Governor Cuomo — despite campaign missteps and relentless attacks about his record and scandals — is holding onto his lead in the race for New York City mayor.

A Marist poll released Wednesday shows the former Empire State governor winning the Democratic mayoral primary by more than 20 points. In a ranked choice voting simulation, Mr. Cuomo reaches the 50 percent threshold to win in the fifth round of voting, with his closest competitor, Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, at 29 percent. 

The city comptroller, Brad Lander, comes in third place in the fifth round of voting with 18 percent. This poll is in line with all recent polls, which show Mr. Cuomo with a substantial lead and Mr. Mamdani in a distant second. It’s Mr. Cuomo’s race to lose. 

“Is it inevitable? That’s what the poll is trying to tell you,” a Democratic strategist, Hank Sheinkopf, tells The New York Sun. “But hope springs eternal with ranked choice voting.”

The Marist poll, conducted in the first week of May, finds Mr. Cuomo is the first-choice pick of 44 percent of likely Democratic primary voters. Mr. Mamdani earns 22 percent in the first round, followed by the city council speaker, Adrienne Adams, with 11 percent and Mr. Lander with 10 percent. The rest of the field is in the single digits.

Despite some calls for progressives to drop out of the race and back Mr. Mamdani, a Democratic Socialist, to prevent a Mayor Cuomo, none of the candidates is budging. Several of these candidates, though, have embraced a DREAM campaign, which stands for “Don’t Rank Eric or Andrew for Mayor,” meaning leave Mayor Adams and Mr. Cuomo off the ranked choice ballot.

“The poll was in the field before we had spent a cent. The day after the poll was done in the field, we spent over three quarters of a million dollars on ads, so I’m excited to see the next poll that shows the impact of the ads,” a person close to the Lander campaign tells the Sun. “This is a three-person race. That’s what the simulation from this poll shows. The Money race shows that as well.”

Mr. Lander is trying to capture Park Slope liberals but also to appeal to centrists who don’t like Mr. Cuomo. He has promised to keep Jessica Tisch as New York Police Department commissioner and is trying to capture the middle ground between Messrs. Mamdani and Cuomo.

Mr. Sheinkopf says that strategy is failing. “I think they wish Mamdani had a ceiling so they could break into it. Lander is boring,” he says. “This is a redefinition of the left in New York City, and Mamdani is leading that redefinition.”

“This is a boring contest, and that benefits Cuomo,” Mr. Sheinkopf says.

Mr. Mamdani is running to the far left, proposing a rent freeze on stabilized apartments, free buses, and free childcare. He fashions himself a champion of the working class, though the poll shows his base of support is among white, college educated, “very liberal” voters in Manhattan and Brooklyn. He earns only 8 percent of the Black vote and 8 percent of non-college-educated voters.

Mr. Cuomo, by contrast, is garnering support to his super PAC from big-dollar donors and is getting 50 percent support from Blacks and voters without a college degree. This is despite the sexual harassment allegations that led to his resignation from the governorship in 2021, his Covid nursing home scandal and the deaths that caused, and the lawsuits around both.

The city’s campaign finance regulators recently fined the Cuomo campaign more than $600,000 in matching funds for allegedly illegally coordinating with its super PAC. The Cuomo campaign was also accused of using ChatGPT to write its housing plan last month. Both episodes undermine Mr. Cuomo’s pitch as being an effective and competent manager for a city in crisis. 

Mr. Mamdani is capturing the youth vote and releasing videos that go viral on social media. In the poll, he earns 38 percent support of voters under 45 years of age in the first round, trumping Mr. Cuomo by 20 points. If Mr. Lander is trying to attract Park Slope liberals, Mr. Mamdani is redefining a next generation of leftist voters as more Bed Stuy or Greenpoint. The Mamdani campaign did not return the Sun’s request for comment.

Candidates polling at just 1 percent are also holding out hope, saying the nearly 20 percent of undecided voters are only just starting to pay attention. The Democratic primary is on June 24. Early voting starts in one month. 

“We’re going to get matching funds. We’re going to talk to every voter from every borough. We’re going to pick off undecideds, and we’re going to win this thing,” a spokesman for the Michael Blake campaign, Michael Ceraso, tells the Sun.

If Mr. Cuomo wins the Democratic primary, the Working Families Party has not ruled out fielding a candidate in the general election. The party has endorsed Mr. Lander, Mr. Mamdani, Ms. Adams, and a New York state senator, Zellnor Myrie.

Mayor Adams is running for re-election as an independent, though he still calls himself a Democrat. Curtis Sliwa is running on the Republican line. The New York mayor’s race could turn into a four-person contest — unless the Democratic challengers find a way to chip at Mr. Cuomo’s lead.