New York has started the year underground. Literally. At midnight, the moment in which the law officially establishes the beginning of the mayor’s term, has been sworn in at the old station City Halla century-old space closed since 1945 and accessed on rare occasions. There have been no crowds or press, just his family and the New York attorney general, Letitia James, on a curved platform that is covered by the tiled vaults of Spanish engineer Rafael Guastavino. An oath taken on the ‘Quran’, the Muslim holy book, in an act that has marked, in a sober and deliberate way, the beginning of a new era in the most populated city in the United States.
The choice of location was not a whim. Mamdani wanted to start at the station to establish a symbolic framework for what will be his first mandate, after: “When this station was inaugurated, in 1904, it was a monument to a city that dared to do beautiful and great things to transform the lives of working people. That ambition cannot be relegated to a memory or isolated in the tunnels that are under City Hall: it will be the horizon of the administration that will serve New Yorkers from the building above,” he noted in a speech later.
Hours later, already on the surface, the scene changed completely. On the steps leading to City Hall, Mamdani appeared before a crowd that, despite the sub-zero temperatures and the icy wind, did not want to miss an investiture ceremony where the first Muslim mayor of New York He has not shown any intention to lower the expectations surrounding his arrival in office, especially with regard to improving the quality of life of citizens, especially the working class that has elevated him in politics. “I have been told that this is the time to lower expectations, to ask for little and to expect even less. I will not do that,” he proclaimed.
Mamdani has also claimed, without any complexes, his political identity. “I was elected as a socialist democrat and I will govern as a socialist democrat,” he assured, presenting an ambitious program in which the social agenda occupies a central place, with measures such as freezing the price of rents, implementing a free bus transportation system or guaranteeing universal access to nursery schools up to the age of five. “We will respond to all New Yorkers, not to any billionaire or oligarch who believes they can buy our democracy,” he added, making it clear that the stage that opens in New York will be based on “the warmth of collectivism” versus “the coldness of rugged individualism.”
First measures: housing as a priority
As soon as he took office as mayor of New York, Mamdani wanted what he said in his inauguration speech to be immediately translated into the action of his government. Thus, hours after taking office, the new councilor has signed his first executive orders of this mandate, focused on addressing the housing crisis in the city and marking distance from the period of his predecessor, Eric Adams.
The package of measures, which places housing policy as an immediate priority and not as a medium-term promise, includes the reactivation of a key body to defend tenants against large landlords: the Tenant Protection Office. The other two signed orders decree the creation of several working groups with a clear objective: to identify public land that is suitable for the construction of social housing and eliminate administrative obstacles that make projects more expensive and slow down.
To head that Tenant Protection Office, Mamdani has appointed Cea Weaveran activist for the right to housing, who will assume the direct defense of tenants against large landlords and who will supervise the response given by municipal agencies to buildings that present unsafe or illegal conditions. His first assignment has been to intervene in the bankruptcy process of Pinnacle Realtya leasing company that has accumulated thousands of violations in 83 buildings in New York. The objective, as detailed by the City Council, is to protect tenants and prevent the legal situation of this company from translating into new abuses or evictions.
A mayor, a city and a new balance
Mamdani has taken office by swearing on two Korans, one belonging to the Puerto Rican intellectual Arturo Schomburg and another that is from his family, which his wife has supported, . However, he was not the only politician who accepted his duties this Thursday. Thus, Jumaane Williams will be the Ombudsman while Mark Levine will be responsible for the city’s finances.
The president of the United States, Donald Trump, was not present at the event, but his figure hovered over the day. Mamdani has built part of his political profile in open opposition to the White House, especially on immigration matters, with the ICE raids and the defense of sanctuary city status as central issues of this war between both administrations. It is not surprising, therefore, that hours after the inauguration the Republicans have branded him a “radical socialist” and have turned him into a national political objective in the face of the 2026 legislative elections.
The expectation aroused by Mamdani’s arrival to the mayor’s office is also explained by the speed of his rise. In just one year he has gone from being an almost unknown legislator to becoming mayor of New York, after mobilizing more than two million voters and achieving 50% of the votes. That expectation has also been reflected in an investiture financed with 2.6 million dollars, a record figure so far this century, conceived as a public celebration with music and poetry that aspired to lead to a large street party. The cold, however, has spoiled it a bit. The crowd, close to 4,000 people, has been dispersing little by little and the city has regained its pulse.
