Zohran Mamdani Gives Inaugural Address as NYC Mayor

 Mamdani spoke for approximately 25 minutes.

Zohran Mamdani delivered his first public address as mayor of New York City on Thursday, following his official swearing-in as the city’s first Muslim mayor and its first mayor of South Asian descent.

Mamdani was sworn in during a public inauguration ceremony at City Hall on New Year’s Day by Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, a Brooklyn-born independent and longtime ideological ally. After the oath of office, Mamdani addressed the assembled crowd.

Below is the live transcript of Mamdani’s approximately 25-minute inaugural address.

If you’d like it tighter, more formal, or more conversational, I can revise it further.

My fellow New Yorkers, today marks the beginning of a new chapter.

I stand before you deeply moved by the honor of taking this solemn oath, humbled by the trust you have placed in me, and proud to serve as the 111th—or perhaps the 112th—mayor of New York City. Yet I do not stand here alone.

I stand with you—the tens of thousands gathered in Lower Manhattan today, hearts warmed against the January cold by a renewed sense of hope.

I stand with the many more New Yorkers watching from crowded kitchens in Flushing and barbershops in East New York; from cellphones balanced on taxi dashboards at LaGuardia; from hospitals in Mott Haven and libraries in El Barrio that have endured far too much neglect.

I stand with construction workers in steel-toed boots and halal cart vendors whose knees ache after long days of labor.

I stand with neighbors who carry plates of food to elderly couples down the hall, with hurried strangers who still pause to lift strollers up subway stairs, and with everyone who chooses—day after day, even when it feels impossible—to call this city home.

I stand with more than one million New Yorkers who cast their votes for this moment nearly two months ago—and I stand just as firmly with those who did not. I know that some view this administration with skepticism or even contempt, or believe that politics itself is beyond repair. While only action can earn trust, I promise you this: if you are a New Yorker, I am your mayor. Whether we agree or disagree, I will protect you, celebrate with you, grieve with you, and never—ever—turn away from you.

I thank the labor and movement leaders gathered here today, the activists and elected officials who will return to the work of fighting for New Yorkers the moment this ceremony ends, and the performers who have shared their talents with us.

Thank you, Governor Hochul. And thank you as well to Mayor Adams—Dorothy’s son, a son of Brownsville who rose from washing dishes to the highest office in our city—for being here today. Though we have had our disagreements, I will always be touched that he once said I was the mayoral candidate he would most want to be trapped with in an elevator.

Thank you to the two giants who represented me in Congress during my time as an assemblymember—Nydia Velázquez and our remarkable opening speaker, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. You helped make this moment possible.

Thank you to the leader whose example I most aspire to follow, and whom I am deeply honored to be sworn in by today—Senator Bernie Sanders.

Thank you to my teams—from the Assembly, to the campaign, to the transition, and now to the team I am proud to lead from City Hall.

Thank you to my parents, Mama and Baba, for raising me, for teaching me how to move through this world, and for bringing me to this city. Thank you to my family, from Kampala to Delhi. And thank you to my wife, Rama—my best friend—for always helping me see the beauty in everyday moments.

Most of all, thank you to the people of New York.

Moments like this are rare. Opportunities to truly transform and reinvent come seldom. Rarer still is when the power to do so rests directly in the hands of the people themselves.

And yet, too often in our history, moments of great promise have been squandered by limited imagination and even smaller ambition. What was pledged was never pursued. What could have changed was left untouched. For the New Yorkers most eager for renewal, the burden has grown heavier, and the wait longer.In drafting this address, I was told this was the moment to lower expectations—to urge New Yorkers to ask for little and expect even less. I refuse. The only expectation I intend to reset is the expectation of smallness itself.

Starting today, we will govern with breadth and boldness. We will not always succeed, but we will never be accused of lacking the courage to try.

To those who declare that the era of big government has passed, hear me clearly: City Hall will no longer hesitate to use its full power to improve the lives of New Yorkers.

For too long, we have looked to the private sector for excellence while settling for mediocrity from those entrusted with public service. I do not fault anyone who has grown skeptical of government, whose faith in democracy has been worn down by decades of indifference. We will rebuild that trust by choosing a different path—one where government is not merely a last resort for those in need, and where excellence is not the exception but the standard.

We demand greatness from cooks mastering a thousand spices, from artists who step onto Broadway stages, from the starting point guard at Madison Square Garden. We should demand no less from those who serve in government. In a city where even the names of our streets evoke innovation and industry, we will make “City Hall” synonymous with determination and delivery.

As we begin this work, we must offer a new answer to the question every generation asks: Who does New York belong to?

For much of our history, City Hall’s answer has been clear: it belongs to the wealthy and well-connected, to those who never struggle to be heard by those in power.

Working people have borne the consequences—overcrowded classrooms, public housing where elevators stand broken, streets riddled with potholes, buses that arrive late or not at all, wages that stagnate while corporations exploit consumers and workers alike.

And yet, there have been moments—brief and fleeting—when that equation shifted.

Twelve years ago, Bill de Blasio stood where I stand today and pledged to end the economic and social inequalities that had divided our city in two.In 1990, David Dinkins took the same oath I took today, pledging to honor the “gorgeous mosaic” that is New York—a city where every person deserves a life of dignity.

Nearly six decades earlier, Fiorello La Guardia entered office determined to build a city “far greater and more beautiful” for the hungry and the poor.

Some of these mayors achieved more than others. But they were united by a shared conviction: that New York could belong to more than a privileged few. That it could belong to those who run our subways and tend our parks, to those who feed us biryani and beef patties, picanha and pastrami on rye. And they understood that this vision could become reality only if government chose to work hardest for those who work hardest.

In the years ahead, my administration will revive that legacy. City Hall will pursue an agenda rooted in safety, affordability, and abundance—one in which government looks like the people it serves, confronts corporate greed without hesitation, and refuses to shrink from challenges others have declared too complex.

In doing so, we will offer our own answer to that enduring question: Who does New York belong to? My friends, we can look to Madiba and the South African Freedom Charter for guidance—New York belongs to all who live in it.

Together, we will tell a new story of our city.

It will not be the story of a city governed by the one percent. Nor will it be a tale of two cities, divided between rich and poor.

It will be the story of eight and a half million cities—each one a New Yorker with hopes and fears, each a universe unto themselves, all woven together.

The authors of this story will speak Pashto and Mandarin, Yiddish and Creole. They will pray in mosques, shuls, churches, gurdwaras, mandirs, and temples—and many will not pray at all.

They will be Russian Jewish immigrants in Brighton Beach, Italians in Rossville, and Irish families in Woodhaven—many of whom arrived with little more than a dream of a better life, a dream that has too often faded. They will be young people in cramped Marble Hill apartments, where the walls tremble as the subway passes. They will be Black homeowners in St. Albans, whose houses stand as living proof of triumph over decades of low wages and redlining. They will be Palestinian New Yorkers in Bay Ridge, no longer forced to navigate a politics that preaches universalism while treating them as exceptions.

Few of these eight and a half million will fit neatly into simple categories. Some will be voters from Hillside Avenue or Fordham Road who supported President Trump before casting a ballot for me—tired of being abandoned by the political establishment. Most will not speak in the polished language we often associate with power. I welcome that. For too long, fluency in the grammar of civility has been used to cloak agendas of cruelty.Many of these New Yorkers have been failed by the established order. In our administration, they will be seen and served. Their needs will be met. Their hopes, dreams, and interests will be reflected openly in government. They will help shape our shared future.

And where these communities have too often existed apart, we will bring this city closer together. We will replace the cold logic of rugged individualism with the warmth of collective responsibility. If our campaign proved anything, it is that New Yorkers are hungry for solidarity. This government will nurture it. Because no matter what you eat, how you pray, or where you come from, the words that unite us most are the ones we all share: New Yorkers.

It will be New Yorkers who reform a long-broken property tax system. New Yorkers who build a new Department of Community Safety—one that confronts the mental health crisis while allowing police to focus on the work they signed up to do. New Yorkers who hold abusive landlords accountable, who free small business owners from suffocating bureaucracy. And I am proud to count myself among them.

When we won the primary last June, many said these ideas—and the people who believed in them—had appeared from nowhere. But one person’s nowhere is another person’s somewhere. This movement rose from eight and a half million somewheres: taxi depots and Amazon warehouses, DSA meetings and curbside domino games. For too long, those in power had ignored these places—if they noticed them at all—and so dismissed them as nowhere. But in a city where every corner of our five boroughs holds power, there is no nowhere and there is no no one. There is only New York, and there are only New Yorkers.

Eight and a half million New Yorkers will bring this new era into being. It will be loud. It will be different. And it will feel unmistakably like the New York we love.

No matter how long you have called this city home, that love has shaped your life. I know it has shaped mine.

This is the city where, at twelve years old, I set land-speed records on my Razor scooter—four blocks faster than ever before.

The city where I ate powdered donuts at AYSO soccer halftimes and realized I probably wasn’t going pro. Where I devoured oversized slices at Koronet Pizza, played cricket at Ferry Point Park, and took the 1 train to the BX10, only to still arrive late at Bronx Science.

The city where I went on hunger strike just outside these gates, felt claustrophobic on a stalled N train past Atlantic Avenue, and waited in quiet terror for my father to emerge from 26 Federal Plaza.

The city where I took a beautiful woman named Rama to McCarren Park on our first date—and where I later swore a different oath, becoming an American citizen on Pearl Street.

To live in New York—to love New York—is to understand that we are caretakers of something unmatched anywhere in the world. Where else can you hear steelpan rhythms, smell sancocho simmering, and pay nine dollars for a cup of coffee on the same block? Where else could a Muslim kid like me grow up eating bagels and lox every Sunday?

That love will guide us as we pursue our agenda. Here, in the city where the language of the New Deal was forged, we will return the immense resources of New York to the workers who make it run. We will not only make it possible for every New Yorker to afford a life they love again—we will also confront the isolation so many feel and reconnect the people of this city to one another.

The cost of childcare will no longer prevent young adults from starting families—because we will deliver universal childcare for the many by asking the wealthiest few to pay their fair share.

New Yorkers in rent-stabilized homes will no longer brace themselves for the next rent hike—because we will freeze the rent.

Boarding a bus without worrying about fare hikes or chronic delays will no longer feel like a small miracle—because we will make buses fast and free.

These policies are not just about reducing costs; they are about expanding freedom. For too long in this city, freedom has belonged only to those who could afford to buy it. That ends at City Hall.

These promises carried our movement to City Hall, and they will carry us from the chants of a campaign into the work of a new political era.

Two Sundays ago, as snow fell softly, I spent twelve hours at the Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria, listening to New Yorkers from every borough describe the city they call home.

We talked about construction schedules on the Van Wyck Expressway and EBT eligibility, about affordable housing for artists and ICE raids. I spoke with a man named TJ, who told me that one day his heart broke when he realized he could never get ahead here, no matter how hard he worked. I spoke with a Pakistani auntie named Samina, who said this movement had sparked something too rare—softness in people’s hearts. As she put it in Urdu: logon ke dil badal gaye hain.

One hundred and forty-two New Yorkers, out of eight and a half million. And yet what united every person across from me was the same understanding: this moment demands a new politics, and a new relationship to power.

We will deliver nothing less as we work each day to make this city belong to more of its people than it did the day before.

Here is what you should expect from the administration that moved into the building behind me this morning:

We will transform City Hall from a culture of “no” into a culture of “how.”

We will answer to all New Yorkers—not to any billionaire or oligarch who believes our democracy is for sale.

We will govern without shame or insecurity, and we will not apologize for what we believe. I was elected as a democratic socialist, and I will govern as a democratic socialist. I will not abandon my principles out of fear of being labeled radical. As the great senator from Vermont once said, what is truly radical is “a system that gives so much to so few and denies so many the basic necessities of life.”

Every day, we will work to ensure that no New Yorker is priced out of any of those basic necessities.

And through it all, in the words of Jason Terrance Phillips—better known as Jadakiss, or J to the Muah—we will be “outside.” Because this is a government of New York, by New York, and for New York.

Before I close, I want to ask something of all of you—those here with me today and those watching from wherever you are. If you are able, please stand with me.

Stand with us now, and stand with us in the days to come. City Hall cannot deliver this vision alone. And while we will ask New Yorkers to demand more from those entrusted with the honor of serving them, we will also ask you to demand more of yourselves.

The movement we began more than a year ago did not end on Election Day. It will not end this afternoon. It will live on in every struggle we face together; in every blizzard and flood we endure together; in every fiscal challenge we meet with ambition rather than austerity; and in every effort to pursue change in the interests of working people, never at their expense—together.

Victory will no longer be an excuse to tune out or turn away. From this day forward, we will understand victory for what it truly is: something powerful enough to change lives, and something that requires effort from each of us, every single day.

What we build together will be felt across all five boroughs, and it will echo far beyond them. Many will be watching. They want to know whether the left can govern. They want to know whether the struggles they face can be solved. They want to know whether it is right to hope again.

So standing together, with purpose at our backs, we will do what New Yorkers have always done better than anyone else—we will lead by example. If Sinatra was right, let us prove that anyone can make it in New York—and everywhere else too. Let us show that when a city truly belongs to its people, no need is too small to meet, no one too sick to heal, and no one too alone to feel that New York is home.