New York City’s 2025 mayoral race was, honestly, one of the weirdest fever dreams in local political history. You’ve got the incumbent mayor, Eric Adams, effectively dropping out late in the game while staying on the ballot. You’ve got Andrew Cuomo—the guy who literally resigned in disgrace just a few years back—making a massive independent run. And then, standing in the middle of this chaotic three-way street, was the Republican running for NYC mayor, Curtis Sliwa.
Sliwa is a character. There is no other way to put it. If you’ve spent any time in the city, you know the red beret. You know the Guardian Angels. You know the guy who once lived in a tiny Upper West Side apartment with sixteen rescue cats.
But behind the stunts and the "law and order" rhetoric, the 2025 election revealed a massive, uncomfortable truth about the GOP in the five boroughs. Basically, they’re in a bit of a crisis. While the national Republican party was celebrating a massive victory in 2024, the NYC branch was watching their nominee struggle to break out of single digits in the general election.
The Man in the Red Beret: Who Was the GOP Nominee?
Curtis Sliwa wasn't just a candidate; he was the only candidate. He ran uncontested in the Republican primary. Think about that for a second. In a city of over eight million people, with thousands of registered Republicans, nobody else even bothered to step into the ring.
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Sliwa’s platform was exactly what you’d expect if you’ve followed his career since the 1970s. It was heavy on public safety, aggressively pro-police, and deeply skeptical of the city’s migrant spending. He also had a weirdly specific (but passionate) focus on animal rights, running on the "Protect Animals Party" line as well.
He pitched himself as a mix of Rudy Giuliani’s 1990s toughness and Michael Bloomberg’s efficiency. Giuliani even endorsed him. But the city in 2025 isn't the city of 1993.
Why the "Law and Order" Message Didn't Stick
The problem for the Republican running for NYC mayor wasn't that people didn't care about crime. They did. The problem was that the lane was already crowded.
Andrew Cuomo, running as an independent under the "Fight and Deliver" banner, was eating Sliwa's lunch. Cuomo was hammering the same "tough on crime" and "restore the city" themes but with the weight of a former governor.
Then you had Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic socialist who eventually won. Mamdani was the polar opposite. He was talking about rent control, free buses, and taxing the rich. He mobilized a youth vote that Sliwa—and even Cuomo—didn't see coming.
The Catsimatidis Call: A Civil War on the Right
The most dramatic moment for the Republican side happened just two weeks before the election. John Catsimatidis—the billionaire who owns WABC Radio and Gristedes supermarkets—publicly told his own star host to quit.
Catsimatidis is a GOP kingmaker in New York. He literally pays Sliwa's salary at the radio station. But he saw the writing on the wall. He saw that Sliwa was polling around 7%, while Mamdani and Cuomo were neck-and-neck.
"Curtis should pull out right now," Catsimatidis said on his own airwaves. "We cannot take a chance on Zohran winning."
It was a cold-blooded calculation. Catsimatidis basically said that if you’re a Republican who actually wants to win, you have to vote for the Independent Democrat (Cuomo) to stop the Democratic Socialist (Mamdani).
Sliwa, being Sliwa, didn't budge. He called Cuomo "Zohran lite" and stayed in. He ended up with about 7% of the vote. If those voters had gone to Cuomo, the race would have been a statistical tie. Instead, Mamdani walked into City Hall as the first Muslim and first South Asian mayor in the city’s history.
Why Other Republicans Sat This One Out
You might be wondering where the "serious" Republicans were. People like Joe Borelli or Nicole Malliotakis.
Honestly, they’re playing a different game.
- Joe Borelli: The former City Council Minority Leader resigned his seat in early 2025. He didn't run for mayor; he went into the private sector at a consulting firm. He knew the math in NYC is brutal for a Republican right now.
- Nicole Malliotakis: She’s the only Republican in Congress from NYC. She’s focused on 2026. She knows that winning a House seat on Staten Island is a lot easier than winning a city-wide race where Democrats outnumber Republicans 7-to-1.
- Eric Ulrich: Once a rising star, he was tied up in a massive felony corruption case. Not exactly "mayor material" in the eyes of the GOP establishment at the moment.
The Future of the NYC GOP
So, what’s next? If you’re a Republican and you want to be mayor of New York, you’ve basically got two paths.
The first path is the "Bloomberg Path." You have to be a billionaire who can spend $100 million of your own money to build a brand that is Republican in name but moderate in practice.
The second path is the "Giuliani Path," but updated for 2026. You need a city that feels like it’s in total collapse. While Sliwa tried to argue that the city was collapsing, the high turnout and the victory of a progressive like Mamdani suggests that a majority of New Yorkers aren't buying that narrative yet.
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Actionable Insights for the Next Cycle
If you’re following the 2029 race (which, let's be real, starts now), keep an eye on these things:
- Ranked Choice Voting is Key: Republicans need to learn how to be someone's second choice. Sliwa's "my way or the highway" approach doesn't work in a system that rewards consensus.
- The "Independent" Line: Watch for more Republicans to run on third-party lines like the Conservative or Common Sense lines to distance themselves from national GOP labels that don't play well in Manhattan or Queens.
- The Outer Borough Strategy: The GOP has to win big—like 70% big—in Staten Island and parts of Southern Brooklyn just to stay competitive. If they can't flip moderate Democrats in the Bronx or Queens, they're toast.
The era of the "red beret" Republican might be over. The city is younger, more diverse, and more progressive than it was during the Giuliani years. The next Republican running for NYC mayor is going to need a lot more than a signature hat and a safety patrol to win over the five boroughs.
Stay tuned to the Board of Elections filings for the 2029 cycle. The registration deadlines for new parties and candidates will be the first sign of whether the GOP has learned its lesson or if we’re in for another Sliwa-style encore.