skip to contentAdvertisementCarl E. Heastie, the speaker of the state Assembly who often tangled with Mamdani in his days as an Assembly member, introduced him Friday night as “the man of the hour.”By: New York Times San Juan,November 11, 2025 07:23 AM IST First published on: Nov 11, 2025 at 07:23 AM IST ShareWhatsapptwitterFacebookMayor-elect of New York City Zohran Mamdani greets people after speaking at the Labor Breakfast organized by Somos Inc., the NY Senate Puerto Rican/Hispanic Task Force, and the NY Labor Council for Latin American Advancement at the Somos conference in San Juan, Puerto Rico. (The New York Times)Three days after winning New York City’s bitterly fought mayoral election, Zohran Mamdani strode into the ballroom of a seaside Puerto Rican resort Friday evening dressed in all white, a color for peacemaking.He smiled, the room paused and then dozens of lobbyists, local lawmakers and union reps pressed toward him. Introductions were shouted. Selfies were snapped. Hugs abounded.After just about two minutes, Mamdani was so overwhelmed that he asked his security detail to pull him from the room for a breather before the night spun on.There was a time — as recently as, well, Tuesday — that Mamdani, a 34-year-old democratic socialist, and much of New York’s political establishment were in an open civil war. He campaigned hard against the old Democratic guard and its transactional politics; they dismissed him as too young, too left, too inexperienced to lead a city of 300,000 municipal workers and a $116 billion budget.But 1,600 miles away, on the Caribbean beaches where New York’s political class decamps every year for a postelection retreat, both sides seemed ready to cast aside their differences over three days of seminars, soirees and late-night mojitos — at least for now.Carl E. Heastie, the speaker of the state Assembly who often tangled with Mamdani in his days as an Assembly member, introduced him Friday night as “the man of the hour.”Labor leaders and business lobbyists, who not long ago steered donations into super political action committees villainizing him, jockeyed for private meetings. Mamdani, in turn, dispatched top aides to attend a reception hosted by major Jewish groups wary of his anti-Israel views.People listen to mayor-elect of New York City Zohran Mamdani speak at the Labor Breakfast at the Labor Breakfast organized by Somos Inc., the NY Senate Puerto Rican/Hispanic Task Force, and the NY Labor Council for Latin American Advancement at the Somos conference in San Juan, Puerto Rico. (The New York Times)And at one point Thursday, a couple of hundred people at a union-hosted reception joined Letitia James, the state attorney general, in an off-key adaptation of “Volare,” with the mayor-elect’s name swapped in.“Mam-dan-i,” they sang under a canopy of palm trees. “Oh-oh-oh-oh.”If the reconciliation was perhaps a little too swift, or the beachfront venues a little too ritzy for Mamdani’s populist campaign rhetoric, few of the hundreds of participants in New York’s permanent political class seemed to want to talk about it as they munched on mofongo and plotted the city’s future.“It went from a morgue to a victory party,” said Todd Shapiro, who as Mayor Eric Adams’ campaign spokesperson, spent months trying to stop Mamdani. “A lot of people are giving the new mayor the benefit of the doubt.”He paused before adding: “It might have been the alcohol that helped, too.”In a handful of short speeches, Mamdani did drop references to the “tens of millions of dollars” spent against him and the “politics of small imagination” that has prevailed under his Democratic predecessors.Mostly, though, he sought to paper over divisions. He agreed to be the guest of honor Friday at an invite-only reception hosted by Gov. Kathy Hochul at a former casino in Old San Juan, where guests were entertained by masked dancers on stilts.“Together in this room and on this stage, I feel something that is all too rare in our politics,” Mamdani told the audience. “A united front.”But reminders of unresolved political fissures never fall far below the surface at the Caribe Hilton, which played host to the annual Somos conference. How Mamdani navigates those challenges may determine the course of his mayoralty.When Hochul took the stage just before Mamdani on Thursday night, she was greeted with chants of “tax the rich.”They were a reference to Mamdani’s calls for the state to levy billions of dollars in new taxes on the city’s wealthiest residents and corporations. The revenue would go to fund the free buses, free child care and other ambitious campaign promises that helped him win the election.“I hear you,” she said with a note of irritation. “I’m the type of person — the more you push me, the more I’m not going to do what you want.”(BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM.)Hochul, a pro-business moderate, has generally been reluctant to raise taxes — and income taxes in particular, despite pressure from the left. She is currently preparing for next year’s legislative session, when she will be running for reelection, and has said she wants to expand child care.(END OPTIONAL TRIM.)Elsewhere at the hotel, the two leading candidates for City Council speaker, Julie Menin of Manhattan and Crystal Hudson of Brooklyn, hosted rival receptions to try to woo colleagues. Many attendees believe Menin, a longtime city official, would put a check on Mamdani’s leftist impulses, while Hudson would lock arms with him.Another potential high-wattage fight was brewing poolside. Brad Lander, the city comptroller, was not so secretly laying the groundwork for a primary challenge against Rep. Dan Goldman, often with a beer in hand. Both men are liberal Democrats, but Lander is a Mamdani ally and Goldman is not, having voiced concerns about the mayor-elect’s harsh criticism of Israel.(BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM.)And just as former Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s long run in politics appeared to be over after his loss to Mamdani on Tuesday, rumors shot around the oval bar at the El San Juan hotel — a favored watering hole for attendees — that Cuomo could possibly run for a House seat to replace retiring Rep. Jerrold Nadler in Manhattan.“Everyone should put down the mojitos,” his spokesperson, Rich Azzopardi said, throwing cold water on the idea.(END OPTIONAL TRIM.)Still, by far most of the attention was on the new mayor, who darted around San Juan with the same speed that characterized his campaign.Mamdani touched down Thursday afternoon in a window seat on JetBlue paid for by funds raised for his mayoral transition. (It was a stark contrast with Adams, who arrived in Puerto Rico four years ago as mayor-elect on a private jet owned by a crypto billionaire.)He skipped out on late-night parties, but visited hotel workers at the El San Juan who just won a new contract, pattered in well-accented Spanish and attended Friday prayers at a mosque far from the beachfront parties, where a Palestinian flag was hoisted behind stacks of canned goods and fruit that were part of a food distribution event.Mobbed by reporters, Mamdani studiously refused to make news. When one asked if Hochul was “throwing cold water” on his victory, Mamdani offered a joke rather than a barb.“To be honest, I wish I had some cold water right now,” he said as sweat dripped down his brow in the Caribbean sun while he wore a long-sleeved guayabera shirt. (He did stop at one point to get a coconut drink from a roadside vendor.)After years of easy access to Adams and his inner circle, lobbyists were busy trying to get intel on Mamdani’s small inner circle and secure meetings with Elle Bisgaard-Church, his top adviser, and Ali Najmi, his counsel.“I tell everyone — civic organizations, businesses, interests groups — just breathe and wait,” said Emily Giske, a top lobbyist for Bolton-St. Johns. “People want to know before anyone else does — and that’s ridiculous.”(BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM.)Several city officials said to be under consideration for posts in Mamdani’s administration were circling, including Dan Garodnick, the head of the city planning department; Quemuel Arroyo, a top official at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority; and Melissa Aviles-Ramos, the schools chancellor.The teachers union has encouraged Mamdani to keep Aviles-Ramos and, on Friday, she visited the mosque with him. Afterward, she said she would be interested in staying on.“If I’m given the opportunity, of course I would be grateful,” she said, adding that she was also grateful to Adams.(END OPTIONAL TRIM.)During breaks from the partying, fixtures of the city’s permanent government seemed to have very different assessments of the moment.John Samuelsen, the international president of the Transport Workers Union, urged Democrats to fully unite behind Mamdani’s vision — even if just for their own sake.“The midterm elections are riding on his success,” he said. “I think that’s the unspoken, extremely important thing.”But others came away frustrated that flash was blotting out substance.“He is being treated like one of the Beatles,” said Jay Martin, an executive at the New York Apartment Association, a trade group representing rent-stabilized landlords.“Yeah, great we’re all gonna work together, but how are we going to pay for this?” he said. “And that’s what I think everybody is just delusionally not dealing with.”As for Mamdani, after months of campaigning, he sounded ready for a real vacation as he marched back and forth through the Hilton.Asked by a reporter if he would take one soon, he quipped, “you sound like the inner monologue of my own head.”AdvertisementAdvertisementLoading Taboola...