Photo by Joanna Insco via Al Jazeera (https://www.aljazeera.com/)
Mayor of New York City, Zohran Kwame Mamdani was sworn into office on January 1, 2026. He has only been in office four months, and has already made major changes to the city that New Yorkers are loving. Part of the reason Mamdani won the election was because people knew his views and goals throughout his campaigning, which is partially due to his strong social media presence – something he leaned into in order to relate to the younger demographic. This is some of Gen Z’s first time being able to vote in a mayoral election, and with Mamdani’s social media presence, he grabbed their attention.
Some wonder if Mamdani’s social media attracted young viewers attention due to the policies he was promoting, or if the viewers found him funny and cringey. He has accounts across many social media platforms including TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, X, and Bluesky. This wide range of social media platforms allows him to reach many demographics, along with his posting in many different languages including English, Spanish, Arabic, and Hindi, in order to draw in more voters from all different ethnic backgrounds.
Mamdani mostly posts short clips. Some show him interacting with the public, others riding public transportation to city hall, and some feature funny skits about the improvements he is making to the city. He also posts segments of his speeches on social media. Many New Yorkers are charmed by his public engagement videos – a popular example being a video of Mamdani building a snowman with a group of preschoolers before going to a meeting. These slice-of-life moments shared online allow people to relate to him. Others argue that he’s cringey, but this may be one of Mamdani’s marketing strategies. By making funny videos that include self-deprecating humor, he draws viewers in, compelling us to continue watching his videos. Even though most of his videos are funny, they are all informative. We might be talking about the videos because they are cringey, but Mamdani is managing to share his ideas and plans for the city, and that too becomes part of the conversation. All of this helps Mamdani gain support.
His tactics have clearly worked, as this past Mayoral race showed a sharp increase in the number of young voters. According to The Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement, there was an estimated 19%-28% increase in young voter turnout in the 2025 mayoral election. Furthermore, 75% of young voters who participated in the 2025 mayoral election voted for Zohran Mamdani. This is in stark contrast to 19% of young voters that supported Andrew Cuomo, even though they are both Democrats. Even though other mayoral candidates from 2025 were also on social media platforms, they didn’t reach the youth the same way that Mamdani does with his funny videos. Some candidates focused on advertising their policies, but lacked the humor and story-telling techniques that Zoran employed to grab peoples’ attention.
The upshot: even if the content that Mamdani’s team produces is cringey, it is effective, as demonstrated by his success in November. His social media platforms continue to bring attention to his initiatives to make New York City a better place for all.