NYC mayoral candidate Jim Walden drops out and implores rivals to consolidate against Zohran Mamdani

Jim Walden, an independent candidate in New York City’s mayoral race, announced Tuesday that he was suspending his campaign, while urging his fellow candidates to unite against the Democratic primary winner, Zohran Mamdani.

“For those still trailing in the polls by month’s end, I implore each to consider how history will judge them if they allow vanity or stubborn ambition to usher in Mr. Mamdani,” Walden wrote in a statement announcing his exit.

He warned that Mamdani, a Democratic Socialist, would represent a “Trojan Horse taking over City Hall,” adding that time was “slipping away” for an alternative option to gain momentum in the crowded field.

Walden, an attorney who has represented Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and mixed martial arts fighter Conor McGregor, had positioned himself as a free-market technocrat in the mold of former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

But he struggled to register among voters already contending with several familiar names: current