Meet Zohran Mamdani’s Wife, The Woman Beside New York’s Possible Next Mayor

New York just elected a 34-year-old, DSA-backed housing counselor-turned-lawmaker as its next mayor, and now everyone wants to know about the person standing next to him at City Hall. Spoiler: Rama Duwaji is not the usual political spouse. She is an animator and illustrator with bylines at The New Yorker and Vogue, a very specific visual voice, and zero interest in the performative side of politics. Which, honestly, makes me like her more.

Meet Rama Duwaji: NYC's next first lady, on her own terms

Duwaji married Zohran Mamdani earlier this year. When he’s sworn in on January 1, 2026, he will be New York City’s youngest mayor since 1892, the city’s first Muslim mayor, and its first mayor born in Africa. She will be stepping into the first lady role with a portfolio that has nothing to do with ribbon cuttings and everything to do with art and politics.

She was born in Houston, lived in Texas until her family moved to Dubai when she was 9, and is of Syrian descent. After a stint at Virginia Commonwealth University’s School of the Arts in Qatar, she transferred to VCU’s Richmond campus for a BFA, and later earned a master’s in Illustration as a Visual Essay from New York’s School of Visual Arts. She’s in her late 20s.

Her illustrations have appeared in The Cut, the BBC, Vogue, and The New Yorker. The work centers Arab culture and social justice, especially women’s rights, and comes from a very personal place. She’s been outspoken about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, has made art about the Gaza genocide, and has also created work supporting victims of the Sudanese Civil War.

Here’s the part that might surprise people expecting a traditional political partner: she hasn’t campaigned for Mamdani, hasn’t done joint TV appearances, and hasn’t sat for a glossy magazine profile. What she has done is post a sweet Instagram carousel on the day of the June Democratic primary — the two of them together, her voting early, and a throwback of him as a kid — captioned: "Couldn't possibly be prouder."

Behind the scenes, she helped lock in the campaign’s look, refining the brand identity, iconography, and font. And she doesn’t mute her politics; she lets the art talk. Mamdani seems fully on board with that.

"Rama isn’t just my wife, she’s an incredible artist who deserves to be known on her own terms."

Who is Zohran Mamdani, beyond the headlines?

Mamdani was born October 18, 1991, in Kampala, Uganda. He’s the only child of scholar Mahmood Mamdani and filmmaker Mira Nair — yes, that Mira Nair — which gives him a direct line to both academia and cinema. His middle name, Kwame, came from his father in honor of Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana’s first president.

His family story spans continents. His parents are of Indian descent: his mother is a Punjabi Hindi born in Rourkela and raised in Bhubaneswar; his father is a Gujarati Muslim born in Bombay who was raised mainly in Uganda. His paternal grandparents were born in what is now Tanzania, part of the Indian diaspora in Southeast Africa. His maternal grandmother, Praveen Nair, founded the Salaam Baalak Trust.

He lived in Kampala until age 5, then moved to Cape Town, and landed in New York by age 7, growing up in Morningside Heights. At Bronx Science, he co-founded the school’s first cricket team. At Bowdoin College, he co-founded the campus chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine. Before running for office, he worked as a foreclosure prevention and housing counselor, helping immigrant homeowners in Queens fight evictions.

Personal life footnotes

He holds dual citizenship in Uganda and the United States, becoming a U.S. citizen in 2018. He identifies as a Twelver Shia Muslim. He and Duwaji met on Hinge in 2021, got engaged in October 2024, celebrated with a private nikah ceremony in Dubai that December, and then made it official with a civil ceremony at New York City Hall in February 2025. They live in Astoria, Queens. He speaks Hindi-Urdu, Bengali, Spanish, and some Arabic.

From organizing to City Hall

Mamdani launched his bid for New York’s 36th Assembly District (Astoria/Long Island City) in October 2019, earned DSA’s endorsement, and unseated incumbent Aravella Simotas in the 2020 Democratic primary before running unopposed in the general. He was reelected unopposed in 2022 and 2024, joined the DSA’s nine-member State Socialists in Office bloc, and was active with the Muslim Democratic Club of New York.

In Albany, he served on nine committees — Aging, Cities, Energy, Election Law, and Real Property Taxation among them — plus various task forces and caucuses. By May 2025, he had sponsored 20 bills (three became law) and co-sponsored 238.

He announced his mayoral run on October 23, 2024. After a June primary (yes, that’s the one Duwaji posted about) and a July 1 vote that cemented the upset narrative, he went on to win November 4, 2025. Along the way, President Donald Trump threatened in early November to yank federal funding if Mamdani were elected. New York voted for him anyway.

So what does he actually want to do?

People like to call his platform "radical," but put it on a global chart and it lands squarely center-left, the kind of stuff other democracies have argued about for decades. In New York terms, it is ambitious and very nuts-and-bolts. He also calls himself a democratic socialist and is a DSA member; you’ll also hear him labeled progressive.

• Housing and wages: Debt relief for taxi medallion owners; stronger rent control and tenant rights; a Social Housing Development Agency to build 200,000 affordable homes in 10 years; minimum wage at $30 by 2030.
• Taxes and services: Higher taxes on corporations and the wealthy to fund tuition-free CUNY/SUNY, universal childcare, and free public transit; property tax reform that cuts bills for outer-borough homeowners and raises them on high-value properties in wealthier areas; a city-run grocery pilot to push down food prices.
• Health and civil rights: Support for the New York Health Act (statewide single-payer) and the 2024 equal rights amendment banning discrimination on sex, gender identity, pregnancy, and reproductive autonomy.
• Policing and safety: Argues that economic stability and social investment lower crime better than policing alone; proposes a civilian-led Department of Community Safety focused on mental health outreach and violence prevention. He backed "defunding" the NYPD in 2020, later emphasized partnering with police on violent crime while integrating social workers. In 2025, he apologized for calling the NYPD racist and condemned all political violence, including the assassination of Charlie Kirk.
• Climate and infrastructure: Opposed expanding a gas-fired plant in Astoria; backs the All-Electric Buildings Act and congestion pricing. His Green Schools plan would put solar roofs on 500 schools, build 500 green schoolyards, and turn 50 schools into climate-resilience hubs.
• Education and communities: Supports universal pre-K and "baby baskets" for new families; wants to end property tax exemptions for NYU and Columbia to redirect funds to CUNY; promises to protect Hasidic yeshivas from state interference by engaging community leadership.
• Immigration: Keep New York as a sanctuary city; bar ICE from public buildings without warrants; provide legal representation for all detained immigrants. He has publicly confronted ICE leadership over free speech issues.
• LGBTQ+ rights: Make NYC an LGBTQ+ sanctuary city; create an Office of LGBTQIA+ Affairs; allocate $65 million so public providers can maintain access to gender-affirming care despite federal restrictions.
• Transit and streets: Push for permanently fare-free buses, phased in across four boroughs; support congestion pricing and weight-based vehicle fees to cut emissions and make streets safer.
• Foreign policy positions from a local official: Condemns Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro and Cuba’s Miguel Diaz-Canel as dictators but opposes U.S. sanctions that worsen civilian suffering; has called India’s Narendra Modi a "war criminal" in connection with the 2002 Gujarat riots and compares him to Benjamin Netanyahu; has called Israeli policies apartheid, supports BDS, and introduced a bill to bar New York charities from funding illegal settlements or war crimes. After October 7, 2023, he mourned all victims, called Hamas’s attacks "horrific war crimes," and reiterated that the occupation must end. He says if the ICC issues arrest warrants for figures like Netanyahu or Vladimir Putin and they enter New York, the city should cooperate.

The unexpectedly musical chapter

Before he was passing bills, Mamdani was producing rap. In his 20s he worked under the monikers Young Cardamom and later Mr. Cardamom. In 2016 he teamed with Ugandan rapper HAB for the EP "Sidda Mukyaalo" (Luganda for "No going back to the village"). Their first track together, "Kanda [Chap Chap]," is a love letter to chapati, the Indian flatbread that’s now a Ugandan staple. They rapped in both English and Luganda and worked with producer Hannz Tactiq, who handled the beats and the late-night studio grind.

He has talked about using language and lyrics to push back on the boxes people tried to put them in — whether that’s being reduced to "Nubi" for having some South Sudanese roots or being told Indian Ugandans are just Indians in Uganda.

In 2019, as Mr. Cardamom, he released the single "Nani," a tribute to his maternal grandmother, calling her a source of joy, wisdom, and love. On the film side, he curated and produced the soundtrack for Mira Nair’s Queen of Katwe in 2016, earned a 2017 Guild of Music Supervisors Awards nomination, worked as third assistant director, and even popped up on screen as a "Bookie Student." Not bad for a side hustle.

Where this goes next

Big promises, big city, limited patience — that’s New York. Mamdani’s pitch blends old-school New Deal energy with very present-tense cost-of-living math. Now he gets to try it from the mayor’s office. He succeeds Eric Adams on January 1, 2026.