City Encounters (Politics Version)

New York City is home to around 8.5 million people, and at around any given time, at least one of the swarm of busy New Yorkers around you is likely to be a tad bit famous. If you live in the city and get around enough, you most likely have a collection of stories kept in your back pocket to regale your friends with. Of course, I’m primarily interested in the more political of those well-known figures: not the A-listers who’ve made an endorsement here and there, but the ones who’ve actually ventured into the political world themselves.

Take case one: I was sitting on the bus, waiting to go on my interschool trip (a jumbled bunch of various high schools scattered around New York), already tired and somehow, bored. Leaning on the window, I saw a group of well-dressed individuals heading our way—suits are not a rare sight in the city, but probably concentrated somewhere around wall street rather than the Upper East Side. I heard a bit of a commotion before it clicked, and suddenly the thirty-something number of teenage girls in the bus (myself among them) were waving at Zohran Mamdani, newly minted mayor of NYC.

Plenty of people have reported seeing the mayor walking, biking, and smiling his way through the streets and subways of New York before. We weren’t far from Gracie Mansion, the mayor’s residence, so the sighting wasn’t inconceivable, but still a first time. He waved back at us before very professionally continuing his walk, to the welcome surprise of many around me. Perhaps it’s a nod to his social media presence and the buzz surrounding the mayoral election in general—despite our inability to vote, New York’s youth are gradually turning into politics.

See case two: Heading home from k-town, I was sitting on a bench while waiting for the subway to arrive, praying my phone wouldn’t die of low battery. Glancing up, I noticed a familiar Emily in Paris-esque beret, and upon closer observation, my suspicions were correct. did curtis sliwa just pass me, I texted my friends. Two minutes later, a friend replied, i see him on the subway all the time. Another day in New York.

Now, if I somehow manage to meet Andrew Cuomo, former governor, I will have completed the trifecta of mayoral candidates (2025 edition).

There are plenty more stories I’ve been able to hear in snippets and quick conversations, encounters I wasn’t there to experience but learned about afterwards.

An upperclassman told us about Jack Schlossberg, NY-12 candidate and Kennedy scion (as he is often referred to as) attending a senior prom night to recruit young voters. I have seen my school taken over by the secret service in preparation for a former president’s visit several times, to the point where it is no longer an anomaly but nearly routine—one such visit was right after I had studied his administration the night before. His counterpart, the former first lady and presidential candidate, has been mentioned in my history class several times. My downstairs neighbor is a state assemblyman running for congress.

The list could go on, although I will say I’ve covered most of them. Any other experiences I have, whether it’s during a school assembly or roaming the streets, I will keep safely in my back pocket, to entertain my friends with, or to write about in another future blog post.