Zohran Mamdani used three things to catapult himself to an upset Democratic primary win in the New York City mayor’s race: a viral social media presence, a laser focus on affordability and an exhaustive ground game.
His opponents’ immediate takeaway? They need a better video strategy.
Nine days after Mr. Mamdani clinched victory, Mayor Eric Adams released an online video where he pretended to be talking to Usher — using scenes from the artist’s well-known music video for “Confessions Part II” — to announce a summer concert series.
He later filmed himself doing pull-ups from a pedestrian crossing sign, and, more recently, invited New Yorkers on an “MTV Cribs”-style tour of his home at Gracie Mansion. (As a candidate in 2021, Mr. Adams conducted a similar tour of a home he owns in Brooklyn to demonstrate that he actually lived there. It was not entirely convincing.)
Not to be outdone, former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, who is running as an independent after losing the primary, has posted videos of himself jump-starting a car and opining on how to pronounce “Kosciuszko Bridge.” using snappy music, a cinematic filter and a new clip-on microphone.
How’re they doin’? The consensus: not particularly well.
“Literally doing ANYTHING but his job,” one person commented on Mr. Adams’s pull-up video, receiving 2,500 likes. Two comments on the Kosciuszko Bridge video derided Mr. Cuomo, whose father also served as governor, as a “nepo baby.”
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The post Mamdani’s Video Savvy: Easy to Envy, Hard to Duplicate appeared first on New York Times.
