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Only 48 hours before the New York mayoral election, Michael Lange made a significant forecast – not just the winner citywide, and precinct by precinct. Lange, a political analyst who grew up in the city, devoted over a decade in left-leaning activism and emerged as something of a well-known figure recently for his thorough analyses into city data and voter surveys.

He released his highly detailed forecast map – accurately predicting that Zohran Mamdani would win while missing Andrew Cuomo’s strong performance – on his Substack, the Narrative War. Lange has a flair for clever terms. He highlighted, for instance, the divide between the progressive stronghold, stretching from Park Slope to Bushwick to Astoria, where he predicted (accurately) that Mamdani would win by large leads, and the “capitalist corridor” on Manhattan’s Upper East and Upper West Sides. There, “the Free Press and Wall Street Journal outrank the New York Times” in readership and most voters favored Cuomo, who ran as a conservative-courting independent.

Election Night Patterns and Unexpected Results

How was your election night?

I had to do that because they were dropping approximately 200K votes into the tally every few minutes! I was actually somewhat anxious at the beginning: The candidate led the early vote by 12 points, but there were large groups of ballots added later and the advantage went from 12% to 8%. It was concerning.

Understand, it was possible where election day went kind of poorly for Mamdani, in which Cuomo would have basically increasing his support from the earlier contest. However the winner added 500,000 supporters to his initial base, and that’s a huge reason why he won. He campaigned and greatly broadened his support from the first round.

Expanding Support

Where did the mayor-elect get additional support from?

He built the alliance that the left always wanted to build: it’s multiracial, it’s young, tenants and it’s people squeezed by affordability. He gained considerably with minority communities, working- and middle-class voters, compared to the primary. Additionally he boosted his core of liberal progressives, youthful radicals, and Muslims and south Asians. Victory required without making those significant inroads.

He built the coalition that the left long aimed for: multiracial, young, renters and people squeezed by affordability

Additionally, there were a number of supporters of both candidates – is that a big trend?

It’s definitely a genuine phenomenon, limited to Hispanic laborers, Asian communities and Muslims. Voters in immigrant strongholds that supported the former president last year backed Zohran now. However I wouldn’t say he was gaining white working-class voters and Maga voters.

Turnout and Impact

A major development of the election was the record participation. Who did that help?

Both sides. Participation was significantly higher than I had expected. I thought it could exceed two million, but it reached 2.3 million – which is a huge number of participants. There was a decent anti-Mamdani block, who were motivated, but his supporters was equally driven, and that sufficed to secure victory.

You predicted he’d exceed half the ballots. Is he on course for that?

Currently it appears he’s likely to get over 50%. He’s at 50.4% but there’s still probably 200,000 votes uncounted as of Wednesday morning. Thus I don’t think it’s definitive, but I believe it’s likely, and I hope he achieves it because afterwards none can claim Sliwa was a spoiler.

Republican Collapse

The GOP candidate, the Republican candidate, is the other big story. His vote plummeted.

He lost any district in any borough. Including one neighborhood in the borough, similar to an highly conservative neighborhood. That truly surprised me. The independent kept very white areas, affluent zones and devout communities, and then added many Republicans on Staten Island with a strong turnout. I think there was a lot of tactical voting by the Republicans. This happened prior to Trump tweeted his support for Cuomo, but that definitely helped. It could have even turned the tide unless the winning alliance failed to expand.

Progressive Strongholds

What about your often-discussed “commie corridor” – did backing for the candidate dominant in those parts of the boroughs?

I think existed a little dilution of the commie corridor in some areas like neighborhoods that have older Caucasian residents. In Astoria, for example, the Greek landlords and residents all went for Cuomo. Thus there was a little resistance. However no, largely the leftist base is a key factor why Mamdani won – he scored between high percentages in Fort Greene, Clinton Hill and Bushwick.

Jewish Voters

In the lead-up to the vote we reported on whether Mamdani was making inroads with Jewish New Yorkers. Any indication that he did?

Exist neighborhoods with a lot of secular and more progressive-leaning Jews – like specific locales – where he did well. But in the affluent districts like the Manhattan area, his position on Israel definitely mattered in those places. Likewise in the more middle-class Jewish areas like Queens neighborhoods, or Spuyten Duyvil and Riverdale – they all leaned Cuomo. And also, you have newcomers from Eastern Europe in the borough, who were pretty staunchly supportive. Therefore I don’t know if existed major surprises on this one, but Mamdani retained left-leaning areas and even parts of the Upper West Side by big margins.

Long-Term Significance

Did Mamdani redefine what New York means politically? Will commie corridor become a launch pad for progressive contenders?

Absolutely, it’s no coincidence that some of the biggest political leaders from the left come from a handful of neighborhoods in Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx. I believe that we’ll see additional examples – people will come from these neighborhoods to be promoted to higher office.

However I think that every city in the US could develop similar progressive hubs. Cities are the epicenters of progressive influence in America – since youth reside there, people rent and they are places where people are crushed by the disparities exist.