Over the past several months, there has been palpable fear among many New Yorkers about the likely prospect of frontrunning mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, an openly declared democratic socialist, becoming the Big Apple's next elected leader.

Some of that fear has recently shifted to Mamdani's camp, however, as a recent poll suggests that his main competitor, former Democratic New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, has closed the once-wide gap between them, according to the New York Post.

In fact, while Cuomo now trails Mamdani by just single digits, the poll results indicated that Cuomo could actually surge to the lead if the Republican candidate were no longer in the race.

Mamdani's shrinking lead over Cuomo

Polling outfit AtlasIntel recently surveyed nearly 1,600 NYC residents about the mayoral race that will be decided on Tuesday and found that Democratic nominee Mamdani still led the trio of candidates for the mayor's mansion with 40.6% support from voters.

Yet, whereas Mamdani previously enjoyed large, double-digit leads over his competitors, independent candidate Cuomo has cut sharply into that gap with a surge of support that pushed him up to 34%, less than seven points behind the frontrunner.

Notably, Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa also benefited from a boost in support that bumped him up to 24.1%, which is believed to be the highest mark he has reached in any poll since the summer.

That said, AtlasIntel revealed that if Sliwa were no longer in the running, the vast majority of his voters would transfer their support to Cuomo, sliding him comfortably ahead of Mamdani, 50.2%-42%.

Cuomo confident of building momentum

"The gap is closing fast -- we can feel it on the ground everywhere from the Bronx to Staten Island. At this rate, we win the race. Keep going strong," Cuomo said of the new poll results on Saturday, according to the Post, and later added, "Six points in this election is nothing."

The former governor went on to slam his socialist competitor for all of his radical promises of "free" things for the people, and suggested that voters had begun to wise up to the empty vows, as he explained, "What has happened since is people have [found] out what he’s about, and there is no free food, and there are no free buses, and he can’t raise corporate taxes statewide and dedicate it to New York [City]. That can’t happen."

The CEO of AtlasIntel, Andrei Roman, told the Post that Cuomo's record as governor limited his appeal to voters, but acknowledged that many still viewed him as the better option compared to the far-left Mamdani and his radical policy proposals.

"From not being inspirational to being really hated and terrifying people -- that’s a major difference. That’s what’s happening with Mamdani," Roman said. "I think Cuomo’s chance in this election is to mobilize an anti-Mamdani vote within mostly the moderate Democratic base that voted for him in the primary, but also with independents and Republicans, and also mobilize a strategic vote by some of Sliwa’s voters."

Mamdani's lead remains large in most other polls

To be sure, while the AtlasIntel poll offered some surprisingly good news for Cuomo's uphill battle against Mamdani, the results are admittedly an outlier in comparison to nearly all of the other polls of the 2025 New York City mayoral race.

Indeed, according to RealClearPolling's average of polls for that race, Mamdani garners around 45.8% support compared to Cuomo at 31.1%, giving the socialist candidate a 14.7-point lead.

That said, a graph charting the race since July does show that Cuomo has gained ground in recent weeks while Mamdani has flatlined and even fallen a little bit, though it is unclear if the former governor can close that remaining gap in the few days left before the election is held on Tuesday.