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Only two days prior to the New York mayoral election, political analyst Michael Lange made a bold forecast – not just the winner citywide, and precinct by precinct. The analyst, an expert in elections born and raised in New York City, has spent over a decade in left-leaning activism and emerged as a kind of well-known figure this year for his deep dives into city data and voter surveys.

He released his highly detailed forecast map – which correctly forecast that the progressive candidate would win while failed to predict the independent candidate’s strong performance – on his Substack, his platform. Lange has a flair for clever terms. He highlighted, as an example, the divide between the progressive stronghold, stretching from Park Slope to Bushwick to Astoria, where he forecasted (accurately) that the left-wing candidate would triumph by huge margins, and the conservative-leaning zone on affluent parts of Manhattan. There, “the Free Press and Wall Street Journal surpass the mainstream paper” in readership and the majority of electors leaned toward Cuomo, who ran as a moderate alternative.

Voting Day Patterns and Unexpected Results

What was your night?

It was necessary because they were dropping around 200,000 votes into the tally every few minutes! I was actually a little nervous initially: Mamdani led the initial ballots by a dozen percentage points, but there were two big batches of votes that came in after that and his lead dropped from 12% to 8%. I was worried.

Understand, there was a world in which yesterday went kind of poorly for him, where Cuomo would have basically increasing his support from the earlier contest. But the winner added 500,000 supporters to his initial base, and this was critical why he succeeded. He went out and greatly broadened his base from the first round.

Coalition Building

Where did the mayor-elect gain those extra votes from?

He built the coalition that progressives always wanted to build: diverse racially, it’s young, tenants and individuals facing cost pressures. He gained significantly with minority communities, everyday New Yorkers, compared to the earlier election. Plus he boosted his base of liberal progressives, young leftists, and Muslims and south Asians. Victory required without expanding his appeal.

He built the coalition that progressives long aimed for: diverse, young, renters and people struggling with costs

Additionally, there were a number of Trump/Mamdani voters – is that a big trend?

It’s definitely a real thing, limited to working-class Latinos, Asian communities and Muslims. Voters in immigrant strongholds that supported the former president previously backed Zohran now. But I wouldn’t say he was winning over white working-class voters and Maga voters.

Turnout and Impact

A major development of the night was the record turnout. Who benefited?

Both sides. Turnout was much greater than anticipated. I figured it could go over two million, but it reached 2.3 million – that 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 forecasted he’d exceed half the ballots. Is he on course for that?

Right now it appears he’s likely to surpass half. He has 50.4% but remain probably 200K ballots uncounted as of Wednesday morning. Thus it’s not certain, but I think probable, and I hope he does because then none can claim Sliwa was a spoiler.

GOP Decline

The GOP candidate, the conservative contender, is the other big story. His support completely collapsed.

He didn’t win any district in any area. Not even Tottenville in Staten Island, which is like an highly conservative neighborhood. That really surprised me. The independent held Caucasian districts, very wealthy areas and very religiously Jewish areas, and plus gained many Republicans on Staten Island with a strong turnout. I think there was significant tactical voting by GOP voters. This happened prior to Trump endorsed for the candidate, but it assisted. It might have changed the outcome if the winning alliance hadn’t grown.

Progressive Strongholds

What about your much mentioned “commie corridor” – was support for the candidate dominant in those areas of Brooklyn and Queens?

In my view existed some weakening of the progressive zone in some areas like neighborhoods that have more older white ethnic folks. In Astoria, instance, the Greek landlords and residents supported Cuomo. Thus there existed some opposition. However no, largely the leftist base is a key factor why Zohran prevailed – he scored between high percentages in Fort Greene, Clinton Hill and Bushwick.

Jewish Voters

In the lead-up to the election there was coverage on whether the candidate was gaining ground with the community. Is there any suggestion that he succeeded?

There are areas with a lot of secular and more progressive-leaning Jews – such as specific locales – where he did well. However in the affluent districts like the Manhattan area, his Middle East stance was influential in those places. Similarly in the moderate communities including Queens neighborhoods, or Spuyten Duyvil and Riverdale – they favored Cuomo. Plus, you have newcomers from the former Soviet Union in the borough, they were pretty staunchly Cuomo. Therefore it’s unclear if there were major surprises here, but Mamdani did hold left-leaning areas and even parts of the Upper West Side by big margins.

Political Impact

Has Mamdani rewritten what New York means politically? Will progressive base become a launch pad for progressive contenders?

Yes, it’s not accidental that some of the biggest figures from progressives hail from a few areas in Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx. I’m sure that we’ll see more of that – candidates will emerge from these neighborhoods to be promoted to higher office.

But I think that each urban center in the US can have similar progressive hubs. Urban places are the epicenters of leftwing power in America – because youth reside there, tenancy is common and they represent locales where people are crushed by the inequalities exist.