NYC won’t know mayoral primary results until at least July 1, but they may have a clue
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NYC won’t know mayoral primary results until at least July 1, but they may have a clue
Zohran Mamdani and Andrew Cuomo are in a tight race for New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary. The city uses ranked choice voting, a system that allows residents to vote for up to five candidates in order from their most preferred to least. If no candidate gets more than 50% of first-place votes, then the least-popular candidate is eliminated and their supporters’ votes redistributed to other candidates. The process takes time, meaning voters are very unlikely know the results on election night.
Unofficial results likely won’t be announced by the city Board of Elections until July 1, and the results won’t be officially certified until July 14.
Since 2021, in primaries the city uses ranked choice voting, a system that allows residents to vote for up to five candidates in order from their most preferred to least. If no candidate gets more than 50% of first-place votes, which seems very likely based on polls of the crowded mayoral field, then the least-popular candidate is eliminated and their supporters’ votes redistributed to other candidates based on their lower-ranked preferences.
This process takes time, meaning voters are very unlikely know the results on election night. In 2021, when current mayor Eric Adams (who is running for re-election this year as an Independent) secured victory, it took several days to determine just how close Kathryn Garcia, the runner-up, came to beating him after all the ranked-choice tabulations.
But voters may have a clue based on the first-place results: While Cuomo has consistently led among first-place votes in polls, supporters of the candidates polling in third through sixth place − City Comptroller Brad Lander, his precedessor Scott Stringer, City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams and state Sen. Zelnor Myrie − appear less likely to rank Cuomo on their ballots than Mamdani. As a result, the most recent poll, a June 23 Emerson College Polling/PIX11/The Hill survey, showed Mamdani beating Cuomo 52% to 48% in the eighth and final round of the instant runoff, even though Cuomo had 35% of first-place votes, followed by Mamdani at 32%.
Pundits such as Ross Barkan and City & State’s Tom Allon, say that means Mamdani is very likely to win if he’s ahead in first-place votes and he has a good shot of winning the election if he’s losing by fewer than 5 percentage points for first place. On the other hand, Cuomo is safe if he’s winning first-place votes by about 10 percentage points or more.