- - Inside Zohran Mamdani's first big test of his mayoral term

Allan SmithJanuary 31, 2026 at 2:00 AM

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Four days before one of the biggest winter storms in years arrived in New York City, Mayor Zohran Mamdani met with top officials and tore up his schedule for the rest of the week. His first major management test was approaching, and the next few days were going to be all about snow.

Mamdani knew his response would be intensely scrutinized. In his meeting with top staffers that Wednesday, the mayor specifically mentioned to his team that his three immediate predecessors — Mayors Michael Bloomberg, Bill de Blasio and Eric Adams — had all botched snowstorm responses because they were caught flat-footed and appeared aloof, a senior aide detailed. Mamdani’s press secretary, Joe Calvello, printed out old newspaper headlines detailing those failures and his colleagues hung them above their desks in the office. Bulletin board material for “motivation,” he said.

“Old-school locker room stuff,” Calvello said, adding: “Take notes from history. Simple as that. A lot of mayors have stumbled in their first big snow. And he made it clear that this wouldn’t be a test, but an opportunity. And then it was on us and workers across the city to step up to the plate like he was doing.”

A front-end loader dumps snow into a snow melter Thursday in New York. (Angela Weiss / AFP - Getty Images) (Angela Weiss)

A self-described democratic socialist seeking to enact a sprawling agenda, Mamdani is keenly aware that voters won’t believe he is capable of delivering on bigger promises if he fails at managing the nuts and bolts of city government. The storm was an early test — and provided him an opportunity to prove himself.

In the run-up to the storm, Mamdani tasked Deputy Mayor Julia Kerson to take the lead on interagency coordination, a senior aide detailed. Beginning last week, City Hall was hosting daily weather briefings across the administration and crafting a game plan for snow removal with the Department of Sanitation. At the same time, Mamdani was ramping up his public communications around the storm, making appearances on TV and radio and with a number of local content creators on social media, in addition to holding multiple press conferences.

As snow accumulated Sunday, Mamdani left a press briefing and, wearing a custom-made jacket embroidered with “The City of New York” on the chest and “Mayor” on the sleeve, picked up a shovel himself, making stops in Brooklyn and Queens to clear snow — and to dig out a motorist. Most of his staff was unaware he was doing that until they saw videos circulating on social media, two aides said.

New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani arrives at a salt depot to speak about preparations for the winter storm in New York on Jan. 24. (Angela Weiss / AFP via Getty Images) (Angela Weiss)

An administration official said the mayor’s team was “extraordinarily cognizant” that any mishaps with the snow response could pose serious problems for the mayor’s ability to govern.

“It was never about putting change or the big, ambitious agenda items over excellence in delivering on the nuts and bolts of government,” the official said. “It was always both.”

Now, days after roughly a foot of snow blanketed the city, Mamdani has won strong reviews for his administration’s response to the storm, largely because city workers were able to salt and plow the streets efficiently and clear snow from roads and sidewalks to keep the city from grinding to a halt. Meanwhile, city governments in Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., have struggled.

A headline in City & State New York read: “OK Zohran, so you aced the storm.” Benny Polatseck, who served in Adams’ administration and has been a critic of Mamdani’s, tweeted Sunday afternoon: “Credit where due, looks like @NYCMayor is handling this storm very well so far.” And during a storm response press conference on Monday, Zach Iscol, an Adams appointee who has continued to serve as commissioner of the city’s emergency management agency, praised Mamdani for the team he built, saying, “I know this city is in great, great hands.”

For Mamdani, handling the snow is just a first step as his first winter in office continues to surface new challenges. Days of bitter cold — projected to be one of the longest stretches with temperatures below freezing in recorded New York City history — have followed the snowstorm. So far, at least 10 people, many of whom were known by the city’s Department of Homeless Services, have died from cold exposure.

People walk between piles of snow in New Yorek on Thursday. (Angela Weiss / AFP - Getty Images) (Angela Weiss)

Meanwhile, the persistent freezing temperatures have prevented the snow from naturally melting, sucking up more city resources.

“We’re in the middle of what could be the harshest winter stretch New York has ever seen,” Mamdani said in a video posted to social media on Thursday evening. “While the sun and rising temperatures would typically help the city’s response after snowfall, this cold is persistent, this snow is stubborn, and this danger is real. That means this work takes longer, and it takes all of us.”

Mamdani did face some criticism of his response — including from some parents of the hundreds of thousands of public school students who did not receive a snow day on Monday and instead participated in remote learning. Others claimed Mamdani’s shift away from Adams’ policy of using the New York Police Department to clear homeless encampments contributed to the death toll from the storm.

“What about the ten homeless who died?” billionaire hedge fund executive Bill Ackman, a frequent Mamdani critic, tweeted at the mayor on Thursday.

The city remains on its “Code Blue” protocol, an emergency weather declaration that removes barriers for homeless residents to enter shelters amid freezing temperatures. But Mamdani has said that protocol alone is not enough.

Mamdani said Thursday that the city is deploying hundreds of additional sanitation workers — and extending shifts — to clear crosswalks and bus stops. His team has also put a callout on social media for New York City residents to serve as paid emergency snow shovelers. A spokesperson said that effort has contributed to roughly 500 New Yorkers per day picking up their own shovels and participating in the effort since Tuesday.

The mayor’s staff said outreach teams have so far made more than 600 placements in homeless shelters since last week, in addition to opening 20 warming buses and 18 enhanced warming centers across the city for residents.

“As the city does its part, I’m asking you, New York City, to do yours,” Mamdani said Thursday. “If you see someone out in the cold, call 311, so we can get them help.”

Bradley Tusk, who served in Bloomberg’s administration, said he thinks Mamdani has done “pretty well” handling the crisis. He suggested Mamdani keep acting Sanitation Department Commissioner Javier Logan in the role permanently, saying the department met the moment under his leadership.

“His youth and energy served him well publicly,” Tusk said of Mamdani, adding: “Obviously the deaths were tragic, but in a city with a huge homeless and addict population and a mayor who’s been on the job for a few weeks, [it’s] hard to blame him for it.”

Ice floats on the Hudson River in front of the Manhattan skyline on Wednesday. (Charly Triballeau / AFP - Getty Images) (Charly Triballeau)

New York City mayoral history is littered with snowstorm flubs, including by Bloomberg, de Blasio and Mayor John Lindsay, who was pilloried for his response to a blizzard that left a death toll of more than 40 people in its wake.

With this in mind, Mamdani wanted to overcommunicate and be “everywhere,” as a senior administration official said, noting the mayor prioritized working with online content creators and through his own social media megaphone to spread his message — much as he did during his successful campaign last fall. A major goal for Mamdani was to drive sign-ups to Notify NYC, the city’s free emergency alert program. An administration official said the platform received about 70,000 sign-ups in the past week. The system saw 35,000 new subscribers on Tuesday alone, the largest single-day enrollment in the program’s history.

Overall, Mamdani’s staff is pleased with the reception his efforts have garnered so far, with one example of negative news coverage showing, to them, how relatively little material his opposition had to work with. A Monday story in the New York Post mocked the mayor for having “poor snow shoveling form” when he sought to join in the recovery efforts on Sunday.

But Mamdani and his team know they’re not out of the woods yet. A potential nor’easter is bearing down on the city this weekend.

“We know there’s more work to be done,” Calvello said.

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Source: “AOL Breaking”