From Mamdani To Her, And The Voters Who Backed Them, There Was A Lot Of Asian Goodness This Past Election Day

At the end of the day we just cleaned up. 

There was Zohran Mamdani as New York's first Asian American, South Asian, and Muslim mayor. The youngest mayor at age 34 to hold the title in a hundred years. This is exactly the change Democrats, and the younger voting block needed to see win.

Mamdani Shows Up And Vibes

In Saint Paul, MN, Kaohly Vang Her defeated two-term incumbent mayor Melvin Carter, the city's first African American mayor, who Her was also policy director for in his first term. She will be the first woman, Asian American, and Hmong American, to hold the office and lead the city.

3HMONGTV NEWS | Recorded on 11-05-2025 Kaohly Vang Her wins St. Paul Mayoral race.

Aftab Karma Singh Pureval, the city's first Asian American mayor was reelected in Cincinnati, winning over Cory Bowman, a Republican who also happens to be JD Vance’s half-brother. A win-win if there was one.

Aftab Pureval celebrates reelection in Cincinnati mayoral race

Ghazala F. Hashmi, born in Hyderabad, India and raised in Georgia, was elected Lieutenant Governor of Virginia. She became the first Muslim American woman elected to statewide office in the U.S.

Trump's unpopular, harmful policies fueled Democratic wins, says Virginia's Ghazala Hashmi

And then there were the voters (us).

From the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF) and the Asian American Federation (AAF) exit poll:

Asian American Voters Favored Mamdani for Mayor, including 20% of 2024 Trump Voters

About half (49.1%) of Asian American voters who participated in the exit poll voted for Mamdani and roughly one-third (33.8%) voted for Cuomo. Notably, an overwhelming 87.2% of South Asian voters cast their ballots for Mamdani, while 9.6% voted for Cuomo.

According to the NBC exit poll this was as high as 62% of Asian Americans.A story down at Documented on why young Asian Americans voted for Mamdani:

But Mamdani’s focus on affordability and housing wasn’t the only thing that resonated with young Asian-American voters. They also wanted to feel hope again about issues that affect people on a larger scale.

“A lot of young people that I’ve talked to, either in schools, at the doors, or in the neighborhood, really want things to change,” Situ said. “But they’ve also lived through two Trump presidencies, and are watching a genocide happen on their phones, so they’re battling a lot of pessimism, whether through conversations with their friends or what they see on the news.”

Nice work if you can get it.