How Zohran Mamdani's 'joyous' ground game helped him topple Andrew Cuomo in NYC's primary

NEW YORK (AP) — On Tuesday night, shortly before polls closed in New York's Democratic mayoral primary, and less than an hour until the first signs of his seismic upset over Andrew Cuomo, Zohran Mamdani was in a Brooklyn park, searching for a ride.

“He said he’d met some kids in the park who still hadn’t voted, so he sent his personal driver to get them to a poll site before it closed,” recalled Charlie Dulik, a campaign volunteer and tenant organizer, who said he approached Mamdani in the park to say hello.

Instead, Mamdani climbed into Dulik’s 2007 Toyota Highlander, drawing cheers from passing pedestrians and cyclists as he made his last-minute pitch to voters while hanging from the car’s sunroof, according to the volunteer. “He just kept saying, ‘It’s razor thin,’” Dulik added.

While the results are not yet finalized, Mamdani’s likely primary victory has jolted the Democratic establishment, leaving many astonished that a 33-year-old democratic socialist outmaneuvered the better-funded and more experienced Cuomo.

Those close to the Mamdani campaign are less surprised. They credit a seemingly omnipresent candidate devoted to speaking directly to New Yorkers, along with a sprawling field operation that helped amplify his affordability-centered platform to new voters.

As Mamdani prepares for the November general election, they say they intend to return to that playbook once again.

“From the very beginning, he was very clear that our ground game was going to be the backbone of this entire campaign,” said Jason Halal, a lead field canvasser for Mamdani. “There was never any lack of urgency, and we got that from the top down.”

Mamdani’s approach offered a stark contrast to Cuomo’s campaign. The former governor, who resigned four years ago over a barrage of sexual harassment allegations, rarely put out a public schedule, chafed at questions from reporters and skipped most candidate forums.

He received fewer individual donations than Mamdani, but more than $25 million in super PAC funds, which were poured into ads that framed the city as beset by chaos.

“He was running a Rose Garden strategy that might’ve suited him as governor, but voters expect an intimacy from the mayor of New York City,” said Basil Smikle, a Democratic political strategist and professor at Columbia University. “They want to see you at the subway stop, the local pizza shop, at church.”

Even Cuomo’s backers — including several prominent labor unions — “didn’t seem that enthusiastic about him,” Smikle said, noting that with Mamdani’s campaign, “you saw both that anger toward the current party and hopefulness in the street.”

A Cuomo spokesperson did not respond to inquiries about the campaign’s field operations, including how many volunteers had signed up.

But some voters took notice of the candidate’s absence.

As she went to vote Tuesday, Michelle Hemmings Harrington, 70, a one-time supporter of the former governor, said she felt as though Cuomo was “taking our votes for granted.”

She carried a pile of Mamdani pamphlets and a water bottle, both handed to her by the group of nearly a dozen of his campaign volunteers stationed around her Brooklyn polling site.

When Mamdani launched his campaign late last year, few New Yorkers had heard of the two-term assemblyman. His solution: recruit an army of volunteers to knock on 1 million doors.

Much of that effort was coordinated by the Democratic Socialists of America, a left-wing organization that counts Mamdani as a member, with experience canvassing for Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other progressives.

Volunteers used an app to track the outcome of each door knock. Another app allowed them to text everyone in their phone contacts and ensure they had a plan to vote — a strategy known as “relational organizing.”

Armed with brightly colored campaign literature and screen-printed merch, supporters also set up shop around concert venues and downtown bars. They hosted cheeky events that dovetailed with Mamdani’s youth-friendly social strategy, including a Mamdani lookalike contest and a “Hot Girls for Zohran” canvas launch.

Volunteers received a “ZetroCard,” a play on the city’s MetroCard, to keep track of how many times they canvassed.

"It felt joyous and optimistic at a time when people are feeling really scared and disillusioned by the state of the world," said Halal, the field organizer.

As Mamdani’s exposure increased in recent weeks, the number of volunteers ballooned. They came from as far as Ireland and Hawaii, though many were young New Yorkers not previously involved in politics, according to Alvaro Lopez, the electoral coordinator for the city’s DSA chapter.

“People would come to us who never even thought of canvassing and say they wanted to get involved, they wanted to get to know their neighbors, they wanted to be part of this,” Lopez said. “We went from basically 300 volunteers in December to being able to launch canvases throughout the city with over 10,000 people.”

Early in the campaign, Lopez said he’d met with a 100-year-old woman in the neighborhood of East Williamsburg, where he grew up. The woman, a former city employee, hadn’t heard of Mamdani when Lopez showed up. By the end of their conversation, she said she wanted to contribute to his campaign in any way she could.

“Canvassing is about bringing ideas to people that can make them feel like they’re part of a broader political project,” Lopez said. “Our message made sense to her: she felt like it was time for a change.”

Supporters of Democratic mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani cheer before he takes the stage at his primary election party, Wednesday, June 25, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Heather Khalifa)

A poster for democratic mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani's lookalike competition is advertised on the traffic pole, Thursday, June. 26, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)

A campaign poster for Democratic mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani is seen outside a store, Thursday, June. 26, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)

Supporters of Democratic mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani cheer while he speaks at his primary election party, Wednesday, June 25, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Heather Khalifa)

LAS VEGAS (AP) — With the start of the New Year squarely behind us, it's once again time for the annual CES trade show to shine a spotlight on the latest tech companies plan on offering in 2026.

The multi-day event, organized by the Consumer Technology Association, kicks off this week in Las Vegas, where advances across industries like robotics, healthcare, vehicles, wearables, gaming and more are set to be on display.

Artificial intelligence will be anchored in nearly everything, again, as the tech industry explores offerings consumers will want to buy. AI industry heavyweight Jensen Huang will be taking the stage to showcase Nvidia's latest productivity solutions, and AMD CEO Lisa Su will keynote to “share her vision for delivering future AI solutions.” Expect AI to come up in other keynotes, like from Lenovo's CEO, Yuanqing Yang.

The AI industry is out in full force tackling issues in healthcare, with a particular emphasis on changing individual health habits to treat conditions — such as Beyond Medicine's prescription app focused on a particular jaw disorder — or addressing data shortages in subjects such as breast milk production.

Expect more unveils around domestic robots too. Korean tech giant LG already has announced it will show off a helper bot named “ CLOiD,” which allegedly will handle a range of household tasks. Hyundai also is announcing a major push on robotics and manufacturing advancements. Extended reality, basically a virtual training ground for robots and other physical AI, is also in the buzz around CES.

In 2025, more than 141,000 attendees from over 150 countries, regions, and territories attended the CES. Organizers expect around the same numbers for this year’s show, with more than 3,500 exhibitors across the floor space this week.

The AP spoke with CTA Executive Chair and CEO Gary Shapiro about what to expect for CES 2026. The conversation has been edited for clarity and length.

Well, we have a lot at this year's show.

Obviously, using AI in a way that makes sense for people. We’re seeing a lot in robotics. More robots and humanoid-looking robots than we’ve ever had before.

We also see longevity in health, there’s a lot of focus on that. All sorts of wearable devices for almost every part of the body. Technology is answering healthcare’s gaps very quickly and that’s great for everyone.

Mobility is big with not only self-driving vehicles but also with boats and drones and all sorts of other ways of getting around. That’s very important.

And of course, content creation is always very big.

You are seeing humanoid robots right now. It sometimes works, sometimes doesn’t.

But yes, there are more and more humanoid robots. And when we talk about CES 5, 10, 15, 20 years now, we’re going to see an even larger range of humanoid robots.

Obviously, last year we saw a great interest in them. The number one product of the show was a little robotic dog that seems so life-like and fun, and affectionate for people that need that type of affection.

But of course, the humanoid robots are just one aspect of that industry. There’s a lot of specialization in robot creation, depending on what you want the robot to do. And robots can do many things that humans can’t.

AI is the future of creativity.

Certainly AI itself may be arguably creative, but the human mind is so unique that you definitely get new ideas that way. So I think the future is more of a hybrid approach, where content creators are working with AI to craft variations on a theme or to better monetize what they have to a broader audience.

We’re seeing all sorts of different devices that are implementing AI. But we have a special focus at this show, for the first time, on the disability community. Verizon set this whole stage up where we have all different ways of taking this technology and having it help people with disabilities and older people.

Well, there’s definitely no bubble when it comes to what AI can do. And what AI can do is perform miracles and solve fundamental human problems in food production and clean air and clean water. Obviously in healthcare, it’s gonna be overwhelming.

But this was like the internet itself. There was a lot of talk about a bubble, and there actually was a bubble. The difference is that in late 1990s there were basically were no revenue models. Companies were raising a lot of money with no plans for revenue.

These AI companies have significant revenues today, and companies are investing in it.

What I’m more concerned about, honestly, is not Wall Street and a bubble. Others can be concerned about that. I’m concerned about getting enough energy to process all that AI. And at this show, for the first time, we have a Korean company showing the first ever small-scale nuclear-powered energy creation device. We expect more and more of these people rushing to fill this gap because we need the energy, we need it clean and we need a kind of all-of-the-above solution.

A Coro breastfeeding monitor is pictured at a Coroflo booth during the CES Unveiled tech show Sunday, Jan. 4, 2026, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)

Yonbo X1 robots are pictured at the X-Orgin booth during the CES Unveiled tech show Sunday, Jan. 4, 2026, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)

A Tombot robotic puppy is pictured at a Tombot booth during the CES Unveiled tech show Sunday, Jan. 4, 2026, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)

People arrive at the CES Unveiled tech show Sunday, Jan. 4, 2026, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)