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Democratic mayoral candidates Andrew Cuomo, left, shakes hands with Zohran Mamdani, center, as Whitney Tilson reacts after participating in a Democratic mayoral primary debate, on June 4, 2025, in New York City.
How Israel made it onto the ballot in the NYC mayoral race
New York City residents head to the polls today to vote in the Democratic primary election for mayor, and while housing affordability, street safety, and public transit are the key issues motivating voters, another issue has come into the limelight in recent weeks, from nearly 6,000 miles away.
The candidates views’ of Israel have become, if not a decisive factor, a huge flash point in a city that is home to the world’s largest Jewish population outside of Israel, becoming a major topic of discussion at the two televised debates.
The race has now come down to two candidates: Zohran Mamdani, a 33-year-old Democratic Socialist politician of South Asian descent who once tried to become a rapper, and former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, an establishment centrist who resigned from his previous role after facing accusations of sexual harassment. Other candidates like hedge fund manager Whitney Tilson and New York City Comptroller Brad Lander are still in the running but face long odds – they have endorsed Cuomo and Mamdani, respectively.
The race is on a knife edge. Polls show a surprisingly close race: Most had shown Cuomo ahead, but an Emerson College survey from last week found Mamdani edging out his rival in the final round. In a city that is as heavily Democratic as the Big Apple, the Democratic primary winner will be the firm favorite to win the general election on November 4.
Where do the candidates stand on Israel? Mamdani is an avowed critic. At the first televised debate, he affirmed Israel’s right to exist, but not as a “Jewish state.” He has also defended the use of the controversial call to “Globalize the Intifada,” drawing backlash from several Jewish groups who view it as antisemitic hate speech. But he has also said that he wishes to “meet Jewish New Yorkers where they are” and focus on the issues that they care about in the Big Apple.
“The New York City mayor does not make foreign policy, of course,” Tilson told GZERO Media last week. But Mamdani’s views on Israel, he said, are “absolutely motivating Jewish voters in the city.”
Cuomo, on the other hand, has been wholly supportive of Israel – he’s always seen wearing a yellow ribbon on his lapel in solidarity with Israelis held hostage in Gaza. Yet he has faced criticism, too. Lander, who is Jewish, accused him of “weaponizing antisemitism to score political points.”
How did this become such an issue? New York City is home to 1.4 million Jewish people, accounting for roughly 12% of the city’s population. While Israel is often a higher priority for Jewish voters than others, it’s especially high now among Jewish New Yorkers due to Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza, the backlash against it at institutions like Columbia University, and the rise of antisemitic violence across the United States.
New York Jewish voters, reflecting the broader community in the US, are hardly a monolith. While support for Israel is generally strong, there is a diversity of opinion about the war in Gaza and the Palestinian cause. That may in part be why a recent poll shows Jewish voters in New York are actually split among the top candidates, Cuomo at 31%, Mamdani at 20%, and Lander, who is Jewish himself, at 18%.
Reality check. Housing affordability and the economy remain the top issue for voters: Three in 10 New Yorkers put housing costs as their top issue, and another two in 10 said it was the economy, per an Emerson College poll from May. Fewer than 1% of voters said their top issue was foreign policy.
Yet Israel specifically remains an issue, one that can’t be captured in the nebulous “foreign policy” bracket, says Tilson, whose wife and daughters are Jewish. What this is really about, he said, is Jewish people’s perception of safety – over three-quarters of all American Jews said they feel less safe in the United States following Hamas’ attacks on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, per an American Jewish Committee report. In New York City, antisemitic attacks increased more than 100% between 2022 and 2023, according to the local offices of the Anti-Defamation League.
“You’re defining it too narrowly by saying foreign policy. It is [about] keeping the Jewish community safe,” said Tilson. “And there has been a dramatic decline in the feeling of [safety among New York Jews].”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini brief the media at the European Council in Brussels, Belgium, on December 11, 2017.
What We’re Watching: Pressure on Israel, Jitters in Bolivia, Podcasts for Democrats
Israel under fresh pressure
The UK and EU threatened Tuesday to revise trade ties with Israel unless PM Benjamin Netanyahu stops the new offensive in the Gaza Strip and allows sufficient humanitarian aid into the besieged enclave. This comes after the UK, Canada, and France threatened Israel on Monday with “concrete measures,” like sanctions. Netanyahu and his far right coalition allies say they are intent on destroying Hamas, though critics warn Israel is becoming a “pariah.”
The Morales of the story: Bolivian heavyweight to defy election exclusion
Bolivia’s socialist powerbroker Evo Morales, who governed from 2006 until he was ousted in protests in 2019, is officially ineligible to run in this August’s presidential election because of term limits. Yet he has pledged to mobilize his supporters to defy this rule, setting up a potentially destabilizing contest as his once-formidable leftwing MAS movement splinters into rival factions.
Democratic donors try a pivot to podcast
Faced with the vast array of conservative or MAGA-friendly online influencers who helped Donald Trump to win the 2024 election, Democrats and their donors are now trying to cultivate a creator economy of their own ahead of the 2026 midterms. There’s lots of money and pitches, but can you really create a viable ecosystem of influencers overnight? Authenticity, the heartbeat of any political campaign, is hard to create in a lab. You’re either a born killer or you’re not.
Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen on why he went to El Salvador and what's next
Listen: In the latest episode of the GZERO World podcast, Ian Bremmer sits down with Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen to unpack what he calls a constitutional crisis unfolding under the Trump administration. At the center of the conversation is the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland father of three who was wrongfully deported to El Salvador and remains imprisoned in a maximum-security facility known for human rights abuses. Van Hollen recently traveled to El Salvador to visit Abrego Garcia and pressure local authorities, telling Bremmer, “I asked [them] whether or not El Salvador had any independent basis for holding him. His answer was, ‘No… the Trump administration is paying us money to do so.’”
The conversation also turns to broader concerns about America’s global posture. Van Hollen argues the administration has gutted the State Department and abandoned U.S. leadership abroad: “What we are witnessing is America in retreat. Our adversaries, like China, are all too happy to fill the vacuum.” He critiques Trump’s sweeping tariff policies as chaotic and harmful to small businesses, saying they’re driven more by political theater than economic strategy.
With due process under threat and American institutions under pressure, Van Hollen calls on Democrats to fight back not just with opposition, but with an alternative vision: “We should point out the betrayal, but also present a plan that helps working people—the people Trump claims to stand for.”
Subscribe to the GZERO World Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your preferred podcast platform, to receive new episodes as soon as they're publishedUS Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris speaks alongside President Joe Biden about lowering costs for Americans at an event at Prince George's Community College in Upper Marlboro, Maryland, on August 15, 2024.
Democrats still don’t have a plan – or a leader – for the future
If anyone thinks the Democratic Party has a plan for combating US President Donald Trump or winning future elections, they should think again.
“The Dem messaging has been all over the place,” says Sarah Matthews, who served as deputy press secretary during Trump’s first administration but resigned after the storming of the US Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Last year, she endorsed former Vice President Kamala Harris.
Matthews isn’t alone in her critique of the Democrats. Several Democratic strategists who spoke to GZERO scoffed when asked if the party has a unified approach. It’s a stark contrast from eight years ago, when Democrats were united behind halting Trump’s agenda, eventually leading to a stomping victory in the 2018 House elections with a campaign centered on protecting the Affordable Care Act.
Today’s Democratic Party is devoid of leadership and strategy, with no clear plan for how to take on the president or win future elections. Gone are the days when Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), the former House speaker, publicly tussled with Trump in the White House – and won. With no clear path forward, the Dems risk further fragmentation as they desperately try to regain their footing ahead of the 2026 midterms and beyond.
Winging it
Just over 100 days into Trump’s second term, the only left-leaning party that seems united against him is based in Canada. Meanwhile, the Democrats’ defense has been disjointed. Some are focusing on the economy, others are criticizing Trump for challenging the legal authorities, while others are just echoing former President Joe Biden’s warnings about Trump’s alleged threat to democracy – as if that worked last year.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), two darlings of the American left, have toured the country in recent weeks to tout an economic-focused message aimed at wooing working-class voters. Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) has zeroed in on due process by flying to El Salvador to advocate for a deported man from Maryland, while Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) is using every platform possible to argue that Trump is undermining democracy.
Some Democratic missives are even in direct conflict with one another. Matthews points to California Gov. Gavin Newsom “trying to cater a little bit to the MAGA crowd” by interviewing conservative activists on his new podcast. Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez, meanwhile, are painting the president and his close allies as an oligarchy.
For Jeff Weaver, who was Sanders’ campaign manager for the senator’s 2016 presidential run, the disjointed communication is just the tip of the iceberg. He argues that Democrats have been papering over their cracks for some time, noting that they’ve hemorrhaged support from its base of working-class voters. Two-thirds of non-college-educated voters went for Trump last year, per NBC News exit polls, whereas they split their vote 12 years ago. People of color each shifted markedly toward the Republicans, too, Weaver notes. A major change in message and leadership, he says, is long overdue.
“In all likelihood, Joe Biden would not have become president in 2020 if not for COVID, the performance of ‘22 was not that overwhelming, frankly,” Weaver told GZERO. “[Democrats] fooled themselves into believing that they had a strong base of support, particularly among working-class people.”
The leadership vacuum creates an opening
The Democratic Party hasn’t had such an absence of leadership since the turn of the century and the end of Bill Clinton’s presidency. Former President Barack Obama emerged from that drought and led the country for eight years, Biden for another four. When Democrats didn’t control the White House, Pelosi – the top House Democrat for two decades – filled the void. With the former speaker no longer leading her caucus and Trump back in charge, an abundance of other Democrats – from Sanders to Newsom – have tried to carry the torch. As yet, none have emerged as the clear leader.
But Democratic pollster Zac McCrary isn’t too worried about this just yet.
“You have to let 1,000 flowers bloom,” says McCrary. “The direction of the Democratic Party is more open-ended than it has been, is more up for grabs than it has been in a generation.”
“I think it’s a good thing coming after an election where Democrats lost all three legs of the stool in terms of both chambers of Congress and the presidency,” he adds.
Party strategists agree that a party leader won’t emerge until the 2028 presidential primaries begin. In the meantime, they say, Democrats can battle test their messages – and their strategies – to see which ones land.
An easier target for Democrats will be the midterm elections, which are 18 months away. The party in power has historically performed poorly, as opposition voters are more motivated to go to the polls. The midterms are also a referendum on the president, and Trump had the lowest 100-day approval rating in 80 years. Potentially adding fuel to the fire: The US economy looks headed for recession, thanks in no small part to Trump’s widespread tariffs.
Trump’s recent own goal on trade policy and his firing-cum-reshuffle of former National Security Adviser Michael Waltz have finally given the Democrats an opening. Rep. Derek Tran (D-CA), one of the Democrats’ rare success stories in 2024 who flipped a Republican-held House seat, acknowledged that the Trump administration’s swift actions early in the term forced Democrats on defense. But now Tran believes it is time to flip the script and go on the offensive against any ineptitude by the administration.
“[Waltz] is one of the rotten apples in the barrel,” the first-term congressman said, before calling for the firing of Defense Sec. Pete Hegseth, who shared US war plans on multiple Signal chats.
“He’s putting a lot of soldiers’ lives at risk,” Tran said of Hegseth. “The incompetency in this administration has to stop.”
Some are eyeing the bigger prize
Though most Democrats – including Tran – are focused on the midterms, a handful are looking beyond 2026. Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear and former Commerce Sec. Gina Raimondo are openly flirting with a run for the White House in 2028. Maryland Gov. Wes Moore and Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker are taking trips to states that hold early primary elections. Former Transportation Sec. Pete Buttigieg has been rampaging through podcast interviews and is heading to Iowa – where he stunned the political world by winning the 2020 caucuses – next week.
Yet these potential 2028 candidates still come from the mainstream of the party, at a time when the Democratic brand is toxic — a CNN poll in March found the party’s favorability rating was just 29%, the lowest rate since the survey began. As such, some Democratic strategists – including Matthews, the former Republican – want to see more from Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez, and their message of economic populism.
“People are even underestimating AOC right now because I do think that there is an appetite for that kind of populist message,” Matthews said. “It does seem like that would be the smart move for the Democrats to lean more into that.”
Dick Durbin speaking to the press in October 2022.
Is the average age of a Democratic lawmaker about to drop?
Democrats have been waging a battle over who gets to bear torches for the party in the 2026 midterm elections. As GZERO’s Riley Callanan reports, young Democrats have been organizing primary challenges to older incumbents, including 85-year-old former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Until recently, 80-year-old Jan Schakowsky was also on the list, facing a challenge from 26-year-old influencer Kat Abughazaleh.
The average age of Democrats in Congress is 59, per Quorum, the third-oldest cohort since 1789. The Senate Democratic caucus is even older, with an average age of 63. Some of the older senators, like Durbin and 78-year-old Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, are retiring as their seats go up for reelection next year. Others, like Ed Markey and John Hickenlooper, who are 78 and 73, respectively, are running for another six-year term, complicating efforts to freshen up the caucus. Only one Democratic senator running for reelection next year, Jon Ossoff of Georgia, is under 50.
The push to lower the average age of Democrats in Congress comes after criticisms that 82-year-old former President Joe Biden hurt the party’s chances at holding the White House as he fought to stand for reelection.A coalition of labor unions, political action, and community groups march against DOGE and proposed cuts to Medicaid, housing, food assistance, and other vital programs in New York, New York, on March 15, 2025. Some expressed their outrage with Senator Chuck Schumer for voting to advance the Republican funding bill.
Democrats vs. Democrats
Senate Democrats unleashed a storm last week when Schumer and nine other Democrats voted in favor of a Republican-authored funding bill. To vote no, Schumer argued, would be to risk a shutdown of the federal government, a move President Donald Trump and advisor Elon Musk might use to further slash the federal bureaucracy.
House Democrats and others were furious with Schumer’s decision. They have argued that the Republican need for Democratic votes to pass the bill gave Democrats rare legislative leverage over Republicans and a chance to strike a blow at Trump. By refusing to stand up to the president and his party when given the chance, they’re leaving the public without a positive reason to vote for Democrats.
More immediately, Congress will replay this drama in September when the next funding bill comes to the floor. Now that Schumer has set a precedent by caving to pressure, critics within his party ask, what’s to prevent Republicans from offering a bill that Democrats find even more toxic than the one that passed last week, with confidence that that bill will pass too?
A new poll finds that Democratic-aligned adults say, by a margin of 52% to 48%, that the leadership of the Democratic Party is currently taking the party in the wrong direction. There isn’t yet a groundswell within the party that favors replacing Schumer as Senate minority leader, but that moment may be coming.US Vice President Kamala Harris delivers remarks at an event for young leaders at Prince George’s County Community College in Largo, Maryland on Tuesday, December 17, 2024.
Head in the Sand: Post-election research shows that Democrats' have a weakness issue
“They’ve got their heads in the sand and are absolutely committed to their own ideas, even when they’re failing,” said one focus group participant. Or, according to another, they are like koalas: “complacent and lazy about getting policy wins that we really need.”
Participants characterized the party as weak, overly focused on diversity and elites, and “not a friend of the working class anymore.” The nationwide poll also found that Trump’s approval rating is at its highest since he left office, at 47%.
While the research showed that the Democrats could capitalize on issues like abortion, health care, taxing the rich, and a fear that Trump may go too far on tariffs, it also indicates that the party has deeper perception issues that may take more than one election cycle to fix. Around the world, support for strongmen (or strongwomen – we see you, Giorgia Meloni) is surging, a current Trump has ridden back back into the White House. Democrats may struggle to make gains in the 2026 midterms if they can’t overcome their perceived weakness and other issues revealed in this research.
A flag is left at the event held by Democratic presidential nominee U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris during Election Night, at Howard University, in Washington, U.S., November 6, 2024.
Where do Democrats go from here?
One month out from the election, the dust is settling around Democrats’ new reality. The final outstanding congressional race was called on Wednesday, solidifying Republican control of the House and Senate. Meanwhile, Donald Trump is entering the White House after winning the Electoral College and the popular vote, and the conservatives hold a majority on the Supreme Court.
But enough about the Republicans. We get it, they’ve got a lot of power. So, where do Democrats go from here?
Analysts are still picking apart exactly what doomed Kamala Harris in the last election, but it’s clear that the Democrats bled base voters. Trump made gains among Black voters, Latino voters, and voters who make under $50,000 a year. These groups are at the heart of who the Democratic Party sees itself as serving and standing for, leaving the party “listless and leaderless,” according to Eurasia Group US analyst Noah Daponte-Smith. “The shift toward Trump among ancestrally Democratic voters has really jolted the party,” he adds, but what will they take away from this reckoning defeat?
In the short term, the Democrats will undergo a leadership transition, and new faces are likely to skew younger. Part of this is generational, as the party’s “old guard” of Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer fade from the scene. Lining up to take their places are representatives like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who is poised to win control of the powerful House Oversight Committee and is far more politically adroit than her fellow progressive “Squad” members. Meanwhile, governors whose names were floated to replace Joe Biden’s on the ticket — including Gavin Newsom, JB Pritzker, Gretchen Whitmer, and Josh Shapiro — will spend the next four years positioning themselves for a fierce primary fight in 2028.
In the long term, Democrats will be looking to win back the House in 2026, which Daponte-Smith predicts “should be eminently possible” thanks to Republicans having only a narrow majority and because the opposition party almost always makes gains after losing a presidential election.
“That will allow them to block the Trump legislative agenda in 2027-28,” he says, “and will give them the gavels to conduct investigations, as they did in the first Trump term.” A win in the House would give them renewed hope going into 2028. That being said, if they don’t win, true panic will set in.
But sometime between then and now, Democrats need to find clarity on their platform. The problem? There is no consensus on what led to their downfall in this election. While Harris’ defeat has some Democrats ready to start from scratch, many blame her loss on the party moving too far left and alienating dependable Democrats in the center. Others believe that the party’s message was fundamentally sound, but Biden’s late withdrawal and unpopularity doomed Harris from the get-go. Meanwhile, supporters of Bernie Sanders echo that the party lost because they left the working class behind.
Daponte-Smith says his big question about the Democrats’ next platform is which parts of the Trump 2.0 agenda they concede, like how Biden maintained Trump’s China tariffs. Potential contenders, in his view, could be RFK’s Make America Healthy Again agenda or a more restrictive stance on immigration.
We will get some clarity on the Democrats’ new direction on Feb. 1, when the party elects a new chair. Back in 2016, this election turned into a proxy fight between progressives and mainstream Democrats. This time around, it has the potential to be the same. So far, the field remains wide open, with four candidates who have officially put their hats in the ring and a dozen or so others whose names are being circulated. We will be watching this race as it will undoubtedly be an inflection point for how the party plans to move past their disastrous 2024 performance.