Zohran Mamdani is forecast to win the New York City mayoral race by double digits, according to yet another opinion poll, this one released on Wednesday showing that support for Andrew Cuomo has remained relatively static over the past few weeks.
Mamdani, a state assemblyman, would get 43%; Cuomo, the former governor, 33%; and Curtis Sliwa, founder of the Guardian Angels crime patrol, would get 14%; with 6% undecided, according to the poll, released by Quinnipiac University.
Early voting began on Saturday; Nov. 4 is Election Day.
The race isn’t a sure thing, according to Mary Snow, the poll’s assistant director.
“The percentage of likely voters not weighing in has increased a bit since earlier this month, suggesting there’s room for movement in the final stretch,” she said.
In a poll Quinnipiac released on Oct. 9, Mamdani had 46% of likely voters’ support. Next up was Cuomo, with 33%, and Sliwa, with 15%. That poll showed that Cuomo had picked up almost all of Mayor Eric Adams’ support after he dropped out from the race on Sept. 28.
But Mamdani’s dominant support remained essentially static between that poll and the previous one from Quinnipiac.
In recent weeks, polls by various organizations have shown Mamdani with greater or lesser degrees of the same conclusion: a Mamdani victory in the double digits. The prediction markets also foretell a similar outcome.
Still, polls and prediction markets are sometimes wrong.
For months, nearly every one of them predicted that Cuomo, buoyed by name recognition, millions of dollars of support from billionaires and union support, was a shoo-in to become the Democratic nominee. But in the closing days of the race, the polls tightened, with some predicting a dead heat and a few forecasting Mamdani eking out a slight victory.
Mamdani wound up winning the primary by 12.8 percentage points.
In a statement, Cuomo spokesman Rich Azzopardi said: “Make no mistake: The race is tightening, and Andrew Cuomo is closing in fast.”
The survey, conducted Oct. 23-27, was of 911 New York City likely voters, with a margin of sampling error of +/- 4.0 percentage points.
Matthew Chayes, a Newsday reporter since 2007, covers New York City.