A shovel, hand weights and a construction hat now displayed in the foyer of New York City Hall are symbols of what Mayor Zohran Mamdani says are the “pothole politics” behind key achievements in his first 100 days in office. That’s where we started our conversation this week during a wide-ranging interview for NPR’s Newsmakers video podcast.

Sitting in the ornate Blue Room of City Hall underneath a portrait of Alexander Hamilton, a founding father who helped shape the nation, 34-year-old Mamdani ticked off all that he’s been able to get done on his list of promises to voters:

“On day eight, we delivered $1.2 billion to make universal child care a reality across our city.”

“We secured more than $30 million in settlements with bad landlords, [and] repaired more than 6069 apartments.”

“We were able to secure nearly $100,000 a day for workers and small businesses that had been exploited by mega-corporations and delivery apps.”

“And we showed that the government can do all of these big transformative things while also doing the little things … filling in 102,000 potholes in that same length of time.”

“I share this with all of you, to give you a sense of where we are on what animated so many,” Mamdani said. “It shows people the very things they were told they would be wrong to believe in are in fact the ones that we can deliver on.”

Just after our interview there was another big win for the energetic young mayor. New York Governor Kathy Hochul announced she’s now backing a plan to tax the multi-million dollar homes of out-of-state residents. It’s money that will go toward paying down the $5.4 billion city budget shortfall.

Mamdani quickly turned to social media to tout the move.

“When I ran for mayor, I said I was going to tax the rich,” he tells the camera in a video post showing him standing in front of a $238 million penthouse.

He leans in, knocks on the lens and says, “Well today, we’re taxing the rich.”

You can watch the Newsmakers interview with Mamdani above. Below are highlights from our conversation.

Mamdani says there’s a lot more to do

Following through on some of his other campaign promises has proven challenging for the mayor. He has promised to disband a police unit accused of heavy handed tactics with protesters, but has not yet done so. It is a key part of Mamdani’s police reform.

I asked where he stands on the issue now.

“I’m committed to disbanding the Strategic Response Group and decoupling our city’s response to protests versus threats of terrorism,” he said. “Part of what you’re seeing in our administration is that we want to deliver this in a manner that isn’t just checking a box, but in a manner that both upholds the sanctity of the First Amendment, the freedom of expression of protest, and also does so in a manner that keeps New Yorkers safe.”

Overcoming Skepticism

There was a lot of doubt from the political establishment when Mamdani, a democratic socialist, swept into office on the promise of affordability.

He shared that message walking the streets of New York City and creating playful videos that talked economics through “halalflation” or poked fun at the focus on his youth with a promise to get older every year. Those are now a signature of his administration. He uses these videos to announce new plans from his administration or to mark major religious holidays important to New Yorkers such as Ramadan and Passover.

In office he’s been a pragmatist and some of his doubters are now key allies on some issues, including Democratic Governor Hochul, who is a partner in his push for universal childcare and now this new tax levied on the most wealthy part-time residents of New York City.

The proposed “pied-a-terre” tax got a sharp reaction from the president who accused the mayor of “destroying” the city in a Thursday post online.

Many Republicans continue to paint the mayor as a radical to be feared. He still faces bigoted attacks on his faith and ethnicity. I asked if he feels pressure to show his brand of democratic socialism works before the midterms this fall, knowing that those attacks are only going to ramp up.

Mamdani said he doesn’t think about how Republicans try to characterize him.

“I think about the fact that the power of an ideology is judged in the worth of its delivery,” he said. “Because for a long time, Republicans have sought to describe themselves as being driven by the needs of working people, when in reality we’ve seen a chasm in what they’ve actually delivered for those people.”

The war in Iran speaks to a “broken kind of politics”

That chasm is most clear in his deep opposition to the U.S. war on Iran, he said.

“We’re talking about a federal administration that has spent close to $30 billion dollars killing thousands of people at a time when working class people across this country cannot afford the bare minimum,” he said. “And to be told that a city-run grocery store is implausible, but spending more than $500 million a day to kill people in Iran and Lebanon is not only plausible but necessary, it speaks to a broken kind of politics.”

He said that New Yorkers feel the effects of that war beyond their pocketbook.

“At the core of any war is a dehumanization that takes place, and that dehumanization is not limited to any battlefield,” he said. “It extends into the lives of people across this country.”

He shared the story of a young Muslim woman he called after seeing the news that she had been thrown to the ground at a New York City subway stop.

“She told me that the first thing her attacker said to her before he attacked her was, ‘I wonder how many Iranians we killed today,’” he said. “That is what we are allowing to take hold in our politics.”

“He’s the President and I’m the Mayor” 

Mamdani captured the nation’s attention all over again when he met President Trump in November after he won the mayor’s office.

The president had referred to him as a “communist lunatic” and Mamdani had called the president a “fascist” and promised to “Trump-proof” New York City.

Yet he appeared to charm the president, even as he smiled and said “yes” when he was asked if he still thinks Trump is a fascist.

“I think that one of the few things that we have in common is that we are both New Yorkers,” Mamdani said. “One part of being a New Yorker is both, to be honest and to be direct. And when I’m sitting with the president, we talk about places of potential collaboration … But we’re also very clear about places of disagreement.”

On his new life at Gracie Mansion

So what’s life like now that he’s moved from a one-bedroom in Queens to a literal mansion?

“You never realize how small your one-bedroom is until you try and move it into the larger bedroom that we have there,” he said.

Mamdani hasn’t had time to really think about all that space he now has, because he spends most of his time at City Hall and around New York City. He tries to keep a semblance of his old life by getting around the city on foot, by bike or train.

“If you spend every single day driving around in a tinted window security detail, you will have a very specific view of the city,” he said. “You actually meet other New Yorkers and you break out of the bubble that so many have come to expect of politics, where politicians only seem to be spending time with other politicians or the people who donated to make them politicians.”