Politics
Zohran Mamdani Holds Sizable Lead With Foreign-Born New Yorkers, Poll Finds
Pro-communist New York City mayoral frontrunner Zohran Mamdani holds a commanding lead among foreign-born city residents. Former Governor Andrew Cuomo, who is running an independent campaign, and perennial Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa did better with Big Apple residents who were born in the United States, a new poll found.
A survey from Patriot Polling found that Mamdani is running away with the foreign-born vote, as 62 percent of respondents expressed support for his campaign. Cuomo trailed in distant second with 24 percent, while Sliwa was the preferred candidate among just 12 percent of foreign-born respondents.
The poll found Cuomo leading comfortably among American-born New Yorkers with 40 percent. Mamdani was the second choice among 32 percent of respondents, while Sliwa again came in third with 25 percent.
In terms of the overall race, Patriot Polling’s survey was much in line with polling trends, as Mamdani led with 43 percent of the overall vote. Cuomo trailed the Democratic Socialist by nine, while Sliwa sits in a distant third with 19 percent of the vote.
The poll further found that Mamdani is dealing with a “serious deficit” among Catholic and Jewish voters, but performs strongest with Muslims, Hindus and atheists. Mamdani, a staunch Israel critic who has vowed to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should be travel to New York City, received just 30 percent of the Jewish vote while Cuomo was the overwhelming favorite with 63 percent, the poll found.
Patriot Polling describes itself as a non-partisan polling outfit that was founded by high school students in 2022 . Polling expert Nate Silver ranked it among the most accurate of the 2024 presidential election, though it has also produced some outliers, such as one poll that found a majority of Greenland residents would be open to joining the United States, the New York Post noted.
Mamdani speaks at the third and final New York mayoral debate onOctober 22, 2025
If elected mayor, Zohran Mamdani has pledged to expand legal protections and services for illegal aliens as part of his broader strategy of “Trump-proofing” the nation’s largest city.
He has vowed to allocate an additional $100 million annually -— bringing the total to $165 million — for free legal representation for immigrants facing deportation proceedings. This would fund public defenders and nonprofits to represent illegal aliens in immigration court, aiming to prevent deportations.
Mamdani has also promised to explicitly bar U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents from entering schools, hospitals, and other city-owned properties without a judicial warrant, a move that will certainly be met with legal challenges from the Trump Administration.
In response, President Trump has stated that the federal government will be taking measures to increase immigration enforcement operations in the city counter Mamdani’s efforts to defy the federal government. The president has indicated that he believes Mamdani will win, based on weeks of polling trends.
“Well, I looked at the polls and looks like we’re going to have a communist as the mayor of New York,” the president said while speaking with reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday. “It’s never worked once. So it’s not going to work now.”
