Andrew Cuomo continues to dominate the Democratic primary for mayor even as the election tightens with less than a week to go, according to a Marist Poll released on Wednesday.
The former governor broke 50% in the seventh round of ranked-choice voting, the Marist poll calculated. As the first-choice candidate of nearly four in 10 likely left-leaning voters, including those who are undecided, Cuomo outpaced fellow second-place candidate Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic socialist Assembly member from Queens who has more than a quarter of the vote, according to the poll.
But the gap between the two leaders is closing. Last month, Cuomo outpaced Mamdani as voters’ first choice by 19 points; this time, the former governor’s lead is down to 11.
“There’s been some slippage,” Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion, said. “The race is indeed a lot closer than it was.”
The remaining candidates are stuck in single digits. Even contender city Comptroller Brad Lander, who made headlines following his arrest by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents while defending migrants at immigration court on Tuesday, is far behidn, according to Marist. The poll was taken before Tuesday’s incident.
There is more good news in the polls for Cuomo, an embattled governor who was forced to resign in 2021 following sexual harassment claims, which he strongly denies. When calculating ranked choice voting round-by-round estimates, Cuomo’s support rounds up to 50% in the sixth round. He crossed the 50% threshold in Round 7 with 55%.
“However, there is a big question mark in all this, and that is we are dealing with 11% who remain undecided,” Miringoff explained. “And then another 11% who don’t select either Cuomo or Mamdani in the ranked choice voting scheme.”
Essentially, there are still votes up for grabs that could be critical in determining the winner of the primary. 11% of likely Democratic primary voters are undecided on their first choice, and another 11% do not choose Cuomo or Mamdani as one of their candidate selections at any point, according to Marist analysis.
“It could be a competitive race before all is said and done,” Miringoff said.
Manhattan Institute poll
Meanwhile, the conservative Manhattan Institute released a poll on Tuesday that also shows Cuomo in the lead, a week before primary day on June 24.
“This is the second poll in two days that showed Andrew Cuomo beginning and ending rank choice voting with a double-digit lead in a crowded multi-candidate race,” Cuomo spokesperson Rich Azzopardi said. “These are serious times and New Yorkers know that Andrew Cuomo is the only candidate with the experience and the real record of results to fix what’s broken and put the city back on the right track.”
Azzopardi did not shy away from taking a jab at Mamdani.
“This is no time for on-the-job training with a candidate who has barely held a job since graduating college, passed only three bills during his five years as a legislator, and then stopped showing up for work,” he said.
amNewYork contacted Mamdani’s press office for comment and is awaiting a response.
