DRUM Beats Plays Key Role in Increasing Voter Turnout in South Asian and Indo-Caribbean Neighborhoods in NYC
Our Bureau
New York, NY
On November 4th, New Yorkers once again made history by delivering Zohran Mamdani over the finish line to secure his position as the mayor of New York City. Mamdani won with a broad, multiracial and working-class coalition in which Indo-Caribbean, South Asian, and Muslim voters played a crucial role.
In September of 2024, DRUM Beats leaders from the Bangladeshi, Indian, Guyanese, Pakistani, Punjabi, Nepali, Tibetan, and Trinidadian communities of NYC undertook a multiday endorsement process which culminated in the unanimous decision to endorse Zohran Mamdani. DRUM Beats was a Day One endorser of the Mamdani campaign alongside CAAAV Voice, New York Communities for Change, the Democratic Socialists of America, and Jewish Voice for Peace Action.
The 2025 general election in NYC saw historic levels of voter turnout and engagement. With over 2 million votes recorded by November 4, the amount of voters who turned out in 2025 compared to 2021 nearly doubled. In South Asian and Indo-Caribbean communities, the percentage of voters who showed up to the polls was higher than the general population of registered voters. South Asians and Indo-Caribbeans in NYC saw a 350% increase in voters turning out for the 2025 election. Bangladeshis quadrupled voter turnout in this past election in which nearly half of every registered Bangladeshi voter cast their ballots last week. While only making up around 7% of total registered voters in NYC, South Asians and Muslims constituted 15% of votes in the general election.
“Having endorsed Zohran from last year, we reached hundreds of thousands of South Asian and Indo-Caribbean New Yorkers who turned out in historic and record numbers for this election,” says Jagpreet Singh, DRUM Beats Poltical Director. “This campaign resonated with working-class and immigrant voters who have never been spoken to by the political establishment.”
Since the launch of Zohran’s campaign, DRUM Beats volunteers knocked over 18,000 doors, made over 66,000 calls, and reached approximately 700,000 New Yorkers in and around Parkchester, Westchester Square, Kensington, Borough Park, Midwood, Jackson Heights,
Woodside, Elmhurst, East Elmhurst, Sunnyside, Queens Village, Bellrose, Jamaica, City Line, Ozone Park, South Ozone Park and Richmond Hill. DRUM Beats worked with the campaign on earned and paid ethnic media in Punjabi, Urdu, Bangla, Nepali, Hindi, and Creolese to reach over 1.4 million people.
These are historic levels of voter turnout and engagement for communities which for over two decades have been largely excluded from the political processes of New York City. In the wake of 9/11, Muslim, Arab and South Asian New Yorkers were driven to the shadows and viewed as communities which were not important to politicians seeking to win elections. The election of Zohran Mamdani as the mayor-elect of NYC flips that narrative entirely. Mamadani’s campaign was intentional about reaching a widely ignored sector of the electorate. The campaign relied on DRUM Beats’ decades of organizing in South Asian and Indo-Caribbean communities in NYC to reach these voters with a message of affordability and hope in their homes, at their workplaces, on the street, at their places of worship, and in the ethnic media.
About DRUM Beats NYC
DRUM Beats is a sibling organization of DRUM – Desis Rising Up & Moving, and builds on its legacy of organizing working-class Indo-Caribbean and South Asian communities to build movements, and our capacities to transform political systems so that they serve our collective needs.
