Today, Explained - The Mamdani moment

Episode Date: November 5, 2025

Democrats had a very big night and now need to figure out how to make it last. This episode was produced by Miles Bryan and Ariana Aspuru, edited by Amina Al-Sadi, fact-checked by Laura Bullard and Denise Guerra, engineered by Patrick Boyd and Adriene Lilly, and hosted by Noel King. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani celebrates during an election night event in Brooklyn, New York. Photo by ANGELINA KATSANIS/AFP via Getty Images. Listen to Today, Explained ad-free by becoming a Vox Member: vox.com/members. New Vox members get $20 off their membership right now. Transcript at ⁠vox.com/today-explained-podcast.⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

My friends, we have toppled a political dynasty. Zoramam Dhani will be New York City's 111th mayor. He celebrated his win last night by thanking some of his constituents. I speak of Yemeni bodega owners and Mexican abuelas. Senegalese taxi drivers and Uzbek nurses. Trinidadian lime cooks and Ethiopian. In other races last night in New Jersey, in Virginia, the Democratic candidates weren't firebrands like Mom Dani, but they won anyway. Reporters asked President Trump about the little blue wave this morning.

We had an interesting evening, and we learned a lot. Coming up on today, explained, have the Democrats learned how to stop losing? Stand clear at the proven door, please. The next stop will be today explained. Today explained will be next. Stand here. Vox's Ested Herndon. You were in New York City last night covering Uri Thing.

Tell me what happened. Yeah, I was in New York City for the last step of what has been a come-from-now-ear political story, a historic moment. Zaramam Dani, a 34-year-old state assemblyman who, as of two, three-year-old. years ago, had very little presence on the, certainly the national stage, and even the state level, you know, ended the Andrew Cuobo political dynasty and, you know, is going to become the one of the youngest mayors in New York City's history and the first Muslim mayor in the city's history. Momdani really benefited from a huge voter turnout. There was almost two million voters, the similar levels to presidential levels that we saw last year and the highest turnout in New York City mayor race in decades. You were talking Mamdani voters last night. You were out in the streets.

You were at a couple of parties. Where did you go? And what did you hear? We went to Astoria, the neighborhood in Queens that is part of Mamdani's district, but also, I think, a place that represents the hue of the Mondani coalition. And we were talking to a lot of folks yesterday who talked about voting from the mayor's race for the first time, talking about being excited by his kind of longstanding average. could see, particularly on the pro-Palestinian cause.

But the thing I most remember is how much the word authenticity came up over and over. More than kind of right, left. So, like, the back room wheeling and dealing, that stuff is over. I think honest messaging is important. I think it was genuine with his intentions, and he could understand the general public. There was a sense that the guy we'd see is the guy we'd know, and we've known for a long time. We talked to one person about how she remembers Mamdani years ago when he was, working with cab drivers as a state assemblyman.

He got like a whole coalition of cab drivers in our area. And like they were all like swagged out cabs, like basically like this, you know? The fact that all the cabs drivers were mobilized, all the yellow cabs were just like lit up all over the avenue up and down. We were like, okay, you know. And that was here. So that's before. Yeah, that's before. So from there we've just kind of had an eye.

I think that's beyond right and left. But really having a sense and trust of a person and that really driving your. connection to them. All right. So the question is, how did he do it? This young guy comes out of nowhere, nobody really knows who he is. He then goes on to dominate the Democratic primaries to completely unsettle Andrew Cuomo and at the end of the day to win. How? Well, this is something he manifested. No one asked the Orm, I'm Donnie the Run. He really saw an opportunity to step in to a moment where he felt that his life had kind of built him to being able to bring together these different coalitions.

And we won because we insisted that no longer would politics be something that is done to us. Now it is something that we do. When I asked him, Donnie, how did he put kind of particularly his primary rise together? He says he started with three different groups. He thinks about his association with the Democratic Socialists of America. Call it democracy or call it Democratic Socialism, there has to be a better distribution of wealth for all of God's children in this country.

He also talks about his association with the Muslim, Democratic Club of America. That campaigns he's been a part of throughout that group had taught him about reaching out to Muslim and South Asian groups and that that kind of growing coalition, that growing community in the city, he felt was an untapped political resource and a place that could really rally around him. The third thing I think is important is what he calls the root of his political formation, which is his pro-Palestinian advocacy. This is someone who started a chapter for students for justice in Palestine in college. This is someone who has been part of those organizing efforts over the year,

and most recently was part of the Democratic movement to push back against Joe Biden in terms of voting uncommitted in New York. And I said time and time again that my concerns beyond those of just moral ones with the administration's support of the Netanyahu government was that it was turning many away from an election where we so desperately needed to build a coalition

to defeat Donald Trump. Because he is an early advocate for a ceasefire, because he is an early critic of Democrats standing with Netanyahu, that drives people toward him in the early stages of that primary and the way that other folks really weren't able to do. The other way that Mamdani stuck out, of course, is through his use of social media. I'm freezing. Your wreck as the next mayor of New York City.

Let's plunge into the details. My team says I move my hands too much in these videos. So for this one, they're staying in my pockets. And I would say it's important to note that this was very intentional. When I talked to people who were connecting with Zoran during his kind of early stages of the race, he was saying, I know I'm going to be outraised in terms of money. I'm going to have to create a movement that also exist online. He studied AOC and her digital communication.

This is someone who is the son of a filmmaker, was really interested in the ways of those early storytelling, someone who had a previous rap career and this thought about music videos and things like that. And he was really coming into this race thinking, how do I make sure I'm not just creating a field organization, but a digital organization? It's views on Palestine benefited him. It seems a lot with young voters. But they also raised questions about whether his views would be a liability in New York City with a lot of Jews, right? A lot of Jewish voters. How did he handle that? And what did the results last night telling us about whether New York's Jews trust Mamdani? It is undeniable that Andrew Cuomo was able to drive up votes, particularly among the kind of Republican or more conservative strongholds in New York.

York City in the Orthodox community. It's true that among kind of younger Jewish voters, particularly in places like Brooklyn, there were a lot of voters who saw no problem with their own faith and identity and voting for Zoroamam Dani. And so it's a little, I think, more nuanced than just saying, you know, are there pockets of New York that have fouled Mamdani not willing to stand up for their community? Certainly. And you have seen that kind of pushback. But he has made a point. And I think even in his speech last night, made a point to say, you know, I look forward to standing with Jewish New Yorkers to stand up against anti-Semitism. And we will build a city hall that stands steadfast alongside Jewish New Yorkers and does not waver in the fight against the scourge of anti-Semitism.

You profiled Mom Donnie for your former employer, The New York Times. And in your big piece, you wrote that you were struck by the fact that he adapted his strategy to keep his momentum go. going after he did so well in the primaries. Talk about what that adaptation looked like and what it got him. A lot of kind of a few more establishment corporate Democrats are currently dealing with right now the balance between winning and values. But there's been a lot of kind of left progressive folks who have prioritized values overwinning. And what Mondani says is that that is a mistake. He would say particularly for the role of mayor, it's not one that rewards rigidity. and so you have to sort of compromise.

And so after the primary, Mamdani and his campaign made a concerted effort to show that. And so this is mostly happening in private. He is following up with a lot of business leaders. He is reaching out to members of the tech community. And he was holding kind of small get-to-know-you sessions, even at this campaign, where folks can ask him direct questions.

Now, I think the interesting part of this thing is in these private meetings, he was willing to kind of present a, I would say, more pragmatic part of himself. Not necessarily as a jekyll and hide from the primary, but I really think as an evolution that took place for him over time. By the time he was running for mayor,

he was willing to make these compromises and he was telling folks in public and private. I think that includes things like being willing to step away from the millionaire's tax if he could buy money and resources other places. He also importantly said, and I think I heard this repeatedly, that he would not have litmus tests

for the people he surrounds himself with, that he wanted a sort of team of rivals and that even issues like his pro-Palestinian advocacy would not be make or breaks for people in City Hall. And so those were the kind of pivots he was willing to do to tell people, I understand the role that I am stepping into, and I am willing to kind of make my values fit into that role. Even as Mamdani was adapting and evolving, President Trump became kind of a specter, instead, hovering over this. race. He had a lot to say about Mom Donnie. And in fact, last night, I was reading that midway through Mom Donnie's acceptance speech, Trump went on truth social and wrote, and so it begins in all capital letters, dot, dot, dot. I mean, what is going on between these two men and how do you see this playing out as Mom Donnie takes office? Well, for the, you know, Trump feels a personal

ownership of New York. That's just a personal investment in New York City. This is someone who's a Florida resident in name and taxes only. But his heart is still in Manhattan. And I think he sees Bumdani as a worthy foe. I think he sees him as someone who has represented the ways the city changes. It's going to be hard for me as the president to give a lot of money to New York. Because if you have a communist running New York, all you're doing is wasting the money you're sending there. And Donald Trump, I think,

or that a Republican Party at large, especially invested in pushing back against them. And so when you see Mamdani yesterday in that speech, you know, turn and talk directly to Donald Trump and say, you know, you're going to have to go through all of us. When you see him kind of speak directly to Trump on Fox News, that is because he is inviting a fight that they are preparing for and a fight that they frankly feel is inevitable.

All right. So this was one of the first big races since the 2024 election when President Trump won, one of the first big races that we're told can sort of tell us how the Democratic Party is doing. What are the lessons from this race, do you think? I think there's several. You know, I was really up close to the Democratic Party's retreat from working class Americans.

I saw it. I felt it. I could feel them increasingly become obsessed with things that were not tangible to people. Things like representation being there deliverable for black and Latino communities over kitchen table, economic, prices-style things, of stepping away from unions, things like that. And I think what Mamdani's, one of the lessons of Mamdani is a return to a type of politics that people can feel. And I think beyond the kind of right-left center of it all, that's a

lesson that Democrats can take in. Part of that authenticity that we were hearing people liked about him from the watch party comes not only in the consistency of his beliefs, but the fact that his policies are targeted at those same communities who powered his rise. And so more, I think, than even the values that Mamdani holds, I think there is a broader lesson that one way the way you build trust, the way you build authenticity is by coming from a place where you're shaping your policies around your actual beliefs. What Mamdani does is start from his premise. And so, you know, when I'm at that rally and he says, freeze the and the crowd can reply

or, you know, make buses fast and they can reply. That reminds me of the moment at the Trump rally where he says, build the wall. There's a tangible expectation that the value itself is what's driving the policy and voters can latch on to it. And I'm saying that's, I think, a less. is to be able to have things that people can feel and people can be excited about. Boxes Ested Herndon. You want to stick around for the second half? Yeah, let's do it. All right. We're going to talk about the results of some other big races last night.

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Use code explained for 40% off your order. Once again, Udacity.com slash explained for 40% off. Make sure you use the promo code explained. Mr. Mamdani. There are many parades that I would not be attending because I'd be focusing on... Today, Explained. I'm Noel King back with Vox's Aestead Herndon. Instead, there were a couple of other big races around the country last night, and the results have got people talking about a blue wave.

What happened? Last night was a great night if you had a D next to the end of your name, and that's not something we could have said for a long time. Beyond New York City, Democrats won two headline governor's races in New Jersey, where Congresswoman Mikey Sherrill was successful. Sherrill defeated President Trump back to Republican Jack Chitorelli by an estimated 13 percentage point. Here in New Jersey, we know that this nation has not ever been, nor will it ever be ruled by Kings.

And in Virginia, where Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger will become. the first woman to be governor, if that's a commonwealth, as they like to remind us, not a state. We sent a message to the whole world that in 2025, Virginia chose pragmatism over partisanship. We chose our Commonwealth over chaos. Even beyond that, there were two Democrats who won statewide in Georgia the first time And that has happened in a very long time. And local races, flips from R to D. And even in California, importantly, Governor Gavin Newsom's gambit about redistricting,

which gives Democrats there the opportunity to draw new congressional maps and combat Republican tactics in places like Texas passed overwhelmingly as well. Tonight, after poking the bear, this bear roared. The results, I think, confirm the evidence of the polling data as well, which is that there is a broad discontent with Trump's second term. The sequel is not as popular as the original. And in the key areas, particularly his handling of the economy, of prices, of discontent around tariffs, Donald Trump has taken what has been his best issue as kind of a safe and prosperous manager of country and made it among his worse.

And Democrats were able to seize on that all across the country. Let's talk about the two big races you mentioned. The governor's races in New Jersey and Virginia. Mikey Cheryl wins in New Jersey. Abigail Spanberger wins in Virginia. These two women have some stuff in common, not just that they won last night. Tell us about them and what they tell us about the Democrats. So Cheryl and Spanberger are both members of the same class in the Democratic House of Representatives.

They came in in 2018 and that wave again. kind of Trump's first election, they really embodied, I think, Democrats' first attempts and first efforts at resistance. They both have national security backgrounds in the Navy and in the CIA, and they've really led with that. I think these campaigns represent kind of the early seeds of showing how the more centrist wing, the more moderate wing of Democrats, has even started to stretch some new muscles. Cheryl and New Jersey really focused on electricity and bringing down those prices.

As a 20% utility rate hike crushes New Jersey families. Day one is governor. I'm declaring a state of emergency on utility costs. In Virginia, Spamberger really focused on the contraction of the federal government and the ways that, you know, the firing of government employees particularly affected folks in Virginia. These are attacks on Virginians and on our economy, and we need a governor who will stand up against them. That was successful there. And so put New Jersey and Virginia together.

And when there wasn't just a good night for progressives and the momdani's of the world, it was a good night where I would say the moderate wing of the party as well and just Democrats broadly. Instead, we have heard both Cheryl and Spamberger called 2018 Democrats, right? They're moderate. They're suburban. They're not super interesting. They're not lightning rods for anything. And there was some analysis that said in 2025, you need a candidate like Mamdani.

You need a lightning rod. These two women seem to have proved something. different here. So what are the lessons here about what kind of candidate works for the Dems? Well, the answer is all the above. I don't think that anyone can blanket say that a 2018 Democrat cannot work in 2025. But I think it's also important that who Cheryl and Spanberger were represented a different type of Democrats than I think they were in 2018. And that time, the focus was largely on Donald Trump, his actions, and not necessarily presenting an affirmative vision on their own. I think both of those candidates did so and made a point to not simply be

running against Donald Trump's actions. What we will do this November is not just vote against something, but we will vote for the policies that we believe in. I also would say Democrats and I think the parties in general have multiple fights at once, and particularly in statewide races and in races where there is a competitive Republican on the other side, the issue of electability of someone being so-called less of a lightning rod or less controversial is it becomes more important. Voters want to find someone who maybe can reach out to the other side. There simply aren't enough Democrats in places like Virginia for you to not be able to win over folks with some more conservative leanings.

And so, you know, that is going to produce a different type of candidate in the Virginias and New jerseys than it would in the New York City election. But I would also say that Donald Trump on the popular vote because of Democrats' erosion in blue areas also. And so it's not as if they can choose candidate that does well in suburbs over candidate that does well in city. You know, the Democrats' national success has come from when they've found candidates who can do all of the above or at least minimize the worst of some of those things.

What questions still remain unanswered for both Republicans and Democrats going forward after last night? Yeah, I think that Republicans have the same problem that we knew they had in the Biden era, that they have not solved since Donald Trump showed up on the scene, which is that in elections where he is not on the ballot, they have not been able to put it together. So they underperformed in the 2022 midterms. They lost seats in that 2018 midterms, and without the kind of uniqueness of the Donald Trump-only voter, their coalition is very beatable for Democrats. On the Democratic side, I think there is both hope and peril. I think the hope here is that it shows how this big-tint party, a version of the party that includes both Mamdani, Cheryl, and Spamberger, has an operational. to really claw back some of the losses that they've seen over the last several years. The peril is that the path to success in the midterms is not the same as the path to success in the presidential race.

And particularly the presidential primary, the conversation that Democrats have to have amongst themselves to produce their nominee, is much more on the terms of the Zoramamundani race than it is on the Spanberger Cheryl race. the New York City electorate and that diversity and that scope is, I think, a harbinger of the ways that the party is changing across the country. And I think shows if you are someone who doesn't want the Bernie Sanders wing of the world to take over the Democratic Party, I think you could take Mamdani's win as a warning sign that they have learned some lessons about how to win and that this version of Democrats wants to fight and wants values and is mad at their party's previous leaders so much that words like socialism are not inherently scary. Words like the charge of anti-Semitism

was not inherently off-putting. And so those are a lot of methods that the centrist's kind of moderate wing is used to having. And so they're going to have to find a different way to win other than just telling people we're more electable. Because I don't think that reasoning has the same validity among Democrats. Vox is a stead, Herndon. Thanks so much, instead. Thank you. I appreciate it. Ariana Espudu and Miles Bryan produced today's show.

Amina El Sadi edited. Patrick Boyd and Adrian Lilly are our engineers and Laura Bullard and Denise Gerecheck the facts. I'm Noelle King. It's today explained. Remember, you can go to Vox.com slash members to take advantage of our membership sale. Thank you.