New York City Mayor Zahran Mamdani takes to Twitch to chat with New Yorkers

Long before Zahran Mamdani became New York City’s 112th mayor, he realized that if you wanted to reach young voters, you had to meet them online.

Now, in classic Mamdani fashion, the mayor has taken this strategy even further. On Thursday, Polygon exclusively revealed that Mamdani will launch a recurring live stream series on Twitch called “Talk with the People,” premiering on Thursday, May 21 at 4:10 PM ET, where he will answer viewer questions live through Twitch chat. It will also be simulcast across YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, X and Bluesky.

More than 10,000 people tuned in to the initial broadcast as Mamdani answered viewers’ questions live through Twitch chat, creating a rare direct line between a politician and the online public. A surprise addition to the stream was influencer Moose, who joked with Mamdani and helped him navigate Twitch culture, including teaching him how to address viewers as “chat.”

Whether Twitch is the right platform for serious political conversations is still up for debate, but it created a relaxed atmosphere as Mamdani communicated with viewers about his desire for the Knicks to win and discussed the best tacos in New York City, compliments of Los Tacos No. 1 and Taqueria Ramirez. There have been some serious discussions too, such as raising taxes on the wealthy and his push for free and faster public buses, including plans focused on speeding up routes by six minutes.

Overall, this was a good first introduction to Mamdani’s Twitch career, and it says a lot about the changing relationship between politics and the internet. Younger audiences increasingly consume political information through creators, live streams, podcasts and online personalities rather than traditional media.

Twitch in particular has evolved beyond gaming over the past several years, becoming a surprisingly influential political platform where audiences watch discussions about current events in real time, such as influencers like Hasan Bekir. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez famously embraced the platform in 2020 when she joined the Among Us livestream aimed at encouraging young people to vote.

In a statement to Polygon, Mamdani said: “By launching the nation’s first recurring cross-platform stream hosted by an elected official, where I will answer New Yorkers’ questions live on Twitch, we are opening a direct line of conversation between our government and the people, especially younger generations who have been ignored for too long.”

Yesterday, Mamdani teased the move on Instagram with the caption: “26.21.5.4:10pm. Live.” Scrolling to the next photo gave followers a bigger clue with a photo of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s famous fireside chats, where radio broadcaster Franklin D. Roosevelt used to speak directly to Americans in their homes.

The comparison seems intentional. Just as Roosevelt embraced radio as the defining communications technology of his era, Mamdani seems intent on closing the distance between government and public by showing where people now spend most of their time online.

The new live-streaming series is a trademark of Mamdani, whose political rise has been closely tied to social media from the beginning. Before becoming mayor, he built his reputation in New York politics as a chronically online elected official. As a New York State Assemblyman representing Astoria, Mamdani has become known for his off-the-record videos explaining housing policy, transportation issues, and affordability in plain language. His clips regularly went viral among young voters who might normally look past traditional political messages.

Over time, Mamdani has built one of the strongest social media followings in urban American politics, amassing more than 15 million followers across Instagram, TikTok, and X.