Will the attacks on Zohran Mamdani awaken a “sleeping giant”?

Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic front-runner in the New York City mayoral race, speaks outside a mosque and cultural center on October 24, 2025, in the Bronx borough of New York City. | Spencer Platt/Getty Images As the New York City mayoral election enters the final stretch, with the Muslim American Democratic Party nominee Zohran Mamdani maintaining a sizable lead in all of the polls, a familiar beast has reared its head: blatant Islamophobia. Most of those dabbling in outright bigotry are unsurprising: right-wing shock-jocks and the pro-Trump New York Post. But what has made many of