Overview and Live Results: New York City Mayoral Primary
By 270toWin Staff
June 22, 2021
Primary voters in America's largest city head to the polls Tuesday to select their party nominees for mayor. The current mayor, Democrat Bill de Blasio, cannot run due to term limits.
Almost all of the interest is on the Democratic side as the nominee will be the overwhelming favorite to be elected in November. However, we probably won't know who that person is for several weeks.
There are 13 Democrats on the ballot. See The Candidates section below the results for more information.
Live Results
Polls close at 9:00 PM ET.
Important: The results released after the polls close will reflect the first choice of in-person voters (ballots cast during early voting and on Election Day). Absentee ballots - which will make up a greater portion of votes cast than in prior years - will not begin to be counted until next week. Once all the votes are counted, a winner will be determined via the Ranked Choice Voting process, which is being used for the first time in a NYC mayoral election. It is possible that someone other than the candidate leading on Election Day will be the eventual nominee.
The week of July 12 is the earliest that the final election results will be certified.
Ranked Choice Voting will not impact the Republican primary, as there are only two candidates. A winner may be projected Tuesday night. However, if the race is close, that may not be possible until the subsequent counting of absentee ballots.
The Candidates
- Gothamist: Where the candidates stand on the issues
- New York Times: Closing arguments from the leading candidates
- Recent polls conducted by Ipsos, Emerson College, and Marist
Eight of the 13 candidates have seen enough support to be invited to debates and included in polls. They have all raised several million dollars or more. Based on polling, these eight can be divided into three tiers.
The number in parentheses is the average of the three polls linked to in the third bullet point above. Candidates are listed in alphabetical order within their tier.
Tier 1: The nominee will likely come from this group
- Eric Adams, Brooklyn Borough President (25%)
- Has been frontrunner in most recent polls
- Kathryn Garcia, former Sanitation Department Commissioner (16.3%)
- Support increased after May endorsement by The New York Times
- Maya Wiley, civil rights attorney (15.3%)
- Gained traction after recent endorsement by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
- Andrew Yang, entrepreneur (15.7%)
- Early frontrunner in the race has fallen back
Tier 2: Had a chance at one point
- Scott Stringer, City Comptroller (8%)
- Lost support after April accusations of sexual misconduct
Tier 3: All consistently polling at 5% or less; not going to win
- Shaun Donovan, Former HUD Secretary and OMB Director (3.3%)
- Ray McGuire, former investment banker (3.7%)
- Dianne Morales, former nonprofit CEO (2%)
More Information
- 270toWin: About ranked choice voting and other changes to the election process
- FiveThirtyEight: The 5 political boroughs of NYC
- NPR: NYC primary preview
- Associated Press: Ranked choice voting gets big test in NYC
- Politico Magazine: Bill de Blasio reflects on his legacy
Other June 22 Election Results
There is also a mayoral primary in Buffalo and a special primary runoff for a vacant state house seat in Alabama. Live results here.
