Branham: I can see the dawn of a better day for humanity

I lived in New York City for eight years. I will always hold a special place in my heart for the place that dreams are made of. Today, I am cheering like wild as if I still lived there because Zohran Mamdani just won theremarkable victory in the New York City Mayoral election. Not only is he the first Muslim and South Asian Mayor-Elect of the largest city in the United States, but he won on a relentless campaign of affordability. In an indefatigable campaign of nightshifts, Mosque visits, bar and night club appearances, and viral videos, his message has been loud and clear: Everyone should be able to afford the city they live in.  

Wait, a city where working people can’t afford to live? Sound familiar? 

“We will fight for you because we are you,” Mamdani said in his victory speech. 

These words give me chills. Not just for, in his words, the Yemeni bodega owners and Mexican abuelas, the Senegalese taxi drivers, and Uzbek nurses. The Trinidadian line cooks and Ethiopian aunties. But for all of us.  

The lift operators and line cooks, the housekeepers and landscapers, the construction workers and healthcare aides — the people who keep this valley running but can barely afford to stay. Those who have been told that power does not belong to them.  

This election proves that tired story has run its course.  

I watched as euphoric joy rippled through the city Tuesday night on the news. My phone was flooded with posts from friends. New York City needed this. We all really needed this. I felt it in my own heart far away from the teeming city. Could the rest of the country allow ourselves to hope too? Might we dare? To insist that we step away from the old world, filled with avarice, hatred, division and greed, into a new one that can tackle, head-on, the affordability crisis that has swept the nation?  

For example, Mamdani’s vision for universal childcare in NYC will unlock thousands of hours of earning capacity for caregivers, ensure child safety and development, and encourage long-term thriving outcomes. His plan for greener schools, tackling environmental racism, and increasing fare-free buses, will make New York City healthier and more climate resilient. When he says “climate and quality of life are not two separate concerns — they are one and the same,” he’s articulating what so many of us in Pitkin County are fighting for: You can’t have climate justice without economic justice, and you can’t build a livable future by leaving working people behind. 

To think that such obvious, smart, and fiscally responsible policies could be met with so much fury by the opposition. To think that the other side threw millions at this campaign to stop it and failed. To think that the peoplemight just have the power to choose a better future for us all. 

This win is a turning point. I sure hope so. 

Mamdani’s win isn’t about perfection. It’s about proving that when you run on making life affordable for working people — and mean it — voters respond. For a Muslim candidate in the most influential city in the United States to win despite a relentless smear campaign is proof that hatred is not as powerful as collective care. That competence and compassion are simply a more compelling platform than corruption and oligarchy. 

This matters everywhere, including right here in Pitkin County. He ended his victory speech to a crowd that erupted in applause: “New York, this power, it’s yours.” 

He’s right. And not just for New York. That power belongs to every community tired of fighting so hard to survive. If New York City refuses to abandon its working people, to use power to fight for everyone, what’s stopping us? 

I am reminded that transformative change is possible when we stop accepting artificial limits on our imagination. As a young filmmaker living in New York, I remember how the city’s diversity, grit, and audacity ignited a sense of possibility in me. It did it then and this win does it now. 

The day before the election, Mamdani walked across the Brooklyn Bridge with thousands of New Yorkers. Every age, every race, every walk of life. What stood out to me was that everyone was smiling. Joy beamed from their faces because the vision was a collective one. Where every human is included in it. As Eugene Debs once said: “I can see the dawn of a better day for humanity.” 

New York just proved this day is dawning. Now it’s our turn. 

Dr. Lindsay Branham is an environmental psychologist, scholar, author, and Emmy-nominated filmmaker whose work explores embodied kinship between humans and the Earth. Subscribe to her Substackat lindsaybranham.substack.com.