‘I will not be intimidated by this president,’ Mamdani says as Trump urges New Yorkers to vote for Cuomo
When asked by a reporter today about Donald Trump’s comments on Truth Social that he plans to limit federal funds to New York City if Zohran Mamdani wins, the Democratic nominee said that he will “will treat his threats as they deserve to be treated, which are the words of a president and not necessarily the law of the land”.
The progressive favorite also said the city deserves a mayor “who stands up for New Yorkers each and every day, not one who’s willing to sacrifice those New Yorkers so that they can stand up for themselves”.
“I will not be intimidated by this president. I will not be intimidated by anyone, because my job here is to serve the people of the city,” he added.
Key events
Leavitt clarifies that administration will make partial Snap payments, following Trump’s contradictory social media posts
Karoline Leavitt confirmed today that the administration is “fully complying” with the court order by a federal judge to disperse partial Snap payments to beneficiaries, using a USDA contingency fund.
This comes after a Truth Social post earlier, in which Donald Trump said that funds will only be released after the government shutdown ends – apparently defying the judge’s ruling.
“We are digging into a contingency fund that is supposed to be for emergencies, catastrophes, for war, and the president does not want to have to tap into this fund in the future, and that’s what he was referring to in his Truth Social post,” Leavitt said. “The best way to get the full amount of Snap benefits to those beneficiaries is for Democrats to reopen the government.”
White House says that it is ‘continually pushing Mexico to do more’ in tackling drug cartels
Karoline Leavitt said today that the White House is “continually pushing Mexico to do more to tackle the drug trafficking and the drug cartels within their country”. This comes as Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, has denied reports that the US is planning to send troops into Mexico to confront the country’s powerful cartels, noting that she has repeatedly rejected such offers from Donald Trump.
“The president has obviously used the full range of executive options and his authorities to crack down on drug trafficking at our southern border and to designate these cartels as foreign terrorist organizations in additional actions as well,” Leavitt said.
She added that Trump has “a lot of respect for her as president of Mexico, and he also really appreciates the coordination that she has provided to the Trump administration”.
Musk promotes his own tweet as anti-Mamdani ad
Nick Robins-Early
Elon Musk is leveraging X, the social media platform he owns, to push a last-minute anti-Mamdani message out to millions of the site’s users. One of Musk’s posts was also listed as an advertisement and used a feature on X that boosts reach to show more users the content.
“Bear in mind that a vote for Curtis is really a vote for Mumdumi or whatever his name is,” Musk said in the post that he pinned to the top of his profile and also appeared as an ad. “VOTE CUOMO!”
The Texas-based Tesla CEO attacked the Democratic candidate in several posts this week and suggested on Tuesday that New York City’s ballots were a “scam” – misrepresenting basic aspects of the city’s electoral system, such as candidates being nominated by multiple parties.
Musk, a top Republican megadonor who has also backed far-right parties abroad, previously criticized Zohran Mamdani as a “charismatic swindler” during an interview last week on Joe Rogan’s podcast.
We’re waiting to hear from White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, who is due to hold a briefing for reporters shortly.
We’ll bring you the latest lines as it happens.
It’s 12.48pm in New York and the New York Times has noted that more people have already voted in this election than in the entire 2021 mayor’s race, and the polls don’t close until 9pm tonight.
Almost 460,000 New Yorkers cast ballots between 6am and noon, the City Board of Elections told the NYT. Added to the 735,000 early votes, the total number of votes cast so far stands at about 1.2 million. In 2021, when Eric Adams beat Curtis Sliwa, turnout was about 1.15 million.
Flags are flying at half-staff at the White House this morning after the announcement of the death of former vice-president Dick Cheney. Despite being active on his Truth Social plaftorm today, Donald Trump has still yet to comment publicly on Cheney’s death.
Here are the clips of Democratic mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani and independent candidate Andrew Cuomo casting their votes in New York City’s mayoral election.
Much attention in the US and abroad will be on democratic socialist Mamdani, who is facing off against Cuomo, a former New York governor who is running as an independent after losing the Democratic primary earlier this year, and Republican candidate Curtis Sliwa.
New York City’s voters are deciding the outcome of a generational and ideological divide that will resonate across the country as they choose the next mayor to run the nation’s largest city.
Cuomo casts his ballot in Manhattan
According to the New York Times, Andrew Cuomo joked that he still hadn’t decided who to vote for as he arrived at his polling places on East 56th Street.
“I’m feeling very good,” the NYT quotes the independent candidate as saying later. “I feel that the momentum is on our side.” He said he thought high turnout would work in his favor and called the vote “the most important election of my lifetime”. The result will have huge implications for the future of the city and the Democratic party at large.
When pressed about receiving Donald Trump’s endorsement, Cuomo appeared to acknowledge that the president’s 11th hour backing was reluctantly given. “The president does not support me,” he said. “He opposes Zohran.”
Peter Walker
in London
Much has been made in the UK of the parallels between Sadiq Khan, the London mayor, and Zohran Mamdani, particularly the often very open prejudice they have experienced as politicians of a Muslim faith.
This has not been lost on Khan and his team, with a source close to the London mayor saying he hoped it would only be a temporary phenomenon if Mamdani is elected.
The source said: “The similarities between the attacks Mamdani has faced and what Sadiq has faced in elections, particularly in 2016 are uncanny.”
“Weaponizing Mamdani’s faith and linking him to terrorism and extremism is an old campaigning tactic, and one we’re all too familiar with here in London,” the source added. “The closer we get to the election, and the more his positive vision has connected with voters in New York City, the more divisive and desperate Mamdani’s opponents have become.”
“The mayor hopes that like in London, New Yorkers see through the politics of hatred and fear, and embrace Mamdani’s hopeful and optimistic vision for the future.”
In his first election campaign in 2016, Khan faced a campaign from his Conservative opponent, Zac Goldsmith, that was condemned by critics as, at times, clearly racist. Despite also being highly secular and liberal, Khan was also implicitly linked to Islamist terrorism, in his case the 2005 suicide bombings on London’s underground and bus network.
Trump appears to defy judge’s ruling on Snap benefits in Truth Social post
As part of a flurry of posts today on Truth Social, the president wrote that Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (Snap) benefits, also known as food stamps, “will be given only when the Radical Left Democrats open up government which they can easily do, and not before!”
This message seems to defy his own administration’s agreement this week to abide by a federal judge’s order, and issue partial payments to the 42 million Snap beneficiaries across the country, using the program’s contingency fund.
Trump also said that Snap benefits were “haphazardly ‘handed’ to anyone for the asking, as opposed to just those in need” under Joe Biden. During the previous administration, Snap payments did rise after Biden issued an executive order in 2021 that required the Thrifty Food Plan to adjust their guidelines to account for inflation. This led to a benefit increase of about $36 per person, according to the Network for Public Health Law.
‘I will not be intimidated by this president,’ Mamdani says as Trump urges New Yorkers to vote for Cuomo
When asked by a reporter today about Donald Trump’s comments on Truth Social that he plans to limit federal funds to New York City if Zohran Mamdani wins, the Democratic nominee said that he will “will treat his threats as they deserve to be treated, which are the words of a president and not necessarily the law of the land”.
The progressive favorite also said the city deserves a mayor “who stands up for New Yorkers each and every day, not one who’s willing to sacrifice those New Yorkers so that they can stand up for themselves”.
“I will not be intimidated by this president. I will not be intimidated by anyone, because my job here is to serve the people of the city,” he added.
My colleagues, Maya Yang, Will Craft and Andrew Witherspoon, have put together a useful guide as the results of the highly anticipated New York mayoral election start to trickle in later today.
They note that the first results will come in shortly after the polls close at 9pm ET, and will continue to come in throughout the night. In 2021, the Associated Press declared Eric Adams the winner around midnight.
New York had nine days of early voting which ended on 2 November. According to the city’s board of elections, there were more than 730,000 early votes cast.
Labor secretary says unemployment insurance is next concern as shutdown is poised to be longest on record
Lori Chavez-DeRemer said today that unemployment insurance, delivered by states, “will be the next thing that we have to be concerned about” as the shutdown enters its 35th day.
“The American workers deserve to know where their next paycheck is coming from, and the American economy deserves the American workers there,” she added.
Johnson says that Republicans are appealing to a ‘handful’ of moderate Democrats to end the shutdown
When asked about the ongoing bipartisan conversations between senators, Mike Johnson said that he doesn’t know much about these meeting, but reaffirmed that he does not think “Chuck Schumer or Hakeem Jeffries will ever vote to reopen the government”.
“I know there are, we hope, we pray, a handful of moderate and centrist Democrats left in among the Democrats in the Senate, where the whole country is counting upon them,” Johnson added. “So we’re going above the heads of the so-called leadership, and we are appealing to the consciences of a handful of people in the Senate who want to do the right thing and just stop the pain, stop the pain for the American people.”
Trump’s labor secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer is now speaking at Johnson’s press conference. She, like the rest of the administration, has blamed Democrats for playing “political games”, and causing the government to shutdown.
“I am begging these Democrats to show up, do their job and open up this government. 35 days is far too long for the American people. Enough is enough,” she added.
