The 2025 NYC mayor’s race has drawn a packed discipline vying to interchange the incumbent, Eric Adams, and would be the marquee contest topping voters’ ballots within the June 24 Democratic major.
Adams, who remains to be a Democrat, isn’t taking part within the major after opting to run as an unbiased within the common election as a substitute. His choice got here after a federal decide granted the Trump Justice Division’s request to drop his federal corruption case in early April—one among many scandals which have severely broken his probabilities of being reelected.
Even earlier than getting into the race, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo emerged because the frontrunner in a collection of private and non-private polls, sustaining a double-digit lead for many of the marketing campaign season. Nonetheless, as election day attracts nearer, Cuomo’s lead seems to be dwindling, with second-place Queens Meeting Member Zohran Mandami closing the hole in the latest polling.
Cuomo has additionally led in amassing institutional Democratic assist from elected officers and labor unions, whereas Mamdani has constructed momentum amongst younger left-leaning voters via his social media prowess. Each have additionally amassed sizable marketing campaign struggle chests using town’s beneficiant matching funds program, and Cuomo is backed by an excellent PAC that has raked in over $12 million.
Regardless of the polling, the Democratic nomination may be very a lot nonetheless in play. Voters will forged their ballots utilizing the ranked-choice system, which permits them to rank as much as 5 candidates by desire.
Mamdani — together with three of Cuomo’s different progressive rivals — are backed by the New York Working Households Celebration, which is urging voters to rank their slate, whereas shutting out the previous governor completely.
Right here’s a take a look at what the key candidates, in alphabetical order, are proposing within the hopes of popping out on prime on the June 24 poll — early voting begins June 14.
Adrienne Adams
Metropolis Council Speaker Adrienne Adams.Photograph by Lloyd Mitchell
Metropolis Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, who isn’t associated to Mayor Adams, was the final main candidate to affix the Democratic major discipline in early March. Representing a portion of southeast Queens since 2017, Adrienne Adams has served as council speaker since Jan. 2022. She is term-limited on the council on the finish of this 12 months.
In her bid for the very best city-wide workplace, the speaker has emphasised her legislative expertise and is pitching herself a “no drama” chief who is not going to get embroilled within the sorts of controversies surrounding Mayor Adams and Cuomo. All through her tenure as speaker, Adrienne Adams has often clashed with Mayor Adams on points together with finances cuts, police oversight, and the steadiness of energy inside Metropolis Corridor, and most not too long ago, led a lawsuit to cease ICE from reestablishing an workplace on Rikers Island.
Speaker Adams’ marketing campaign platform focuses on increasing inexpensive housing, public security, and household assist companies. Her prime marketing campaign proposal is to roll out a assured fundamental revenue program that will intention to offer 21,000 homeless youngsters and younger adults with month-to-month stipend checks for 3 years. She has additionally positioned herself as somebody who would vigorously defend town in opposition to President Trump.
The speaker has highlighted her document of passing quite a few rezonings to construct inexpensive housing in addition to the Metropolis of Sure zoning textual content modification that’s projected to web 82,000 new models of housing over the subsequent 15 years. Moreover, she has touted her expertise advancing packages geared toward violence prevention, whereas advocating for insurance policies that enhance accountability in regulation enforcement and investments in childcare, schooling, libraries, and parks.
A few of her notable backers embody Lawyer Common Letitia James — who inspired her to run within the first place, Brooklyn Rep. Yvette Clarke, and District Council 37. US Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez ranked her second and the WFP ranked her third.
Michael Blake
Candidate Michael Blake speaks throughout a Democratic mayoral major debate, June 4, 2025, in New York, U.S. Yuki Iwamura/Pool by way of REUTERS
Rev. Michael Blake is a former Bronx Meeting member and served as an aide in ex-President Obama’s White Home. Along with vying for mayor this 12 months, Blake additionally ran for public advocate in 2019 and Congress in 2020.
The son of Jamaican immigrants, his marketing campaign platform facilities on 4 key priorities: addressing the true price of residing, inexpensive housing and homelessness, managing an environment friendly and efficient authorities, and schooling and youth empowerment.
To scale back the excessive price of residing, Blake has floated proposals together with a assured revenue program and wage incentives for important staff. Moreover, he says he’ll increase job alternatives by supporting small companies.
Blake is among the many candidates calling for freezing lease will increase on town’s roughly a million stabilized flats. He has advocated for balancing tenant protections with assist for small landlords via proposals like a emptiness tax.
To fight rising rents and the housing disaster, Blake desires to revive and develop the Mitchell Lama inexpensive housing program. His strategy consists of boosting the development of inexpensive houses, enhancing assist companies for unhoused people and people experiencing psychological well being crises, and eliminating credit score scores as a barrier in lease and mortgage purposes to enhance entry to housing.
Blake’s imaginative and prescient additionally prioritizes reforming metropolis authorities to be extra environment friendly and responsive whereas investing in schooling and youth empowerment.
Nonetheless, Blake’s marketing campaign has failed to achieve a lot traction. He has constantly polled within the low single digits, has not attracted any main endorsements, and has not been capable of unlock public matching funds.
Andrew Cuomo
Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo.Photograph by Lloyd Mitchell
Andrew Cuomo, the previous three-term governor of New York who resigned in 2021 amid a number of allegations of sexual misconduct, which he denies, is searching for a political comeback within the mayor’s race.
Regardless of the controversy surrounding his resignation, Cuomo has maintained a robust lead within the polls and is positioning himself as a seasoned govt who can get issues finished. He has maintained his double-digit benefit even after weeks of relentless assaults from his opponents over his document as governor and the scandals that led him to resign.
Cuomo’s marketing campaign is constructed on the notion that town is “in crisis” resulting from Mayor Adams’s failed management and that he’s the one candidate who can “save” it. He has drawn on his document of getting main infrastructure tasks constructed as governor to argue that he can do the identical within the 5 boroughs whereas additionally insisting he’s the one candidate with expertise battling Trump.
The previous governor’s platform facilities on public security and high quality of life. He desires to develop the NYPD’s headcount by 5,000, place extra cops within the subway system, and increase enforcement of low-level offenses and e-bike violations. He has additionally pushed extra aggressive outreach and remedy for homeless people with extreme psychological sickness or substance use issues, aiming to cut back persistent avenue homelessness whereas restoring public order.
Affordability is one other cornerstone of Cuomo’s marketing campaign. He has pledged to push Albany lawmakers to spice up town’s minimal wage to $20-an-hour. He has additionally proposed constructing and preserving 500,000 new housing models, however has not pledged to implement a lease freeze.
Moreover, Cuomo has additionally proposed increasing entry to baby care and common 3-Ok, lowering well being care prices and offering focused tax reduction. He has sought to make combating antisemitism one of many race’s central points, closely criticizing pro-Palestinian protests within the metropolis as selling Jewish hate.
However Cuomo’s candidacy has attracted loads of its personal controversy. His opponents have blasted him for releasing a housing plan that utilized ChatGPT for analysis, getting public matching funds withheld by town’s Marketing campaign Finance Board over suspected unlawful coordination between his marketing campaign and an excellent PAC supporting it, and accepting contributions from Trump-aligned donors.
Cuomo has attracted a slew of high-profile supporters, together with former Mayor Michael Bloomberg, his opponent, Queens state Sen. Jessica Ramos, and the unions 32BJ SEIU and the Lodge and Gaming Trades Council.
Brad Lander
Candidate Brad Lander speaks throughout a Democratic mayoral major debate, June 4, 2025, in New York, U.S. Yuki Iwamura/Pool by way of REUTERS
Brad Lander is a progressive Democrat at present serving as metropolis comptroller, the third-highest-ranking citywide elected workplace after the mayor and public advocate. Lander is working as a seasoned watchdog whose frequent clashes with Mayor Adams have ready him to tackle Trump.
The Brooklynite, who previously served eight years on the Metropolis Council, has made the lofty purpose of ending avenue homelessness the central plank of his marketing campaign. His plan requires embracing the housing first mannequin, whereby he would develop outreach groups to attach roughly 2,000 severely mentally sick homeless New Yorkers with supportive housing.
Lander’s agenda prioritizes inexpensive housing as nicely, with a purpose of constructing 500,000 new models and enacting tenant protections. A part of his housing plan requires using among the metropolis’s public golf programs to assemble 50,000 new models.
He additionally desires to enhance town’s public housing by introducing a “Yelp for NYCHA Repairs” that will enable tenants to price distributors who carry out upkeep on their flats.
Relating to public security, Lander has pledged to retain present Commissioner Jessica Tisch and increase the division’s ranks again to their budgeted headcount of 35,000.
Town’s prime cash man has gained assist from the Working Households Celebration, which ranked him second, Brooklyn Borough President Atonio Reynoso, and Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, who ranked him alongside Adrienne Adams.
Zohran Mamdani
Meeting Member Zohran Mamdani.Photograph by Lloyd Mitchell
Zohran Mamdani has represented elements of Astoria and Lengthy Island Metropolis within the Meeting since 2022. Mamdani is a member of the Democratic Socialists of America and was first elected in 2021 after defeating longtime incumbent Aravella Simotas.
Mamdani has constructed his mayoral marketing campaign on the message of utilizing authorities to make life extra inexpensive for New Yorkers by making metropolis buses free, instituting common backed baby care, and freezing lease will increase for stabilized tenants. He has put ahead a plan to assemble 200,000 new inexpensive houses over the subsequent decade, financed immediately by town.
On public security, Mamdani desires to ascertain a brand new “Department of Community Safety” that will take a community-focused strategy, prioritizing violence prevention and psychological well being companies alongside policing.
Past housing and security, Mamdani helps increasing city-owned grocery shops to decrease meals prices, offering free high-quality childcare from infancy via preschool, and investing in absolutely funded, equitable public faculties and CUNY. His local weather agenda consists of aggressive decarbonization and local weather resilience, whereas his healthcare proposals intention to develop entry, strengthen public hospitals, and decrease prices by rejecting Medicare Benefit.
Mamdani’s progressive platform is funded by a plan to boost company taxes to New Jersey’s degree and tax town’s wealthiest earners, together with cracking down on corrupt landlords and reforming metropolis procurement.
The Democratic socialist’s marketing campaign has gained critical momentum, producing pleasure among the many metropolis’s youthful progressive voters. He has drawn primary rankings from the WFP and Ocasio-Cortez.
On the identical time, nevertheless, Mamdani has taken criticism for his stance on Israel as he seeks to guide a metropolis with the second-largest Jewish inhabitants on this planet. Together with supporting the BDS (Boycott Divest Sanction) motion in opposition to Israel, he has been an outspoken supporter of the pro-Palestine trigger through the Israel-Hamas Struggle and took criticism for saying he helps Israel’s proper to exist as “a state with equal rights” relatively than as a Jewish state.
Zellnor Myrie
State Senator Zellnor Myrie speaks at a mayoral candidates discussion board for local weather justice.Photograph by Gabriele Holtermann
Zellnor Myrie represents central Brooklyn neighborhoods together with Crown Heights, Park Slope, and Prospect Lefferts Gardens within the state Senate. First elected in 2018 after defeating incumbent Jesse Hamilton in a Democratic major, Myrie has served six years within the Senate seat as soon as held by Eric Adams.
Throughout his tenure in Albany’s higher chamber, Myrie has centered on reforms in elections, legal justice, housing, and public security. He helped move early voting laws and a regulation sealing legal information after a chosen interval.
In Mayrie’s bid for mayor, his housing agenda features a plan to construct 700,000 new housing models over the subsequent decade and protect 300,000 present models, with an emphasis on inexpensive houses relatively than luxurious condos.
Myrie desires to spice up NYPD headcount by 3,000 to deliver it again to its 2018 degree of 36,000. Moreover, he has pledged to rent 2,000 new detectives and resolve 100% of shootings.
The state Senator has proposed instituting common free after-school for public college college students. He has additionally pushed insurance policies addressing racial fairness, together with efforts to develop homeownership for Black New Yorkers, fight deed theft, and reform discriminatory mortgage lending.
Underneath his Black agenda, public well being priorities embody funding maternal well being facilities in predominantly Black neighborhoods and increasing psychological well being companies.
US Rep. Dan Goldman (Brooklyn/Manhattan) is Myrie’s most high-profile first-place supporter. Nonetheless, he has attracted decrease rankings from progressive powerhouses just like the WFP, which ranked him fourth, and AOC, which ranked him fifth.
Jessica Ramos
Queens State Sen. Jessica Ramos.File photograph by Lloyd Mittchel
The daughter of Colombian immigrants and a lifelong New Yorker who grew up in Astoria, Jessica Ramos has represented Queens within the state Senate since 2019. Throughout her time in Albany, Ramos supported laws to boost the minimal wage, strengthen tenant protections, and develop immigrant rights.
Whereas Ramos remains to be on the poll, she threw her assist behind Cuomo on June 6, primarily conceding that she doesn’t see herself profitable the first. Her transfer got here after she failed to draw the assist of town’s main labor unions or progressive teams.
However, her marketing campaign facilities on housing, public jobs, psychological well being reform, and assist for immigrant communities.
Ramos proposes increasing housing entry via voucher packages and legalizing basement flats, enhancing entry to immigration authorized companies, and growing funding for grownup literacy and job coaching packages. She additionally requires better language entry throughout metropolis companies to raised serve non-English talking residents.
Ramos plans to declare a citywide psychological well being emergency on day one, committing to rebuilding psychological well being infrastructure and increasing entry to care in all neighborhoods and languages. She helps integrating psychological well being care into housing, schooling, workplaces, and public security techniques.
A signature proposal of her marketing campaign is the creation of a New York Metropolis model of the Works Progress Administration. This system, she says, would fund public service jobs centered on neighborhood infrastructure, workforce housing, local weather resilience, public markets, and the restoration of shuttered psychological well being services.
Scott Stringer
Candidate Scott Stringer speaks throughout a Democratic mayoral major debate, June 4, 2025, in New York, U.S. Yuki Iwamura/Pool by way of REUTERS
Scott Stringer, who preceded Lander as comptroller, is making a second run for mayor after coming fifth in 2021. His earlier bid was derailed by allegations of sexual misconduct that he has repeatedly denied.
Stringer has constructed his marketing campaign message round his many years of expertise in metropolis and state authorities. He beforehand served as Manhattan borough president and as a member of the Meeting, and argues that his background makes him well-suited to guide town via advanced challenges.
The previous chief bean counter is proposing vital investments in public infrastructure and companies, together with a $1 billion “Very Rainy Day Fund” to stabilize metropolis funds and a “Mitchell-Lama 2.0” initiative to construct and protect inexpensive housing.
Stringer’s public security plan additionally consists of hiring 3,000 extra cops, deploying psychological well being professionals within the subway system, and putting a cop on each practice automobile. He’s additionally calling for ethics reforms, together with restrictions on marketing campaign contributions from metropolis contractors and better transparency in budgeting and procurement.
His platform additionally consists of initiatives on youth companies, childcare, and local weather resilience. These embody common summer time camps, prolonged college hours, new cell parks, and neighborhood “resilience hubs” in underserved communities. He’s additionally proposing zoning reforms to restrict personal makes use of of federally owned properties, geared toward countering federal overreach.
Stringer has not attracted many endorsements all through the cycle. Manhattan Rep. Jerry Nadler is his prime supporter, and he did entice a number-five decide from AOC.
Whitney Tilson
Candidate Whitney Tilson attends a Democratic mayoral major debate, June 4, 2025, in New York, U.S. Yuki Iwamura/Pool by way of REUTERS
Whitney Tilson, a businessman and former hedge fund supervisor, is working for mayor on a platform that emphasizes college reform, public security, and housing improvement.
As a member of the primary New York Metropolis cohort of Train For America within the early Nineties, he later turned an outspoken advocate for constitution faculties and schooling reform. He co-founded the nationwide nonprofit Democrats for Schooling Reform and has served on the board of KIPP NYC, a community of constitution faculties, for greater than 20 years.
He helps sustaining mayoral management of colleges and guarantees to nominate a reform-oriented chancellor to root out inefficiencies and enhance pupil outcomes. He desires to shift away from seniority-based instructor compensation in favor of performance-based pay and better salaries for educators in hard-to-staff topics and high-needs faculties.
Tilson is a robust supporter of constitution faculties and requires lifting the state’s cap on constitution faculties, increasing high-performing faculties, and holding all public faculties accountable to efficiency benchmarks.
Past schooling, Tilson’s agenda consists of lowering crime and increasing town’s housing provide by reducing crimson tape for builders and streamlining zoning and allowing processes. He proposes ending avenue homelessness in his first time period and overhauling the shelter and psychological well being techniques.
