This is not the case. His main opponent was Cuomo who was the Democrat "establishment" candidate. Zohran narrowly defeated Cuomo in the primary. Typically that'

This is not the case. His main opponent was Cuomo who was the Democrat "establishment" candidate. Zohran narrowly defeated Cuomo in the primary. Typically that's it but Cuomo took the unconventional strategy of running independently in the general with the backing of establishment Democrats. Typically, the Republican candidate would have no chance in a city like NYC. This was the case here as well, but Cuomo calculated that with the backing of establishment Democrats AND the backing of Republicans/conservatives, he'd be able to defeat Mamdani. The Republican candidate did not agree to drop out, however. In the end it didn't matter though because Zohran Mamdani won by a larger margin than Cuomo and the Republican combined In a typical election, the main election is the primary (which happened back in June). The Democrat nominee is pretty much guaranteed to win so the general is almost a formality. This general election was actually more contested than is typical tl;dr: his main opponent was establishment democrats