Democrats resurged across the country on Tuesday, and New York was no exception. Voters didn’t just elect a socialist mayor in New York City. They also voted in progressive candidates in several of the state’s largest cities, flipped county legislatures blue, and chose a new Democratic assemblymember in US Representative Elise Stefanik’s backyard.

Jasmine Gripper, co-chair of the New York Working Families Party, said Tuesday’s results were the strongest for the left-leaning party since 2018, when it helped end Republican control of the state Senate, ushering in a wave of progressive legislation. Now, victories by WFP-backed mayoral candidates in four of the state’s six biggest cities and in two county legislatures could have a similar effect at the local level, Gripper argued.

“We’re in another movement moment where we have unlocked a key of executive power across the state, as well as in these county legislature and local races, that will help us unleash some victories to really help working people — not just in New York City but across the state,” Gripper said.

Republicans seized on Zohran Mamdani’s victory to paint their rivals as dangerous radicals, with state party chair Ed Cox calling Mamdani “the face of the Democratic Party” in a statement Tuesday, and Stefanik, next year’s likely gop challenger to Governor Kathy Hochul, labeling him “Hochul’s communist” in one of many social media posts about the results.

The state gop did not respond to requests for comment about Tuesday’s wider results.

Here’s a look at how some of New York’s most important local races played out.

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Buffalo — Sean Ryan

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Sean Ryan, a progressive state senator and Democrat, was elected mayor of Buffalo, becoming the city’s first newly elected top leader in 20 years. In his victory speech Tuesday night, Ryan described conversations on the campaign trail with people who shared “their most cherished memories of a better Buffalo.”

“But I also heard about a city government that has been failing at the basics for too long,” he said, according to Spectrum News. “Filling the potholes, plowing the streets, fixing the community centers, opening the pools — all these little things, they add up to a lack of trust in city government. Every person I talked to agreed that Buffalo deserves better.”

The city’s longtime mayor, Byron Brown, left office for a new job in 2024. Then-president of the Buffalo Common Council, Chris Scanlon, took over as acting mayor without an election; Ryan, who was endorsed by the wfp and the Erie County Democratic Committee defeated Scanlon in the Democratic primary in June. On Tuesday, Ryan beat Republican James Gardner, a lawyer who ran unsuccessfully for Erie County district attorney last year.

Ryan served in the New York State Assembly for a decade before being elected state senator in 2020. His mayoral campaign emphasized fixing the city’s fiscal crisis — it faces a significant budget deficit — and argued that his longstanding relationships in Albany would benefit the city. He also pledged to be “the most pro-labor Mayor in Buffalo’s history.”

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Syracuse — Sharon Owens

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Sharon Owens, a Democrat backed by the Working Families Party, was elected mayor of Syracuse with about 74% of the vote. She will become the city’s first Black mayor and the second woman to serve in the position.

Owens served as deputy mayor under outgoing Mayor Ben Walsh, an independent. Before that, she worked as deputy commissioner of neighborhood development under an earlier mayor and at local housing nonprofits. She beat Republican Tom Babilon, a lawyer at a nonprofit legal services organization and former city attorney.

“To the elders of this community, you who for decades looked to the future of a time when there would be a mayor that looks like you, that comes from your experience, that understands the struggle, that gets the hopes and the aspiration of generations of Syracusans … I’m going to work hard to make you proud,” she told supporters at her election night party, Syracuse.com reported.

During the campaign, Owens told the outlet that her housing experience equipped her to oversee new development in Syracuse and that she would use her relationships with state leaders, including Hochul, to bring in new funding for affordable housing. She added that she wanted to promote options like modular and manufactured housing “and encourage that they are created right here in Syracuse.”

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Albany — Dorcey Applyrs

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Voters in New York’s capital elected Democrat Dorcey Applyrs as mayor with a 70% margin of victory. Applyrs, who has served as Albany’s chief auditor since 2020 and was previously a member of the Common Council, will become the city’s first Black mayor. Applyrs won the endorsement of outgoing Democratic Mayor Kathy Sheehan, who is stepping away from the post after 12 years.

Applyrs, who also had the endorsement of the Working Families Party, defeated Republican business owner Rocco Pezzulo.

Her priorities will include expanding the city’s affordable housing stock through public and private investment, and promoting economic development and public safety to create a more “livable city,” her campaign manager Denise Murphy McGraw said in an interview.

“It’s not easy in a city that is as old as it is,” McGraw said. “The infrastructure and the neighborhoods and things like that need revitalization. But she’s excited about that and she’s up to the task.”

On Wednesday, the Albany Times Union reported, Applyrs announced a transition team of two committees. One will focus on recruiting people to join the new administration, and the other will develop a citywide survey to inform an action plan for Applyrs’s mayoralty.

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Rochester — Malik Evans

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Incumbent Rochester Mayor Malik Evans cruised to reelection Tuesday, securing some 87% of the vote against Conservative Party challenger Louis Sabo, a small business owner. Evans had faced a slightly closer race in the Democratic primary, but handily defeated progressive City Councilmember Mary Lupien and businessman Shashi Sinha at the time.

Evans said in his victory speech that it is a “tough time to be an elected official,” pointing to the Trump administration.

“Probably for the first time in history,” he said, the federal government is “sticking their nose in our business. They’re trying to bring the negativity that they have in Washington, particularly the president, to our localities. And what did Monroe County say? … What did Rochester say?”

“No,” the crowd replied.

Evans pledged to continue fighting gun violence, building affordable housing, and promoting economic development in his second term. He was a city councilmember before unseating scandal-plagued former Mayor Lovely Warren in 2021, with wfp backing. He did not win the party’s support this year, and ran solely on the Democratic line.

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State Assembly — Michael Cashman

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Democrats held onto their seat in Tuesday’s sole state legislative race, as Michael Cashman won a close special election to fill the North Country Assembly seat vacated by Billy Jones. (Jones stepped down in late July to take a position at a Plattsburgh community college.) Cashman, currently Plattsburgh town supervisor, claimed just over 51% of votes to eke out a win over Republican Brent Davison, a former state police and corrections officer.

Close Trump ally Stefanik had vowed over the summer that the seat would flip red, but she did not campaign for Davison after the county gop picked him over her preferred candidate, calling party leader Jerika Manning incompetent and selfish. (Manning lost her own close race for Clinton County clerk on Tuesday, to WFP-endorsed Democrat Brandi Lloyd.) Cashman will need to win election again next year to stay in office. Davison told local outlet nbc5 that he hasn’t made up his mind yet about a rematch.

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County legislatures flip blue

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Perhaps the most striking upsets outside New York City on Tuesday came at the little-watched county level, where Democrats flipped two legislatures long held by Republicans and picked up seats in other red-leaning areas. The Onondaga County Legislature will have a narrow Democratic majority for the first time in decades, Spectrum reported, while the Dutchess County legislature went blue for the first time since 2008. Some of the candidates in the two counties had wfp backing.

Gripper said the party had hoped to pick up a few seats on Tuesday and break the Republican majorities in the Onondaga and Duchess legislatures within the next couple of years. Instead, both legislatures flipped.

“You swing, you say, ‘I’ll land some of the punches,'” she said. “We swung and we landed all of the punches. That momentum is just on our side.”

Democrats also picked up county legislative seats on Long Island and outside of Rochester.

Gripper said control of the county legislatures is particularly important because of their large budgets, which give them significant leverage over city-level policies.

“Sometimes we have done a really good job of having majorities of city councils and mayors in our cities, but those cities are often strapped for resources that the counties control and have,” she said. “When we have Democratic cities in really red counties, what sometimes happens is our cities get shortchanged on the county level.”

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This story originally appeared in New York Focus, a non-profit news publication investigating how power works in New York state. Sign up for their newsletter at https://tinyurl.com/368trn9p.