When midnight struck in New York, the large ball of Irish crystals and LED lights descended from the top of the Times Square number 1 building to mark, like every year, the end of one era and the beginning of another. And the city hasn’t just welcomed 2026. Or the second quarter of the 21st century. Its nearly 8.5 million inhabitants also welcomed the dawn of a new era. The era of Zohran Kwame Mamdani.
In another New Year’s tradition, the first Muslim and socialist mayor of the most populous city in the United States and unofficial capital of the world took office in the first minutes of 2026. It was in a private ceremony, held about fifty blocks south of Manhattan and in a parallel universe to the bustle of Times Square.
Faithful to his talent for choreographing the steps that took him in just over 12 months from the status of an almost unknown young politician, member of the Democratic Socialist Party of America, to one of the great global hopes of the left, the new mayor chose the ghost station of the City Hall subway, a filigree of another era, with its vaults by the Spanish architect Rafael Guastavino and its brass chandeliers, completed in 1904 and decommissioned since the end of the Second World War.
There, Mamdani made history as the first 9/11 city councilor to take the oath of office on a Quran. Three, in fact, two of them inherited from his family – his parents, the Indian filmmaker Mira Nair and the Ugandan academic from Colombia Mahmoud Mamdani were present at the event – and a third, which he will use early Thursday afternoon during the second inauguration. This one belongs to the collection of the Afro-Puerto Rican writer Arturo Schomburg.
The decision is loaded with symbolism for nearly a million Muslims who live in the city. It’s a growing community. Highlighted after the attack on the Twin Towers and which now sees one of its own brandishing the stick, to the great dismay of the American extreme right and Christian nationalism which dominates the MAGA (Make America Great Again) world.
“It is the honor of my life to take office as mayor. We have chosen this place to demonstrate the importance of public transportation in the vitality, health and heritage of our city,” declared the new mayor, after taking the oath of office in the presence of his wife, Rama Duwaji, and the Attorney General of the State of New York, Letitia James, responsible for taking the oath, in another significant election.
James was the scourge of Mamdani’s rival at the polls, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, as well as then-Republican candidate Donald Trump, whom he sued in New York in a civil suit for inflating his wealth. Once Trump punched his ticket to the White House, his Justice Department didn’t stop until it indicted James, one of the Democratic politicians who jumped earliest on the Mamdani change train.
Two other notable figures from the American left, without whom it would not be possible to understand the rise of the new mayor, will participate this Thursday in his second inauguration, the massive celebration of his arrival at town hall. Bronx Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez will deliver a speech on the steps of City Hall around 1 p.m. (New York time, six more in mainland Spain). Sen. Bernie Sanders (Vt.) will then lead Mamdani’s swearing-in.
It was Sanders’ campaign in the 2016 presidential election, the first won by Trump, that prompted the new mayor to abandon his career as a regular rapper and enter politics in the left-wing faction of the Democratic Party, whose victory and his new style, a blend of hard-to-imitate charisma, a message based on controlling the cost of living and an unusual mastery of social media, was shocking.
Endless campaign
To a large extent, Mamdani’s campaign did not end with his resounding victory at the polls on November 4, the day when two million New Yorkers went to the polls and broke a turnout record not seen since the late 1960s. Relying on ads and coups, the young politician remained committed to his mission of convincing his neighbors (and the rest of the world) that he was prepared to make up for his inexperience by listening to the problems of New Yorkers.
It is now his turn to demonstrate that his promises – free buses, daycare for all and freezing rent increases for rent-controlled apartments – do not contradict the reality of managing a $150 billion budget. And that it will also be possible to make New York a safe city.
Mindful of Abraham Lincoln’s old admonition – “Public opinion is everything.” With her, nothing can go wrong; without it, nothing can be right” – his first decision as mayor was to organize a street party for his neighbors. Tens of thousands of them are invited this Thursday, alongside the four thousand who usually attend the inauguration, to shake off their New Year’s Eve hangover and go to the area around City Hall in Lower Manhattan, in a neighborhood party inspired by those in which the culture was born hip-hop in the Bronx.
And once again, Mamdani is determined to make history. It’s the first time the city has welcomed its new mayor by taking to the streets on a day when subzero temperatures are expected. It is not simply a matter of greeting the 112th municipal councilor in more or less 400 years of existence, and not the 111th, as was believed until a few weeks ago, when an archivist adjusted the count of the mayor’s occupants. It is a list in which there were already immigrants, remarkably young men or sympathizers of socialism like Mamdani, but never a woman.
This time it is also about inaugurating an era, that of Zohan Kwame Mamdani. Now it’s his turn to keep his promise. It won’t be easy.
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