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Tuesday’s panel on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” largely agreed that while independent New York City mayoral candidate Andrew Cuomo finished his campaign strong, it’s almost surely “too late” for him to overcome Democratic frontrunner Zohran Mamdani.
MSNBC senior contributor Mike Barnicle questioned who was running Cuomo’s campaign, noting that the ads released in the final week before the election have been “very effective.”
“The closing argument has been better. I think they struggled a little bit. They had Melissa DeRosa. They’ve had some of the people who were with him in the governor’s office,” Carolyn Ryan of The New York Times replied.
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Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski on the set of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2025. (Screenshot/MSNBC)
“I do think that they struggled initially on the social media front. And Mamdani is cinematic. I mean, he knows visual imagery, and his stuff has been of a different level. So the question with Cuomo is, is the argument that he’s making too late?” she questioned.
Host Joe Scarborough concurred with both panelists’ takeaways on the final days of Cuomo’s campaign, conceding that while his ads have been “really strong,” they may not be enough to get him over the finish line.
“Those closing ads, his closing argument the last week, have been really strong ads. In one of the most hapless, listless, directionless campaigns I think any of us have seen in a very long time,” Scarborough recalled. “But man, you talk about focusing in on a message the final week. Cuomo has been strong.”
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“It’s too late,” he added.
New York City mayoral candidate Andrew Cuomo leaves a campaign stop in New York City on Monday, Nov. 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)
Agreeing with Scarborough, Ryan also acknowledged that it “might be too late” for Cuomo to secure a win, especially considering that “close to half of the people have already voted.”
Zach Sage Fox, CEO of Fat Camp Films, was hired by Cuomo’s campaign after the withdrawal of current Mayor Eric Adams from the race. He was contracted to produce eight to ten social media videos for the campaign.
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Although Fox told Digital that the race “started tightening in direct relation” with his company’s revamp of Cuomo’s social media, he also questioned whether the efforts came too late in the game.
“The question is, is it a little too late? We had under one month to do a good job, and there’s a million other factors and a million other pieces of the pie that we’re not a part of,” Fox said.
Former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, left, an independent candidate, Democratic mayoral nominee Zohran Mamdani, center, and Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa face off in Tuesday’s NYC mayoral election. (Seth Wenig; Michael Nigro/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images; Edward Berthelot/Getty Images)
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Digital’s Gabriele Regalbuto contributed to this report.
