‘We made history': Mamdani celebrates after shocking Cuomo in New York City mayoral primary

The Guardian

4 hours ago

Update:
Date: 2025-06-25T10:22:37.000Z
Title: The Hague
Content: We have more from .
Reuters is reporting that when asked if the United States would strike again if Iran rebuilt its nuclear enrichment programme, Donald Trump said: 'Sure.'
Update:
Date: 2025-06-25T10:17:17.000Z
Title: US politics
Content: Hello and welcome to the live blog.
We start with Zohran Mamdani's historic victory in the New York City mayoral primary.
In a major upset, Andrew Cuomo who had been a recent favourite - conceded after it was clear the 33-year old democratic had built a substantial lead over the more experienced but scandal-scarred former governor.
Mamdani' appeared to have cleared the first hurdle on the road to become New York's first Muslim mayor.
In a speech to supporters, Mamdani said: 'We made history,' adding: 'I will be your Democratic nominee for the mayor of New York City.'
If his win is confirmed, Mamdani will be seen as the frontrunner for the 4 November mayoral election in New York, a city where Democrats normally dominate.
After 93% of votes were counted in the primary's first round, Mamdani, a state representative, had 43.5% of the vote. Cuomo was on 36.4%.
Cuomo, who was attempting a political comeback after he resigned from office in 2021 amid a sexual harassment scandal, said he had called Mamdani to congratulate him.
'He put together a great campaign and he touched young people and inspired them and moved them and got them to come out and vote,' Cuomo said. 'I applaud him sincerely for his effort.'
However, Cuomo told the New York Times he may still run in the November mayoral election as an independent. 'I want to analyse and talk to some colleagues,' he said.
In other developments:
Donald Trump hit back at a leaked preliminary US intelligence assessment which cast doubt on the success of US military strikes on three of Iran's nuclear sites. Trump said Iran's nuclear programme had been set back 'decades' by the strikes despite the reports suggesting they had only set it back by months. Ahead of meeting with other world leaders at a Nato Summit in the Hague, he said he believed 'total obliteration' was achieved. 'This was a devastating attack,' Trump told reporters. Asked about the intelligence reports, Trump said 'they really don't know.' He added: 'The intelligence was very inconclusive. The intelligence says we don't know. It could've been very severe. That's what the intelligence suggests.'
Steve Witkoff, Trump's special envoy to the Middle East, called the leak 'treasonous' and called for the individual responsible to be investigated
Meanwhile Nato Secretary-General Mark Rutte was full of praise for the US strikes, saying they 'took out the nuclear capability of Iran', he added that it been carried out in an 'impressive way'.
As mentioned, Donald Trump is at The Hague where leaders of the Western defensive alliance have gathered. They are set to commit to a new defence spending target of 5% of GDP and demonstrate that European allies are stepping up. This is Trump's first Nato summit since 2019.
At The Hague Trump confirmed commitment to Nato's Article 5 which states that an attack on one member is seen as attack on all members. When asked about Article 5 he said: 'We are with them all the way.' It was in contrast to earlier comments he made en route to The Hague. 'There's numerous definitions of Article Five, you know that right?' he had said.
Speaking at The Hague, Trump likened the US strikes on Iran to his country's decision to drop atomic bombs on Japan in the second world war. 'That hit ended the war,' he said. 'That hit ended the war. I don't want to use an example of Hiroshima, I don't want to use an example of Nagasaki, but that was essentially the same thing that ended that war. This ended that, this ended that war. If we didn't take that out, they would have been they'd be fighting right now.'