75% of Jewish voters in New York have unfavorable opinion of socialist NYC candidate Zohran Mamdani: Siena College poll

The numbers make the socialist Queens lawmaker the least popular political figure among Jewish New Yorkers in the poll, sharply undercutting media narratives that he enjoys meaningful support within the community. His unfavorability among Jewish voters is 38 points higher than his standing with the general state population surveyed for the poll, where he registers a 37 percent negative rating compared to 28 percent positive. The remainder of respondents said they either didn’t know or had no opinion.

The deep disapproval follows months of controversy over Mamdani’s explicitly anti-Israel campaign rhetoric. He has falsely accused Israel of “apartheid,” called for a US arms embargo against the country, labeled its Gaza military operations a “genocide,” and refused to affirm its right to exist as a Jewish state, per The Algemeiner. Mamdani has also been a vocal supporter of the pro-Palestinian boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement.

Jewish leaders across the city have condemned his positions as dangerously one-sided, warning they feed into the surge of antisemitism seen globally and in the United States. Critics say Mamdani’s rhetoric erases Israel’s right to self-defense and alienates Jewish New Yorkers concerned about rising hostility toward their community.

A mere 20 percent of Jewish voters told Siena they intend to support Mamdani in November. That figure sharply contradicts earlier polls widely cited in the press, including a story by The New York Times that interviewed only five Jewish respondents but still ran under the headline, “Many Jewish voters back Mamdani and many agree with him on Gaza.” Another poll, reportedly commissioned by a Mamdani adviser and conducted by a known supporter, claimed most Jews and one in four conservatives supported him, a finding critics derided as implausible but still received significant media coverage.

According to the new Siena numbers, 44 percent of Jewish voters in New York City plan to back former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, while 23 percent support Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa. Only 4 percent say they will vote for incumbent Mayor Eric Adams.

Mamdani, 33, is a self-described democratic socialist who surged to victory in this year’s Democratic mayoral primary, winning 43.5 percent of first-choice votes to Cuomo’s 36.4 percent in the city’s ranked-choice system. Virtually unknown before the race, he built his campaign around radical leftist causes, including the BDS movement and opposition to US military aid to Israel.

His most incendiary remarks came when he defended the slogan “globalize the intifada,” a rallying cry rooted in past waves of Palestinian terrorism against Jews and Israelis, by comparing it to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising during the Holocaust. The US Holocaust Memorial Museum swiftly condemned his comments as “outrageous and especially offensive to survivors.”