Green Party leader Zack Polanski has held talks with the campaign team of New York's left-wing mayor Zohran Mamdani in an effort to replicate his electoral success. Mr Polanski, described as an 'eco-populist', is reported to have met with Mr Mamdani's aides in recent weeks as he seeks to enhance his social media strategy.
Focus on Video Content
The discussions are said to have centred on how Mr Mamdani used 'high-quality video content' to drive his campaigning. At 34, Mr Mamdani became the youngest mayor of New York in over a century and the first Muslim to hold the office. The self-described socialist defeated independent Andrew Cuomo and Republican Curtis Sliwa in November's election.
Mr Mamdani's campaign focused on reducing costs for New Yorkers through rent freezes, city-owned grocery stores, free buses, and universal free childcare. He also pledged to 'tax the rich' by increasing levies on businesses and the wealthiest 1% of the city's population.
Social Media Influence
In a recent social media video that garnered millions of views, Mr Mamdani announced the introduction of a 'pied-a-terre tax', stating: 'When I ran for mayor, I said I was going to tax the rich; Well, today we're taxing the rich.'
Mr Polanski is reportedly considering changing his branding and hiring a videographer to emulate Mr Mamdani's social media success. Currently, Mr Polanski has 670,000 followers on Instagram and 157,000 on TikTok. In contrast, Mr Mamdani boasts 11.5 million Instagram followers and 3.5 million on TikTok, with his videos accumulating 42 million 'likes' compared to Mr Polanski's 873,000.
Learning from Mamdani's Strategy
A Green Party source told The Times that Mr Polanski wanted to understand how prioritising social media and video content shaped Mr Mamdani's campaign. The source added: 'Zack's social media is absolutely flying. It helps that he's a natural at it. But we want to make sure we're being as strategic as possible in how we're using all forms of social media, particularly video, to really own the narrative. Mamdani has set the bar really high for producing a huge volume of high-quality video content to drive his campaign and there is lots we can learn from that.'
The meeting with Mr Mamdani's team was reportedly hosted online a few weeks ago between Mr Polanski and Morris Katz, one of the New York mayor's top strategists. Mr Polanski was unable to visit New York in person because he does not fly for environmental reasons.
