State Assembly member Zohran Mamdani (D) has surged into a clear second place in the New York City Democratic mayoral primary, though he still trails former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D), a new poll found.
The Emerson College Polling/PIX11/The Hill survey showed Cuomo leading in the first round of the ranked-choice vote system that New York City employs, receiving 35 percent of the vote. Mamdani is about 12 points behind with 23 percent.
That’s in line with other polls since before Cuomo even entered that have shown the former governor with clear, double-digit leads over the rest of the field. But it’s considerably closer than the last Emerson poll of the race from late March in which Cuomo was at 38 percent and Mamdani was the closest behind him with 10 percent.
It’s also closer than a Siena College poll from April in which Cuomo led by 24 points in the first round and a Marist University poll from earlier this month in which Cuomo was up 22 points in the first round.
In the Emerson poll released Wednesday, City Comptroller Brad Lander came in third in the first round with 10.5 percent, followed by former Comptroller Scott Stringer with 9 percent and New York City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams with 8 percent.
Cuomo maintains a double-digit lead in almost every round as the lowest performing candidate is eliminated and their votes are reallocated to their voters’ next preference. Cuomo eventually wins in the poll in the 10th round over Mamdani, 54.4 percent to 45.6 percent.
But the results show some reasons for hope for Mamdani, the Democratic Socialists of America-endorsed candidate who is seeking to be the main progressive alternative to Cuomo.
“Cuomo has led in the polls since early 2025, but Mamdani has surged, gaining 23 points and winning second-choice votes nearly 2-to-1, cutting Cuomo’s ranked-choice lead from 12 points to 9 points,” Spencer Kimball, the executive director of Emerson College Polling, said in a release. “With four weeks to go, the question is whether Cuomo can run out the clock, or if he needs to win over second-choice voters to hold off Mamdani’s momentum.”
Pollsters found Mamdani’s strongest base of support comes from voters under 50, 61 percent of which support him in the final round. He leads among white voters with 57 percent and college-educated voters with 58 percent.
Cuomo’s lead in the final round is powered by the three-quarters of Black voters, two thirds of voters over 50 and 58 percent of women who back him.
Despite Cuomo’s advantage, the poll still showed him with an underwater favorability rating, with 41 percent of New York City voters viewing him favorably and 46 percent viewing him unfavorably.
Still, both Cuomo and Mamdani have clear leads in a hypothetical general election matchup in the solidly Democratic-leaning city. Mayor Eric Adams, embattled by political and legal controversies, is running for reelection as an independent, while Curtis Sliwa, the 2021 GOP nominee, is likely to be the Republican nominee again.
Cuomo leads in the general election with 44 percent to Sliwa’s 13 percent, Adams’s 10 percent and independent Jim Walden’s 7 percent.
Mamdani also has a solid lead but by a somewhat smaller margin, 35 percent to 16 percent for Sliwa, 15 percent for Adams and 6 percent for Walden.
The poll was conducted from May 23 to 26 among 1,000 registered voters, including 606 Democratic primary voters. The credibility interval, similar to margin of error, for the entire sample was 3 points and for the Democratic primary was 3.9 points.
