In 2021, when India Walton, a political activist supported by the Democratic Socialists of America and the Working Families Party, won an upset victory in the Democratic primary for mayor in Buffalo, one national party leader backed her when most of the establishment would not.
“India Walton won the Democratic primary fair and square and is the nominee,” Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, then the majority leader, said at the time, describing her as an inspiring community leader with a clear progressive vision for her hometown. “I have always believed that the Democratic Party is a big tent.”
These days, Mr. Schumer, the highest-ranking Jewish elected official in the country, the dean of New York’s congressional delegation and an avatar of old New York politics, has drawn criticism from some in his party for holding out on a similar type of endorsement for Zohran Mamdani, the young Democrat running to be the first Muslim mayor of New York City who has leftist views, particularly on Israel.
Last week, Mr. Schumer met one-on-one with Mr. Mamdani for an hour in Manhattan, a meeting described as warm. Before that, the senator called to congratulate the mayoral candidate on his upset victory in the Democratic primary in June, and once more a few weeks later to check in about how the campaign was unfolding.
But during a week when much of the Democratic establishment seemed to be slowly getting on board with Mr. Mamdani’s candidacy, Mr. Schumer, people familiar with his thinking on the matter said, still has not made up his mind.
His hesitance reflects the complicated calculus of a leader facing unique political challenges of his own, including an approval rating at a 20-year low, and who is single-mindedly focused on leading his party back to the Senate majority next year — a task that will require victories in competitive states with little appetite for a democratic socialist who is deeply critical of Israel. It also springs from Mr. Schumer’s sense of responsibility to Jewish voters, and the influence of donors and Democrats in New York City, particularly in the real estate industry, many of whom are vocal with their concerns about a Mamdani mayoralty.
This week, Mr. Mamdani has racked up endorsements from Gov. Kathy Hochul of New York as well as Carl Heastie, the speaker of the New York State Assembly; Representative Yvette D. Clarke, the chairwoman of the Congressional Black Caucus; and Thomas DiNapoli, the New York State comptroller. Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the minority leader, has hinted at an announcement about Mr. Mamdani’s campaign, which many expect to be an endorsement.
Mr. Schumer recognizes that Mr. Mamdani is a talented politician and likes him personally, people familiar with his thinking said. But he also has to think about how his words might affect candidates he has recruited to run in states like Ohio. And he is aware that unlike Ms. Walton’s race in Buffalo, the New York City mayor’s race carries unique national implications.
“We met yesterday, we had a good meeting, we know each other well and we’re going to keep talking,” Mr. Schumer told reporters last week when asked why he had yet to offer his backing to his party’s nominee for mayor in the city where he has lived his entire life. It was a line he has repeated verbatim in the days since — a strategy Mr. Schumer often employs when he doesn’t want to make news or answer a question.
Mr. Mamdani, for his part, appears to be on a glide path to Gracie Mansion.
Aides said his campaign would welcome Mr. Schumer’s endorsement, but it has been less of a priority than securing the backing of the New York State leaders with whom Mr. Mamdani will eventually have to work on a daily basis.
The awkward political dance between the two leaders representing different wings and generations of the party has many people in New York City political circles speculating about who would benefit most from an alliance: Does Mr. Mamdani need Mr. Schumer, or does Mr. Schumer need Mr. Mamdani?
Both Mr. Schumer and Mr. Mamdani declined to comment for this story.
Mr. Schumer has been something like the Forrest Gump of New York politics, a character in every chapter of the city’s history since the 1970s. Larger than life figures like Hillary Clinton, Eliot Spitzer, Michael Bloomberg, Andrew Cuomo and Anthony Weiner have risen and fallen, but Mr. Schumer for decades could be reliably counted on to still be there, outlasting them all.
He is forever enthusiastically preparing for his Sunday morning news conference and carefully monitoring his own news coverage, often complaining if he was not quoted prominently enough in a story, and working with bigger political stars that come and go.
But Mr. Schumer now finds himself in uncharted territory. Polls show Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the 35-year-old progressive, beating him by double digits if she decided to challenge him. If he opted to seek another term in 2028, Mr. Schumer would be 78 years old, representing the establishment at a populist moment when voters are angry at the government that many believe has failed them, and when the Democratic Party has been eager for generational change.
As a national leader of a party that has struggled to find its footing after the 2024 election, Mr. Schumer has been a source of great frustration to progressives who want to see Democrats put up more of a fight against the Trump administration, and do more to support nontraditional candidates. Mr. Schumer suffered politically for his decision last March to help Republicans pass stopgap spending bill to stave off a government shutdown.
Now his hesitancy to back Mr. Mamdani has progressives frustrated again.
“If you were a Democratic leader, in a party which is now in the doldrums, you would be jumping for joy — ‘Oh my God! This is just the guy we want, I want to see this all over the country!’” Senator Bernie Sanders, the Vermont independent, said on CNN, when asked about Mr. Schumer and Mr. Jeffries withholding their endorsements. He called it “absurd” and “pretty crazy stuff” that the two Brooklyn-born Democratic leaders in Congress had not eagerly jumped onto the Mamdani bandwagon.
When pressed on whether they were holding back out of fear, Mr. Sanders said he thought it was because of pressure from their donors.
“I think that money speaks,” he said.
Ben Rhodes, a former top adviser to President Barack Obama, said it looked out of touch to wait so long.
“It makes the party leadership look afraid of the future of the party,” Mr. Rhodes said in an interview. “To be out of step and so evidently afraid of getting behind a politician who has moved the needle on issues that matter — affordability and Israel — that is, to me, a metaphor for what’s wrong.”
Rebecca Katz, a veteran Democratic strategist who worked as an adviser to former Senator Harry Reid of Nevada when he served as majority leader, and whose firm works for Mr. Mamdani, said that “Democrats should be uniting around leaders who understand this moment and are ready to fight back. What’s coming out of leadership in D.C. is just plain weak.”
And a fairly moderate member of Mr. Schumer’s own caucus, Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, endorsed Mr. Mamdani over the weekend and said that Democratic leaders were demonstrating “spineless politics” and needed “to get behind him, and get behind him now.”
Mr. Schumer prides himself on being Mr. Brooklyn, but the reality is that as Senate minority leader, his focus is more often on national issues than on local ones. The constituency he spends the most time thinking about is his caucus of 45 Democratic senators. His overarching goal in every decision is to ensure that the Democrats win back the Senate majority next year, and he does not want to harm their political standing by association, people close to him say.
But Mr. Schumer has also long taken pride in cultivating relationships with up-and-coming political talent in New York. For decades, he has aggressively pursued new state lawmakers, not because he needs their support so much as because he views them as a resource that can give him the latest intelligence on what they’re hearing in their districts.
That’s how he connected in 2021 with Mr. Mamdani, then a fresh face in the State Assembly. Mr. Schumer partnered with him on an effort to help rescue thousands of cabbies from paralyzing debt after years of exploitative practices in the industry. Mr. Mamdani credits Mr. Schumer with handing him the project. The two even filmed a video together, presenting a united front as they rode in the back seat of a cab, wearing masks and interviewing their driver.
These days, Mr. Schumer is hesitant to do the same.
Mr. Mamdani has long been deeply critical of Israel, accusing its government of imposing apartheid and committing genocide in Gaza and declining to say it should be a Jewish state. He said last week that he would order the New York Police Department to arrest Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he set foot in the city.
Mr. Schumer also has harshly criticized Mr. Netanyahu. But he often likes to remind people that his name in Hebrew is “Shomer,” which means “guardian,” and he considers his role as a self-described guardian of Israel a core part of his personal and political identity. Earlier this year, Mr. Schumer wrote a book entitled “Anti-Semitism in America: A Warning.”
He is also aware that traditional Jewish donors were furious about Ms. Hochul’s endorsement of Mr. Mamdani.
Still, some people with his flip phone number, or access to his inner circle, have pressed Mr. Schumer to get involved in the race, hoping to convince him that part of his job is to help an untested new leader square his aspirations with the realities of governing. They have noted to people he listens to that if Mr. Schumer is waiting for a moment when it will feel easy and right to back Mr. Mamdani, he could be waiting past the November election.
Those people are also concerned that if he waits too long, he will look like he is bringing up the rear rather than leading.
As strange as it looks for Mr. Schumer to keep dodging the endorsement question with less than 50 days before Election Day, it is not totally out of step with how he has behaved in previous mayoral races. In 2021, he did not endorse Eric Adams, then the Democratic nominee for mayor, until October, just weeks before the general election.
When the senator finally appeared onstage with him at a union rally in Midtown Manhattan, Mr. Schumer was effusive about Mr. Adams.
“You are going to see how damn good this guy is going to be as mayor,” he said.
Annie Karni is a congressional correspondent for The Times.
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