In the final hours of the New York City mayoral race, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo has found support from figures who don’t typically cozy up to Democrats.
A number of Republicans, now including President Donald Trump and tech magnate Elon Musk, have backed Cuomo to avoid a Zohran Mamdani mayoralty.
The late moves signal an ongoing concern from the socialist’s opposition that his win is inevitable, given that he has led all his opponents in the polls by double digits for months. Two AtlasIntel polls have given the Cuomo campaign hope, with a single-digit lead by Mamdani, but the survey still shows Cuomo outside the margin of error to win.
Trump wrote a Truth Social post on Monday, which he later reposted, boosting Cuomo. He said the Democrat had a “record of success” and that Cuomo is “capable” of doing a fantastic job. The president also echoed a Cuomo campaign talking point, which is that a vote for the Republican Curtis Sliwa “is a vote for Mamdani.”
“Whether you personally like Andrew Cuomo or not, you really have no choice. You must vote for him, and hope he does a fantastic job. He is capable of it, Mamdani is not!” Trump wrote.
The president had not endorsed Cuomo in the race before now, but had previously signaled his preference for him. At one point, he was vicious rivals with Cuomo and blasted his leadership day after day.
“Governor Cuomo has shown tremendously poor leadership skills in running N.Y. Bad time for him to be writing and promoting a book, especially since he has done such a poor job with Covid and Crime. So many unnecessary deaths. The City & State have sunk to historic lows,” he wrote on X in October 2020 during his first term.
Cuomo later said at a news conference in Manhattan that Trump was “not endorsing me, he’s opposing Mamdani.” Cuomo added that he won’t blame Sliwa if he loses.
“No, I’m not going to blame anyone, because I’m not going to lose tomorrow,” he said.
The Mamdani campaign called Trump’s endorsement the “nail in the coffin” for Cuomo. Sliwa said the president is “entitled” to his own opinion, but that the “people’s opinion” is the only one that concerns him.
Musk’s endorsement came a few hours before the president’s, but reflected much of the same sentiment: any votes for Sliwa equaled support for Mamdani, and Cuomo should be mayor.
“Remember to vote tomorrow in New York! Bear in mind that a vote for Curtis is really a vote for Mumdumi or whatever his name is. VOTE CUOMO!” Musk wrote on his X social media platform. He pinned the post to his page, signaling its importance.
Other notable Republicans backed Cuomo in the final hours before election day.
White House advisor Stephen Miller matched Trump’s support for Cuomo.
“The Anti-Mamdani vote which is really the pro-NYC vote, the pro-America vote, needs to unite behind a leading candidate and that’s Andrew Cuomo,” he said.
Former New York Rep. George Santos, who once posted on social media that he hopes Cuomo “goes to hell” and said he had a role in “murdering senior citizens in nursing homes during the pandemic,” endorsed Cuomo.
“A vote for Curtis is a vote for Mamdani… As bad and horrible as Cuomo is I rather him over the jihadist sympathizer. Please vote like your life depends on it!” he wrote on X, noting his support for Cuomo was “forced.”
All of the endorsements likely will not move New York Democrats, who largely do not like the administration, Trump, Musk, or Santos. However, Republicans could be swayed by Trump’s endorsement and move their votes to Cuomo. However, his nod could also alienate Democrats supportive of Cuomo.
Some New York Republicans stuck with Sliwa in the closing hours of the race. Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani reiterated his endorsement of Sliwa on Monday and said voters shouldn’t have to vote for someone in high office whom they don’t feel good about.
“You’re not supposed to vote for someone in high office you gotta hold your nose about,” he said on his show. “They can go in there, and they don’t have to hold their nose, and they can vote for Curtis. And then we can have a mayor so we don’t have to walk around New York City holding our nose.”
Endorsements aside, New York City voters will choose their next mayor on Tuesday.
If Cuomo loses to the politically inexperienced Mamdani, it will be because voters ultimately could not stomach the ugly parts of his long political career. Trump and Republicans savored opportunities to blast Cuomo when they could on his faults, and now they’re turning to voters to ask them to support the former governor.
Mamdani said in a CNN appearance that the timing of the Trump endorsement was odd. He said Cuomo “wanted to be able to make the message to Democrats that he was, in fact, the governor that he said he was,” but then waited until the last moment to “fully embrace the MAGA movement that we have long said he is tied to.”
TRUMP SAYS NYC VOTERS HAVE ‘NO CHOICE’ BUT TO VOTE CUOMO FOR MAYOR
New York Democratic strategist Max Burns suggested to the Washington Examiner that he believes the endorsement effort is shameful and amounts to a Hail Mary.
“Shame is a dead idea in American politics, you do whatever you can and hope the Hail Mary works, even if it reveals you to have no values whatsoever,” he said.
