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On the precipice of winning next week’s New York mayoral contest, Zohran Mamdani cast himself in an interview with NBC News as the city’s bulwark against President Donald Trump, even as the president has threatened his hometown over the prospect of a Mamdani victory. In the interview, Mamdani laid out his strategy for handling Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids in New York City and projected confidence about running the city at age 34. Asked what scares him most about the job now that he is on the verge of leading the nation’s biggest city, Mamdani — who was once seen as a longshot candidate — instead took aim at his chief rival, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who is running as a third-party against Mamdani. “I think what scares me in this moment is the prospect of Donald Trump’s puppet becoming the one who would hold it,” Mamdani said. “And that’s what we find in Andrew Cuomo, a man who knows he has a narrow path to City Hall and has taken that to mean that he should fund it and pave it with the money from Donald Trump’s billionaire donors.” “I am very excited at the prospect of winning this race, but I will never let our confidence become complacency,” he continued. “And so every single day, I remind myself, I remind our supporters, I remind our team of the fact that this is an election to be won. It’s not one that will ever be given to us.” Mamdani has sought to position himself throughout the campaign as the candidate who will take the hardest line against Trump, to which rivals like Cuomo and Republican Curtis Sliwa have argued that he is either too inexperienced to be an effective counterweight or that fighting Trump would be a risky move for the New Yorkers he represents. But Mamdani’s candidacy also represents a challenge to parts of the Democratic Party, too. He declined to express confidence in fellow New Yorker Chuck Schumer’s leadership of the Senate Democratic caucus. And Mamdani did express openness to hiring members of the Democratic Socialists of America, the left-wing group that incubated him during his political rise, to serve in his administration. NBC News asked Mamdani about how he would handle a major ICE raid in the city, similar to enforcement actions the Trump administration has undertaken in Chicago and Los Angeles. “What I would be doing is reminding New Yorkers of their rights, making it clear that this is not something that we stand for, being proud of our sanctuary city policies and utilizing the courts,” Mamdani said. “Because so many of the threats that Donald Trump makes are not law, even though he seems to believe that just by saying it, they become so.” He added that Democratic leaders have attained legal victories against the president’s actions at the state level, and he would seek to pursue a similarly aggressive legal strategy on behalf of New Yorkers. “It’s time to bring that kind of cooperation and conviction right here to New York, and I’m proud to have the endorsements of Governor [Kathy] Hochul, Attorney General Tish James — that is the coalition that would be on the front lines of fighting Donald Trump.” Mamdani, who has previously said he would be open to working with Trump on affordability and cost of living issues, told NBC News he “will continue to be open to speaking with Donald Trump, to meeting with Donald Trump, all of it on the premise of actually supporting New Yorkers.” “My issue is not with people speaking with the president,” Mamdani said. “My issue is what they speak about.” “And so I’ll be there ready to have that conversation around cost of living, if the president ever wants to,” he said. “But if the president wants to have a conversation about hurting New Yorkers, about sending more ICE agents here to terrorize families, about cuts that we’ve seen, whether it be, taking from the city budget, or suspending funding for city schools, or threatening $18 billion in infrastructure grants being withheld. That’s not something I’m going to go along with. That’s something that I’m going to fight.” The federal government shutdown As the government shutdown reaches one month in length, nearly 1.8 million New York City residents are at risk of losing food assistance benefits this weekend. Mamdani said it’s Republicans that need to come to the table immediately and meet Democratic demands to end the shutdown. He also said the coming lapse of SNAP benefits “is squarely on the shoulders of Donald Trump and on his” Department of Agriculture. “They could release the funding, as they have done in previous occasions, and we could ensure that we avert this kind of a crisis,” he said. “This is not just an attack on New Yorkers who are on SNAP. This is an attack also on the institutions that rely on these benefits.” He said he learned from a conversation with owners of a local grocery store chain that SNAP is responsible for more than 20% of revenue across grocery stores in the Bronx. Republicans have countered that their members of Congress have voted nearly unanimously to keep the government open and that Democrats are refusing to pass a continuing resolution to keep the government funded. Democrats have demanded an extension of Affordable Care Act subsidies that are set to expire and will lead to higher healthcare premiums for millions of Americans. “I say this directly to the Republican Party that they should look to actually ensure that 4 million Americans can retain their health care, that millions of Americans can stay using SNAP benefits,” Mamdani said. “That is something that they need to fulfill, and that is why they need to actually come back to the table being serious about addressing these concerns absolutely now.” His relationship with other Democrats Many New York Democratic leaders were slow to rally behind Mamdani’s progressive campaign, though Hochul and — just last week — House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., have now endorsed Mamdani. Schumer remains a holdout, telling reporters yesterday “Look, the bottom line is very simple. I have a good relationship with him, and we’re continuing to talk.” Mamdani said he spoke to Schumer “a few days ago” and that they two “had a conversation that comes back to the focus of this race, affordability.” “And I also know that winning this race will not be on the basis of who endorses me and when,” Mamdani said. “Rather, it will be on the basis of the team that we build around this campaign.” Asked if he has confidence in Schumer’s leadership, Mamdani said: “I have confidence in winning this race.” “And I have confidence in ensuring that we transform the most expensive city in the United States of America into one that’s affordable,” he said. “And I often think about my life and my horizons in the manner of that New Yorker cover, where it just ends right at New Jersey, that’s where the focus is.” The ‘singles tax’ and housing affordability On affordability, NBC News asked Mamdani about how he would alleviate the so-called “singles tax.” One analysis earlier this year found that single New Yorkers pay on average more than $20,000 more to live alone compared to residents who live with their significant other or with roommates. That’s roughly three times higher than the national average. “I have never heard of the singles tax before,” a smiling Mamdani said. “But I think what we find time and again is that New Yorkers, wherever they are in the stage of their love life, they are being pushed out of the city. And I hear from many about their dream of even starting their own life here is one that they cannot begin, because their only options are either continue to live with their parents or never move to New York City.” “And that, frankly, is because of the fact that city government has used its power to hike the rent on more than 2 million rent stabilized tenants, to support Con Edison when they want to increase gas and electric, to even say that we’re going to raise the water bill to the highest it’s been in 13 years,” Mamdani said. “And so I say: Whether you’re single, whether you’re married, whether you’re dating, wherever you are, whether it’s situationship, we are going to be fighting for you to make sure that this is a city you can afford.” One of Mamdani’s key campaign pledges is to freeze the rent on rent-stabilized units — a promise his rivals have painted as misguided. As for how to lower costs for renters who do not live in a rent-stabilized building, Mamdani said he will push to build “an immense amount of housing across the five boroughs.” “And we’ll also make it easier for building, whether [it’s] the public or the private sector,” Mamdani said. “Because today, when I speak to housing developers, what I find again and again is beyond the back and forth that we might have on the question of labor or materials, the wait — the wait is something that costs an immense amount of money and immense amount of time.” “And right now, frankly, is the time for us to deliver on a streamlined process that can actually ensure that we can increase our housing production so that no longer do we look across the river at Jersey City and say, how can they build seven houses per 1000 people, and we’re stuck at four,” Mamdani continued. On how he would pressure developers to build more affordable housing, Mamdani said: “Well, I don’t think that we’ve seen a city hall that has really tried all that hard.” “Some of the most exciting achievements we’ve seen under [New York Mayor] Eric Adams have happened in spite of him, as opposed to because of him,” Mamdani said. “And I think it’s time to look at what it would be possible if we had a mayor who is actually dedicated to affordability, not in exacerbating the crisis to the benefit of those who donated to put the previous mayors in office.” A Mamdani administration Given Mamdani’s relative youth and lack of an executive track record, the question of who he will hire to fill out his administration — and what their level of experience will be — has followed him on the campaign trail. He told NBC News he hasn’t made any hiring commitments beyond retaining New York Police Department Commissioner Jessica Tisch. “But what I will say is that the New Yorkers that I am looking to build my team with are ones whose experience spans generations, who have served in a wide variety of mayoral administrations, and whose track record can be characterized by a record of excellence and an ability to deliver on agendas that are as ambitious as the crises that New Yorkers face,” Mamdani said. “Because that’s what’s needed in this moment.” On whether he will hire DSA members to serve in his administration, Mamdani said: “I will hire people no matter who they are members of.” He added: “I will hire them on the basis of the work that they can do.” Trump’s World Cup threats The president has recently expressed openness to pulling 2026 FIFA World Cup games next year from cities he deems unsafe, including near Boston, where he criticized Mayor Michelle Wu. Wu said in response that the matches are locked in and that not even Trump cannot move them, as host sites are not up to Trump but instead negotiated with world soccer’s governing bodyFIFA. Mamdani, an Arsenal fan who has criticized World Cup ticket prices, said he is ready for Trump to try and move games from the New Jersey host site that is just outside of New York City. “I will have to prepare for every single eventuality with Donald Trump,” he said. “I do take a lot of heart from Mayor Wu’s response from Boston, who treated this kind of a threat with the response that it deserves, which is that this is in direct violation of the agreements that have been made. And what we’ve seen is a continued attempt from Donald Trump to try and intimidate cities and those who look to dissent to his cruel policies that he’s enacting upon Americans across the country.”
