NEW YORK, USA – Large crowds, seven-block parties and chants of “Tax the rich” rang out in the world’s richest city on Thursday for Zoran Mamdani’s public swearing-in as mayor of New York as the metropolis ushered in the new year with a new leader.
Political inaugurations are usually much more low-key affairs. But, as he did during his mayoral campaign, Mamdani flipped the script at his swearing-in event.
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In the first act, just after midnight, as the ball drops in Times Square for 2026, Mandani takes the oath of office in a small ceremony on the steps of the landmark New York City Hall subway station.
New York State Attorney General Letitia James administered the oath to Mamdani as he stood next to his wife, Rama Duwaj, on a staircase inside the transportation hub. The staircase has not been used for passenger service since 1945. He used a historical Quran borrowed from the New York Public Library for the oath, as well as a second Quran that belonged to his grandfather.
Public celebrations then arrived on New Year’s Day, when Mamdani repeated the oath on the steps of City Hall to a crowd that spilled out into the street from the surrounding square. Despite the bitter cold, tens of thousands of supporters, along with City Comptroller Mark Levine and Public Defender Jumaane Williams, flocked to Lower Manhattan to watch the new mayor be officially sworn in.
National political figures, including Vermont Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Bernie Sanders, flanked the city’s new leadership in speeches outlining the progressive movement’s ambitions to govern New York and the national resonance the party already has with lawmakers across the country.
“The most important lesson we can learn today is when it’s time for workers to stand up, and when we don’t let them stay standing. [the ultra-wealthy] Divide us, there is nothing we cannot accomplish,” Sanders said before taking the oath at Mamdani.
As guests and reporters gathered on the grounds of City Hall, the city held a seven-block public block party, a new twist on the traditionally ticketed inauguration format. In addition to being a private event with attendance limited to a few thousand people, anyone willing to RSVP and brave the frigid air and howling winds after a snowy night can try their luck at making it.
And many did, and the assembled New Yorkers limped through security, hoping to catch a glimpse of the oath of office by the 34-year-old democratic socialist now in charge of running America’s largest city, streamed on large monitors set up all around the outside of City Hall.
Some supporters told Al Jazeera they waited in line for hours and many were unable to get through the checkpoint in time. Several protesters remained behind police barricades as the crowd cheered from a distance and honked in solidarity.
Democratic strategist Nomiki Const told Al Jazeera that the bloc parties themselves were symbolic in their efforts to reach more New Yorkers who have typically been excluded from the political process.
“This was a way to open up something that wasn’t accessible to everyone who wasn’t part of the inner circle of New York politicians or media,” Const told Al Jazeera.
“This was an opportunity to give back to those who helped get him into office.”
![New Yorkers gather for first inauguration ceremony open to the public [Andy Hirschfeld]](https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/IMG_6332-1767314647.jpg?w=770&resize=770%2C578&quality=80)
A message of uniformity and affordability
Mamdani, Williams and Levine gave speeches in English, Spanish, Hebrew and Greek and appeared alongside leaders of several different faiths, including Islam, Christianity and Judaism, and spoke of unity among all New Yorkers.
“There are three oaths: one by leaders using the Koran, one by leaders using the Christian Bible, and one by leaders using the Hebrew Bible. I’m proud to live in a city where this is possible,” Levine said after taking the oath of office.
Mamdani also agreed with that opinion.
“We will bring this city closer together. We will replace the coldness of rugged individualism with the warmth of collectivism. If our campaign has shown that New Yorkers crave solidarity, let this government foster it,” Mamdani said in his speech.
“We work every day to make this city more for more people than it was the day before, and we wouldn’t give it anything less.”
But the central message reiterated by Mamdani, Levine, Williams, Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez was the same one that characterized this campaign: that the super-rich should pay higher taxes.
“Tax the wealthy,” Sanders said as his supporters chanted, “It’s not radical to ask the wealthy and big corporations to pay their fair share of taxes. It’s the right thing to do.”
One of Mamdani’s core promises was to raise New York City’s corporate tax rate from 7.25 percent to 11.5 percent, on par with neighboring New Jersey, and to raise taxes by 2 percent on people making more than $1 million a year. Any tax plan would need the governor’s approval to move forward.
“This movement came from somewhere in the 8.5 million, whether it was a taxi rank, an Amazon warehouse, or a DSA. [Democratic Socialists of America] Meetings and curbside domino games. Those in power have turned a blind eye to these places for so long that even if they knew about them, they ignored them as out of nowhere. But in our city, where power is held in every nook and cranny of these five boroughs, it is nowhere and no one,” Mamdani said.
Housing policy is central to Mamdani’s affordability message. One of his signature campaign promises was to freeze rents on the city’s rent-stabilized apartments, which account for about half of the city’s rental housing stock.
“People living in rent-stabilized housing will no longer fear the latest rent increase, because we will freeze the rent,” Mamdani said in his remarks.
Just hours later, President Mamdani announced a series of executive orders targeting housing.
“We will not wait to take action on the first day of a new government, when so many rent payments are due,” Mamdani told a news conference.
He announced three executive orders inside a rent-stabilized building in Brooklyn. That includes creating two new city task forces on housing policy. One would take inventory of city-owned land that could be used for housing, and the other would identify ways to encourage development.
“The housing crisis is at the heart of our affordability crisis. There are many things we will focus on, including protecting tenants, going after bad landlords, and building more housing. A big part of how we get out of the housing crisis is building more affordable housing across the city,” Leila Bozorg, deputy mayor for housing and planning, told Al Jazeera on the steps of City Hall hours before announcing the new policy.
“If we have the political will and we put the resources behind it, we can work on these policy decisions, and that’s what he is.” [Mamdani] I am committed to doing so. ”
