, and more charismatic politicians rising to the top. That's all natural. Ranked choice is here to give voters more choice, not to overturn the laws of physics and turn politics into a lovefest. It would also be better if this was happening not in a party primary, but in an election open to all voters—and if Democrats made it easier for everyone to take part. There is no reason—beyond making it harder to participate—to have a February registration deadline for a June primary. We shouldn't judge RCV against perfection, but against the old rules—where agreements between campaigns would be struck in back rooms. Candidates would be told to drop out, or maybe not to run in the first place. Then endorsements would be traded for a job, or a promise of support down the line. Voters would be kept in the dark. Those who wanted more choices would be out of luck. Americans want more choices and new voices. They want winners chosen by majorities, who are accountable to all of us. The road to better elections and more accountable politicians will be long. Ranked-choice voting is an important first step. What's happening right now in New York City is the proof. Andrew Yang is a businessman, lawyer, philanthropist, and former candidate for president of the United States. In July 2022, Yang, alongside Democrats, Republicans and Independents, launched the new Forward Party to give Americans more choice in our democracy. The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.
